Brew kettle size

[dreaded_rust]

Im looking at getting a new brew kettle.
Im looking at a 7.5 gl kettle right now.
My question is right now all i do is extract brewing, will this pot still be usefull to me in the future when i start full grain.?
Should i go with the ten gallon or will that be too big for 5 gallon extract batches?

 

[lightjt]

When you go all grain, and full boil batches using a flame thrower turkey fryer setup and that beast starts to boil you will be loving the extra room!
just a comment from a peanut, but I have been in the but business a couple of year!
cheers!

 

[barnaclebob]

For all grain 5 gallon batches, I wouldn't go anything less than 10 gallons. People will tell you they are fine with 8 if you watch the start of your boil carefully blah blah blah. Life is too short for that.

For 5gal BIAB, which I recommend, you'll probably want at least 12.

10 gal won't be too big for 5 gal extract batches.

 

[Brewskey]

Go with the 10Gallon it will be perfect for 5 gal batches. Your other pot will be useful for heating mash and sparge water.

 

[m00ps]

Youll need at leasst 8 gallons for a 5 gallon batch if you want to not have to top off your fermentors with water. I got a 9gallon 2-weld pot from adventuresinhomebrewing and id highly reccomend it. It made it through over 100 batches before I upgraded

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Depends. If your doing Partial boils and and adding water back at the end because of lack of heating power to boil a full volume the 7.5 is fine...because your really only boiling 5 gallons down to like 3.5 gallons and then adding back in the remainder in cold water to get up to 5 in the fermenter.

If your stove or burner is capable of boiling 7 gallons of wort, go for the 10 gallon pot. With 7 gallons in it, it will be pretty full already theres no way a 7.5 gallon pot would work, you'd literally have the wort at the upper edge of the pot and as soon as it started boiling you would have wort everywhere, even if you controlled the heat i dont think you could prevent such an overfilled pot from spilling.

 

[dyqik]

I've just upgraded my 8 gal to 10 gal for full volume boils with 5.5 gal into fermentor (all grain).

The 8 gal will become my HLT for 5 gal batches, as I can refill it/top it off and heat sparge water during the mash if needed.

The new 10 gal (Bayou Classic 1040) kettle is the same diameter as my 8 gal (Homebrewstuff) kettle, so both would be equally suitable for a partial volume extract batch. 2.5 gal covers the valve in both, but not quite the thermometer in the Homebrewstuff kettle.

 

[firerat]

I started with a 7 gallon pot.

Unless you really enjoy constantly turning down heat or spraying your boil over in hopes to not make a giant mess, get a 10 gallon. Or bigger.

 

[NeoBrew]

I do all grain BIAB with a 10 gallon Megapot. I would not go any smaller than that. It is big enough for full volume 6.5 gallon BIAB of most beers below 1.060. I use a dunk sparge technique which allows me to go to 1.070 batches and above.

If you are going to go 3 vessel brewing when you go all grain, you might be ok with 7.5 gallon. But I doubt you would regret having the extra headspace a 10 gallon pot will give you.

 

[oujens]

I purchased a 9 gallon pot from Academy a couple years ago for my all-grain 5 gallon batches. I really wished I had an extra gallon of room for comfort. Go 10 gallon for sure if you are considering all-grain. I have my eye on a 15 gallon Bayou Classic pot with a spigot on Amazon since its only $10 more than the 10 gallon and would give me the option of increasing batch size. I think a pot with a spigot would be nice so I didn't have to siphon wort from the kettle. Its hard to lift and transfer a pot with 6 gallons of wort and barely any room at the top. And the gallon markings would be a huge help!

 

[SpikeBrewing]

If you think you'll go all grain at any point then we wouldn't recommend anything smaller than a 10gal. We've had quite a few customers say they bought a 8gal thinking they can get away with it and they just end up having to watch it like a hawk.

A lot of people will recommend a 15gal. That's only necessary if you plan on bumping up to 10 gallon batches down the road.

-Spike Brewing

 

[EtchyLives]

For the cost difference ($30 or 40 more for the bigger pot) and potential to upgrade (I have been known to upgrade a hobby or two in my life) I bought a 15g pot. I use it to do all the water for my mash tun heating/mash/sparge AND use it for my boil. Since the first big water requirement has me using 13g+ (10g for mash and sparge, another 3 for heating the mash tun) I REALLY like my 15g pot. Plus, even with all the extra space I can manage to almost get a boilover when running my burner at WOT.

 

[lightjt]

If you think you'll go all grain at any point then we wouldn't recommend anything smaller than a 10gal. We've had quite a few customers say they bought a 8gal thinking they can get away with it and they just end up having to watch it like a hawk.

A lot of people will recommend a 15gal. That's only necessary if you plan on bumping up to 10 gallon batches down the road.

-Spike Brewing

I just started doing 10 gallon batches in my 15 gallon kettle, when my starting wort volume is 13.4 I get pretty nervous and ready to move to a 20 so I can let loose a heavy boil and not have to babysit the kettle for an hour!

 

[eadavis80]

About a year ago I bought the 8-gallon Tall Boy thinking it would be the last kettle I'd ever need. Now, I wish I had bought the 10-gallon one. I can do 5 gallons of all-grain BIAB in there, but I need to sparge using my old 5-gallon pot. Looking back on it, I don't think saving the $30 between the 8 and 10 gallon was worth it. I wish I had the 10-gallon one now, but I doubt I'll upgrade now. I'm fine BIABing with my current setup, but kind of wish I had the bigger kettle.

 

[Nagorg]

+1 to all the comments. I'd do nothing less than 10G for 5G all grain batches. I actually started all grain with the 11G kettle from Bayou Classic and loved the extra room for comfort before hot break.

My kettle evolution:
1) 5G kettle for doing 5G extract batches.
2) 11G kettle for 5G all-grain batches.
3) 20G kettle for 10G all-grain batches
4) 30G kettle for 15G all-grain batches. (I cant currently ferment more than 15G at a time. )

Each time I was sure that I had bought a big enough kettle. I may have now with my 30G but the saga continues....

 

[dreaded_rust]

awesome, thanks for all the help guys.
is there any bennifits to triclamp fittings over threaded?

 

[sablesurfer]

So you had two questions...extract and all grain.

I have a 9gal pot for all grain BIAB and my boils get really really close to top. You will have to monitor it and be careful with that first hop addition..WHOOOO.

Your extract should be fine in that if you are still doing 5 gallon beers with something like a 6gal preboil, or whatnot. I brew my extracts in the 3.5gal range so I use the GF's 6gal pot for those.

 

[Patrick87]

I'm doing full-boil extract and just went from my 7.5 gallon pot to a 10 gallon pot. I can now squeeze out slightly larger batches and not have to worry about boil overs.

 

[SpikeBrewing]

awesome, thanks for all the help guys.
is there any bennifits to triclamp fittings over threaded?

Short answer: On the 'hot' side of brewing? No.

 

[dmcman73]

awesome, thanks for all the help guys.
is there any bennifits to triclamp fittings over threaded?

The ONLY thing you benefit from triclamps on the hot side is being able to remove all valves from the kettle for easier cleaning of the kettles, not having valves in the way to put the kettle on it's side or into the sink is nice.

I have all threaded fittings on my new 20 gallon kettles from Spike because that's all I had was threaded from my old rig, I wasn't going to reinvest in all triclamps after I spent all the money on the kettles.