false bottom advice needed

[alemonkey]

I'm upgrading my setup to 10 gallons (eventually to include HERMS) and I'm ready to put my MLT together. I'm trying to decide what thickness of expanded metal to use for a false bottom (70 quart Coleman Xtreme cooler), and hole size/spacing.

BTW, I think I'm going to go with aluminum for my false bottom. **covers ears to ignore screams of the anti-aluminum crowd** It's about 1/3 the price of stainless, which in this case works out to about $20 vs $65-70.

I was wondering if 1/16 thick would be sufficient? I'm also not sure what hole size and spacing to use. I'm looking at http://www.onlinemetals.com/ and they have a pretty good selection.

 

[david_42]

It's probably thick enough. Palmer recommends 1/8" holes spaced at 1/4". That's a lot of holes, no way would I try to do one in stainless.

 

[alemonkey]

Luckily, online metals sells perforated sheet, so I won't have to drill them myself. You can also have them cut it to the size you want.

 

[david_42]

I didn't look at the site earlier, but you've got me thinking about one for the igloo.