Imperial IPA and Boil Volume

[gladius270]

I would like to try my hand at an extract imperial IPA, but I am seriously worried about equipment limitations. When gathering all of my initial equipment, I made the mistake of buying an undersized brew kettle (4 gal) mostly because of the ridiculous cost of stainless steel kettles. I have a few questions as this relates to the brewing of a big beer like this.

1. Can I even make an imperial IPA with a 2.5 gal. boil?

2. Will the 4 gallon kettle be too small even for a 2.5 gal. boil with the large amount of extracts that an imperial IPA would take?

3. Should I just break down and buy a larger aluminum brew kettle (knowing that some people will say not to use aluminum, some will say it's fine).

4. I need a recipe!

 

[Yooper]

I would like to try my hand at an extract imperial IPA, but I am seriously worried about equipment limitations. When gathering all of my initial equipment, I made the mistake of buying an undersized brew kettle (4 gal) mostly because of the ridiculous cost of stainless steel kettles. I have a few questions as this relates to the brewing of a big beer like this.

1. Can I even make an imperial IPA with a 2.5 gal. boil?

2. Will the 4 gallon kettle be too small even for a 2.5 gal. boil with the large amount of extracts that an imperial IPA would take?

3. Should I just break down and buy a larger aluminum brew kettle (knowing that some people will say not to use aluminum, some will say it's fine).

4. I need a recipe!

You can make an IIPA, but you may be a bit limited as far as IBUs go. What I would suggest is boiling as much as you possibly can (3 gallons, if you use "fermcap" probably) and adding the bulk of the extract late in the boil. The 60 minute boil is for hops utilization, as the extract has already been boiled, so it's the hops here that really need the boil.

As far as a recipe, my favorite is either Pliny the Elder clones, or Stone Ruination. They are very different, but I love them both. We have both posted in the IPA area of our database but we can help you with a link if you can't find it. (I'm on a goofy little work computer and have trouble finding links).

I used an aluminum turkey fryer for years, so I don't have a problem with aluminum. But keep in mind when you increase your boil size, some stoves don't have the capability to boil much more than 3-4 gallons of liquid anyway. Plus, it's harder to cool 5 gallons of boiling wort since there is more mass to cool. So if you decide on a bigger pot, you may need a turkey fryer burner and/or a wort chiller. So that's something to think about.

 

[jmprdood]

1) Yes
2) No. Do partial boils. Steep grains in a couple of gallons, then boil hops, then add DME/LME at flameout.
3) You could, and probably will later on, but you don't have to. I use a 4G brewpot and scale my boils down for that pot and then top up in the fermenter.
4) Use the recipe link at the top of the page - lots of good ones from simple to over the top!

Cheers!

 

[gladius270]

Thanks for the help. I actually have dug up a turkey fryer out of my parents' garage (they didn't even know they had one). I think I could come up with something for cooling to get me by, in the form of a large tub full of ice. I've been doing my boils inside until now, and the kitchen sink barely works for cooling small partial boils. I'm looking to make a large shift in equipment and process in the near future.

 

[ndinh]

I just upgraded to a turkey fryer + 7.5 gal aluminum pot and did my first full boil (Pliney clone) about 2 weeks ago. Tasted it last night before moving to secondary and it was really good. A bathtub of ice may be difficult to cool 5 gallons + it'd be hard to lug around that much hot liquid. I just made my own wort chiller with a 20 ft copper coil, pipe bender, faucet adapter and rubber hose. Total cost= $110 ($60 for burner/pot and $50 for homemade chiller including the pipe bender). Good luck.

 

[bobbrews]

You can do anything you want, but I would personally say NO to partial volume boils and YES to full volume boils... especially for a hop-forward, high OG beer.

I never had an issue with coming close to a boilover when brewing Extract and Partial Mash. Like you, I used a 4.43 gallon kettle and do approx. 4 gallon boils / 3.25 gallon batches. The only difference is that I now have two kettles this size, so I straddle double burners with two 4.43 gal kettles then combine the wort later into one 6 gallon primary.

I have a bunch of IPA recipes like this under the same user name @ hopville if you want to check them out. They will have to be converted from Partial Mash to Extract though, which is easy.

 

[brtisbuck]

I have an 8 gallon somewhat rectangular kettle/turkey fryer. As long as you season your kettle to get a nice oxidation layer on it and don't use oxy-clean or anything abrasive when cleaning that will remove that oxidation layer they are fine. The aluminum actually is a better temp conductor than stainless. My kettle just fits in my stationary tub and I've used that for many ice baths with success....or you can build your own wort chiller with about $30 and a trip the the hardware store.