To cool my wort...I do 5gal full boils...I do an ice bath in a plastic storage container. it is tall enough to fit plenty of gallons of water and ice and my cool time is 15-20 mins. that's 200* - 70*. The only thing is spending $2.50 per 20lbs bag of ice X2. I just got my MLT...igloo 5 gal cyl. $20 @ walmart. I think I can set this up fairly inexpensively.
Good luck.
Dec. 6th I brewed my first batch ever. A partial mash kit from Mid-West. Of the sample I've removed from the bucket last Thursday...I have to say it's pretty damn good.
On Dec. 20th, I brewed my second batch.....all grain. Based on the knowledge I've gained here and in Palmer's and Charlie P's books, I don't think I've missed out on anything by jumping right in, and passing up the extract phase.
The notes I kept on my process were great. I improved, in the areas I muffed the first time around, but then a whole new set of things to improve popped up during the All Grain session. Which are fixable.
Two problems that I encountered weren't even problems...easily fixed. One was the collection of wort...my process was highly inefficient (involved me taking a pitcher full of wort then dumping it in the boil kettle, then me marking a hash mark in my notes.....You can guess after a while I was asking myself if I marked that pitcher off or not.)
The second was my flame lost it's potency somewhere in the boil. How long? I don't know. I switched out quick, but by the time I noticed, I was no longer getting a roiling boil. So I missed a mark in the process there for not evaporating enough wort. Which would probably cause my OG to be a little low.
Third, is I just got to get the hang of the process of mashing in. Next time, I'll just heat water to 185, dump it in, wait for my strike temp, and add the grain. I covered the mash at the desired temp, but it seems like after an hour, it went up to over 160.
In the end, I'm sure I'll end up with something that'll look and hopefully taste like beer. Matter of fact, I'm sure it'll taste damn good. And I'm glad that I jumped right up to All-Grain.