Test ability of burner

scorpionc53 · Oct 15, 2012

I'm about to buy a 9 gallon boil pot and go all grain. I purchased a cheap propane burner and wok a couple years ago but don't have the information on it anymore. It has a 10 psi regulator on it and I'd like to know if there's a way to test it's ability to boil my wort before I plunge into it this weekend. I'll be boiling between 5-7 gallons for all my batches I'm planning on doing. Can I just test it with water or is there some other way to test this burners ability to boil a large pots worth? I have an electric stove so I won't be doing anything there.

mpcluever · Oct 15, 2012

Can you post a picture of what you have? We could probably give an opinion of it from a picture. Certainly just testing it with water would give you an idea how it will work. I'd use the kettle you're going to use though as testing a smaller kettle and volume probably won't tell you much as to whether it will handle the larger load.

Golddiggie · Oct 15, 2012

I would advise testing it with more water volume than wort volume due to wort being denser. Getting 5 gallons of water to a boil on a burner can be faster than getting 5 gallons of wort to a boil (both starting at the same temperature) in the same pot/kettle.

Or just say F it and brew a batch of beer and see how it performs. I would advise going with a 10 gallon kettle over a 9 gallon pot. Or get a 10 gallon pot at least and then convert it to a kettle ASAP.

IME, the better burners (typically costing more than the cheap ones) get you to temp faster and use less fuel. My Blichmann burners get me to a boil faster than the KAB4 burner I had earlier. Same burner element, but different housing design. That made a bigger difference than you might think. The Blichmann is also damn near dead silent when going. Compared with other burners I've seen that sound like jet engines getting ready to take off.

scorpionc53 · Oct 15, 2012

Here's a pic. I think I'll try to bo water up to capacity in my 9 gallon pot. If it can handle 9 gallons water, it should be able to handle 6-7 gallons wort.

300RUM · Oct 15, 2012

It will work. I would like to here other opinions of this burner I just put two on my stand and had to crank them up pretty high to keep a rolling boil ( 11 gal Batch, 13gallon boil).