Wondering, if I will only be making batches between 3 and 6 gallons, would there be any reason I would need a pot larger than 10 Gallons?
The only time I can think of is if I am doing a 6Gal grain batch with a full boil where I may be starting with 8 Gallons, that only gives me about 3" of headspace to prevent a boil over in a Blichmann pot.
I am starting all over, and buying new equipment, so trying to figure out if 10 Gallon pots will be sufficient. The 15 Gal pots just seem overkill, especially when I may only be doing a 3 Gallon batch.
With extract kits and partial boils the volume wasn’t needed. So looking forward to doing all grain and full boils it means I have to step it up a bit.
Some homebrew shops sell 15.5 gallon kegs that have been converted into kettles. These are nice because they have a relatively small diameter. Which makes smaller batches easier, with less boil off. I don’t know about blichman, but the 15 gallon megapots have a massive diameter.
You can get away with a 10 gallon kettle. Even with 8 gallon boils. You’ll just have to be careful. There’s also a product called ‘fermcap s’ that will help prevent the boil from foaming over.
If your certain that will be your max size batches it sounds like the 10gal pot should work for your needs.
I remember at one point saying that I would never do bigger batches and have since had to upgrade several times. If you ever think you will be doing bigger batches down the road, I would get the biggest pot that you can afford and use a smaller pot for the 3gal batches.
Pretty certain, unless there is a special event for me to brew for, it’s mostly me around here and I don’t have a ton of parties. So for me to brew up large batches would be very unusual. I plan to do more split batches where I mash for a 6 gallon result and then split it into two pots before boiling so I can do two separate 3 gallon batches. This way I can do side by side comparisons of different hop additions and different yeast strains.
And I am looking at the Blichmann pots mostly because of the quality and the height to width ratio.
The megapots are built well but whomever decided to make them so wide that is ridiculous. Way too much boil off. I honestly dont know why you would make a pot that wide…
Fortunately I have a few more weeks before purchasing new pots.
I have a 15 gallon keggle for my larger batches and keep my trusty 5 gal stainless pot for the smaller ones. I; m an extract brewer for now so I have plenty of flexibility :cheers:
I got a 10 gallon pot so I could do full boils…initially that meant 5 gallon final volume, but I upped it to 6 so I would have at least 5 gallons going into the bottles after racking out of the carboy. This basically amounts to a 7.5 gallon boil, and on occasion this will sometimes threaten to boil over, but has yet to do so. It’s exceedingly easy to beat it back down if it looks like there might be a problem, whereas my first couple full boils were virtually impossible to control in my 8 gallon pot.
I wouldn’t look to a 15 gallon pot unless I wanted to start doing 10 gallon batches, and that would necessitate more than just a new kettle…
