I should have known better. The last brew house that I built in 2013 was a 3-gallon brew house. Brewing 3 gallons at that time was a bit of an oddity. I had to fabricate my own custom 6.75 gallon brew kettle with the aid of a local sanitary welder because 10 gallons was the smallest prefabricated commercially available kettle (I prefer welded fittings). The trend was bigger, not smaller. People will still argue that they can brew 10 gallons of beer in the same amount of time that they can brew 3 gallons, but that argument misses the mark. A lot of us like to brew, but have limited capacity when it comes to consumption. My maximum consumption capacity is 28 pints over a span of three weeks, a month to six weeks is a better spread. I have decided that I am going to downsize to a 3-gallon setup and sell off the parts of my brewery that are for 5-gallon batches. Being a 3-gallon all-grain brewer today is not the challenge it was when I built my last brewery. It is now easy to get a prefabricated brewing kettles and stainless steel fermentation vessels that are purpose-built with 3-gallon brewing in mind. For those who have switched over to 3-gallon brewing since 2013, what was your turning point?
I made the switch very early. I’ve always been a stovetop kitchen brewer, so to make the switch from partial boil extract to all grain I was constrained by my maximum boil volume of a little over 4 gallons. It’s better for me anyways, since I usually only drink 3 to 5 beers a week, and many of them are half-pours. This let’s me brew more often, and I’ve come to realize that I enjoy the creative process of brewing as much as (if not more than) the beer itself.
Where I live it gets very cold in the winter. It’s just not enjoyable to brew in the garage with the doors and windows open on my 15 gallon propane system when it’s 15F outside. So I built my 3 gallon system for the propane kitchen stove during winter. I love using both systems, and transition with the seasons. I’ve never considered brewing on just one system.
Similar story on a more compressed time scale. I was initially advised to go big because “most people eventually scale up to ten-gallon batches…”
But I realized pretty quickly that at my rate of consumption, 5-gallon batches are way too big for me to iterate through recipes at a reasonable pace. I switched to 2.5-gallon batches and then ultimately down to 1-gallon (now metricized to 4-liter) batches.
I agree that the brewing is more fun than the drinking anyway, and at 4L, I can brew every other weekend. And at ~1 kg of grain, a few grams of hops, I’m out maybe $10 if I don’t like how a recipe turns out. Less than that if I’m repitching yeast.
Someday, when I’ve settled on my go-to recipes, I assume I’ll scale back up to, say, a 10-L standard batch size, but who knows.
I started out brewing ~3 gal batches and bottled when I got into brewing 10 yrs ago and have returned the smaller volume the last several batches. It allows me to brew more often, have more variety and work through more styles and recipes that I want to brew…giving me more experimentation. Besides the occasional company, I am really the only one drinking the majority of what I brew (my wife only drinks Porters, Stouts, Kolsch or Lagers when I brew them) so I can get through the batches faster. I can also do this cheaper per batch which is easier as well.
I takes me a little less time than brewing a full 5 gal batch, but really that is due to my equipment and processes now. I picked up a Robobrew 2 yrs which has streamlined my process. I do full volume no sparge, I can program the unit to heat up my water ahead of time, there’s no transfers, etc. Then lastly, I ferment, naturally carbonate and then serve all in the same keg and have been for a few yrs now so these are also major reasons to brew smaller batches.
I tried exactly what ttash describes for the exact same reasons. Cold winters, unheated garage. So I did small batch BIAB batches on my kitchen stove and found I did not like it. Not enough result for almost the same amount of work. My solution was to buy a 10.5 gallon Anvil Foundry for winter brewing indoors.
I have been brewing 5 gallon batches recently (scaled back from 10 gallons previously in pre-pandemic times) and giving away over half when I can. I just wish that my friends had their own growlers for me to fill - I get them back eventually, but they are out of commission for extended periods until returned.
Back in the 90’s I made 5 gallon batches as was the norm. Worked well, but mostly because I drank too much back then. When I got back into it a few years ago I decided to brew 2.5gal BIAB and after a few years of this, I can’t imagine brewing any other way. Sure, the volume more closely matches my drinking habits now, but its the simplicity of the process that has me won over. A pot, a bag, a fermenter. I’m good. All my brewing equipment (save for the kegs) fits inside my 8gallon pot. It’s the darndest thing.
probably this is a close answer to why i like 3 gallon.
i brewed a size about 3 gallons (i think 12 litres or so at a time) in korea because that was the size of carboys i was able to get. a full 6 gallons in a glass carboy is just about the maximum size a single person can reasonably carry around and move and that is the limit of the average person’s ability i’d say.
3 gallons is a lot easier to move around, but still big enough that racking isn’t too weird without special sized equipment. faster to boil. just more that you can do without straining yourself. and yeah, i guess or hope that all these people doing tons of 10+ gallon brews regularly are giving away this beer at parties or to family.
This kind of revelation was a large part of the inspiration for Simple Homebrewing.
Great ideas all around. I brewed 2.5 gallon batches in 2017/2018 and really enjoyed the simplicity of the process. I did full volume mashes and that really simplified the brew session. I brew 5 gallon batches now on the same equipment, but have often thought about going back to half batches because my consumption seems to be leveling off a little. For a while a 5 gallon keg would last about 4-6 weeks. I guess I figure if I can get a 2.5 gallon keg to last 4-6 weeks, that’d be almost ideal.
But as it stands now, I have a 6.5 gallon kettle and a 3 gallon kettle that I split the boil between. I do 5 gallons in the main kettle and 1.5-2 gallons in the smaller kettle. All inside on the stovetop. It works well.
The only bummer with wanting to go back to doing smaller batches would be having to buy back a few more 2.5 gallon kegs. Should’ve have sold the 4 that I sold!
Alternatively, after losses, a 2-gallon batch fills a twelve pack of swingtop pint bottles with one serving left over for gravity and taste testing.
I meant to say “shouldn’t have sold the 4 kegs I sold” in my previous post. I do still have 2 of those smaller kegs fortunately. They’re very easy to clean. I can actually get my arm in there comfortably to clean with a sponge or rag. With 5 gallon kegs I have to use a carboy brush, which likewise isn’t a big deal, just don’t feel like I can clean as thoroughly sometimes. Although there haven’t been any issues with sanitation.
This thread’s got me thinking and that might not be a good thing because I tend to obsess over stuff like this!
Cleaning is the one of the advantages of a properly sized 3 or 2.5-gallon brewery. Almost everything fits in a standard kitchen sink. I actually have a utility tub in my brew house (a.k.a. garage). The previous owner had a plumber install it. However, it is a small utility sink. My 10-gallon brew kettle will not fit in it and neither will my 10-gallon Igloo industrial cooler-based MLT. Three and 2.5 gallon kegs are significantly easier to clean, not to mention lift and carry up and down stairs when full. A full 3-gallon keg weighs approximately 20lbs less than full 5-gallon keg. However, I think the straw that broke the camel’s back in my case was having to hump my 10-gallon mash tun out to my compost pile with 12lbs of grain retaining 12lbs of water. A 10-gallon Igloo cooler is significantly more awkward to carry than a 5-gallon Igloo cooler when one is talking about more than a few feet. A 5-gallon Igloo cooler with the same amount of grain and liquid is significantly easier to carry 150+ feet because it is not as bulky.
Sounds like you might want to look into a garden cart or a hand truck to make it easier on yourself with the larger loads - if your terrain allows for it. But your points are certainly valid on the ease of working with smaller volumes. I don’t look forward to carrying full kegs anywhere - not that they are too heavy, but they are awkward, especially going down stairs…you have me thinking, I need to come up with a simple ramp to slide them down one flight to the basement freezer chest.
I guess the question is, what are your goals? How long do you want each keg to last? I think about 4 weeks on tap seems right to me.
Dumbwaiter?
I have a hand truck, but that misses the point. It is about simplifying the amount and size of the paraphernalia that I need to brew. Luckily, I have never had the desire to brew 10-gallon or larger batches, not once. That is just too much beer. It was too much beer when I started brewing back in my early thirties and had thirsty friends. Another big thing is that I have discovered that brewing without maintaining yeast cultures is not much fun for me. Playing with yeast is what has kept me interested in the hobby for this long. Maintaining even a modest culture collection (<= 6 cultures) requires one to brew at least once a month. The weird thing is that I did not drink much beer before I started to brew. I purchased the occasional six pack of what was then referred to to as “microbrew” to have with pizza, but I was primarily a wine drinker when I drank. I did not drink on anything approaching a regular basis.
I started brewing in 2009 and I was assured I would want to get into real big batches. My first kettle was an eight gallon kettle I’ve used like four times. I bought a five gallon kettle fairly early because I brewed indoors and my electric stove couldn’t get the larger kettle to a boil easily. I bought a ten gallon cooler for a mash tun and I’ve never made a batch larger than six gallons. I still use that mash tun but I built a two gallon cooler mash tun that gets used on most of my beers. I pretty much only brew 1, 2, 2.5 and 3 gallon batches and very rarely have brewed the standard five gallon batch. I have a couple five gallon kegs that I use for carbonated water but my beer kegs are all three gallons. I just don’t go through enough beer at home to justify larger batches nor do I want to drink a pale ale a year old because I go through it too slowly. I still remember talking about my early one gallon batches and being told it was insane to spend that much time and attention on so little beer.
I never liked my BIAB batches very much which led to crafting a two gallon mash tun but I can’t deny BIAB opened a lot of people up to the idea of brewing smaller batches.
In addition to weather related brewery adaptations, there’s my weird schedule of being very busy during the warmer months and not so much in the winter. Plus I brew a lot of lagers. When I get a chance to brew in the summer I usually brew 10 gallons of lager so I can let it properly condition. During the winter months I brew very frequently on my little 3 gallon all grain infusion system. Based on number of batches brewed it’s 60% small system 40% big system. Works great for my situation, and I like the variety of brewing on more than one system.