Green Bay Rackers--Mash Calculators Scroll down to “Can I Mash It”.
EDIT - When you find out what size cooler can be used for a given grist weight, just run that info through your software to see what OG that correlates to.
I agree with the others, you can always upgrade later. I brewed over 30 batches of 3-3.5 gallons finished in a 5 gallon igloo cooler. It was very easy to handle sparge water volumes, etc without pumps. If you see that you will want larger batches in 6-12 months, go ahead and get the larger cooler, otherwise stick with what works for you today.
One problem I have is I do not have software or know how to do fancy conversions for OG calculations. I would like to brew 5 gallon batch Imperials and can’t see myself brewing anything above the 1.100 mark. A little more help with be much appreciated! Not sure what kind of grain I’ll be using either, as I’m preparing myself to get into all grain. Lots of people recommend 10 gallon cooler over the 5 gallon, but I’d just like to know how big of a beer (with an actually number to show how “big”) can a 5 gallon mash for 5 gallon batches
1.100 will be tough in a 5 gallon cooler. Using just grain, that is a very large grain bill. It would not leave much room at all for mash in and sparging.
Paul
OG estimates are basic math. Take the potential extract of the grain in “point-gallons per pound” and, as you can see from the units, multiply by grain weight and divide by wort volume, then multiply by mash efficiency. Since you don’t know your base malt yet, I’ll assume a potential extract of 37 pg/p and efficiency of 70%:
0.7 * 37 point-gal/lb * 15 lb / 5 gal = 78 → 1.078 OG
This isn’t the most precise way to do things, but it’s certainly good enough for first-order estimates.
So no, you can’t brew 5 gal of 1.100 all-grain wort with a single mash in a 5 gal tun. Working with a mash that’s thin enough to stir, and some room to actually stir it, you’d top out at around 1.060.
Using a 48 qt. cooler, I can make 5 gal. of a 1.100 beer if I go with 1 qt./lb. It’s a very tight fit and hard to stir. I’d recommend at least a 70 qt. for what you propose. That’s rectangular, not round.
That doesn’t sound right. At 1.09 qt/lb including the grain, you should be able to fit 40+ lb in there and get to at least 1.130. I’ve mashed 1.120 beers in my 50 qt cooler, and that’s for 7 gal pre-boil wort.
Is it possible your cooler is smaller than you think? I mean, if you only look at it from one angle…
Edit: Anecdotally, I’ve heard some cooler manufacturers use grossly inaccurate methods to arrive at total volume. Including the space above the rim but still “inside” the lid, for example.
Beersmith tools tell me that in theory I could mash 27.5# at 1qt/# for 5.5gall @1.127 in my 50 qt cooler. It says I would have 0.04gallons left empty in the cooler, really not enough room to stir or even work with. It does look like the max in the 50qt though. If I dropped to 5G batch, same 27.5# @ 1qt per pound, it would yield OG of 1.14 again, just in theory.
Awesome info! Can you please run the numbers for me for a 28 qt cooler. The max grain pounds is 17# at 1.25qt/# and the resulting OG is??? This is the last piece to my puzzle!!!
I just found a 7 gallon gatorade round water cooler that I think & hope will be just enough space to mash Imperials for 5 gallon batches.
Software says at 1qt per #, you can mash those 17# with 1.42G of extra space for a 5G batch @ 1.086
You can always bump your OG with DME or sugar for an Imperial style if you can’t fit everything in the mash tun.
Ain’t no shame in that.
I see you ran the number for 1qt/# vs 1.25qt/#. Can you up the pound to 20 keeping 1qt/#? Thank you so much, I need to buy that software your using.
You can download it and use it for a 21 day trial for free…
On my way out of office, and on the road, maybe later when I get home if some else has not already
Or brewersfriend.com has a free version as well with a recipe builder
Yep, that’s it exactly…the concave lid is counted as part of the volume. If you’re just packing stuff in a cooler that’s fine, but when you fill it with liquid not so much. Believe me, I have plenty of experience to confirm the amounts I posted.
Sneaky bastards.
Makes sense then; I didn’t think about that until after posting. If memory serves (after 10 years of homebrew), that’s part of why I went with the 50 qt Cube - it’s a full 50 qt liquid volume.
With 15lbs of grain, a hot liquor to grist ratio of 1 quart per pound, and an extraction rate of 32 points per pound, which is possible with imported base malt when continuous sparging, one can theoretically achieve an original gravity of 15 * 0.032 / 5 + 1.0 = 1.096. However, that volume does not allow for the loss of wort that is left behind with hops and break when transferring the contents of one’s kettle to one’s fermentation vessel. The biggest 5.75-gallon batch of wort that I have made with my 5-gallon Igloo beverage cooler had an original gravity of 1.072. That batch was made with 13lbs of grain and a hot liquor to grist ratio of 1.25 quarts per pound.
Now, to put things into perspective, we are talking about an extraction efficiency of 87% in order to hit the numbers that I quoted above. That extraction rate is not easy to achieve unless one has a well-tuned tun and is experienced with continuous sparging. An inexperienced brewer risks producing a tannic wort by pushing the extraction rate into that territory. In practice, a 5-gallon beverage cooler is too small for most brewers when attempting to make 5-gallon batches of high gravity wort.