I have a burner and a kettle. Now all I need is a mash tun and I will ready for all grain. 
I’ve read denny’s instructions and it seems dead simple. Are there any tricks or tips you wished you had known before building one?
Home Depot doesn’t sell stainless steel braids ;D
Get one big enough to do ten gallon batches.
The cooler should be blue, of course
damn, i just bought the 10 gallon AGS from northernbrewer and it comes with red coolers… am i doomed to make shitty beer?
No matter what you do your beer will taste like Miller Lite.
What size batches do you plan on making?
I would get a Coleman Extreme with a stainless braid to start with…they’re reasonably priced and very practical.
[quote]No matter what you do your beer will taste like Miller Lite.
[/quote]
I didn’t know it tasted like anything. It is like gatorade with barley.
I am currently seeing them for $39.00 at Walmart to $44.00 at Fleet Farm.
As you build your brewery always look to the future so you do not end up buying twice.
It is dead simple…if it wasn’t, I couldn’t do it! My tip would be to make sure you get a cooler with a drain hole near the bottom. Some are a couple inches off the bottom. I use a cheapo Rubbermaid 12 qt. cooler. If I was to do it again, I’d go for a 70 qt. And coolers that have names like “Extreme” or “MaxCold” retain heat no better than my cheapo.
One of the advantages of the Coleman Extreme (70 qt., anyway) is that it has a trough/groove slightly lower than the bottom level that allows maximum drainage. The 70 qt. is also large enough to do reasonably big 10 gallon batches.
That’s the perfect kind of cooler design, Doug. I’m waiting for my current cooler to disintegrate, then I’m gonna get one of those.
+1 to the 70qt coleman! gotta love the channel for the drain. Plus it can do 10 gallon batches. When I went all grain, I bought a small cooler (5 gallon I think?) did 3 or 4 batches then bought the 70 qt so I could do 10 gallons. Should have done it in the first place…
I have an Igloo cube cooler 60 qt that I built a copper slotted manifold for. The drain is about and 1.5 inches above the bottom but I work around that with having all the fittings going to the outlet soldered to allow for a siphon to be set up with the manifold. All other fittings are slip fit to allow for a complete break down for cleaning. I also feel that having an outer ring and inner run of the manifold allows for better efficiencies. I generally see efficiencies in the 80 to 88% range with no issues of stuck runoff. I built 2 similar systems for friends with rectangular coolers with great results. One of the systems is used almost exclusively to make wheat beer with no issues of stuck runoff. I don’t know how to get a photo on the forum or I would post one as a reference.
What are people’s experience with using 10 gallon Rubbermaid water coolers? What is the maximun capacity for those coolers? I have figured that about 24lb of grain with a ratio of 1.33 qt/lb is about the max, but some discussion I have read seem to indicate that more can be used (with a lower water to grain ratio, I would assume). I’ve never maxed it out, but I plan on doing so soon.
That’s interesting; my Cube (the 50 qt) has a depression at one end where the drain would go, but no drain actually installed. I installed the valve slightly below the bottom of the cooler, so there’s literally no dead space.
If you’re talking about the round 10 gal. coolers, my experience is that they’re pricey for the limited volume they have. Also, they’re harder to use than rectangular coolers since the opening is smaller.
I just mashed 24# in my 10 gal rubbermaid cooler at 1.25 qts/lb and it was pretty darn full. Worked great though!
You come brew 5 gallons with me. I’ll show you why they call them “X-Treme”. ;D
I first installed a brass ball valve(lead) then switched it with S/S.
- a few more on prepping for 10 gallon.
I also dump in about 3 gallons of hot water to the tun then empty before adding my grain bill and mash water to help offset huge temp drops.