mash tun size... I thought 70 qts was big enough

[Todd]

I just made the jump to all grain after 20+ batches of extract brewing. I had a 70 qt Coleman Xtreme cooler on hand that I converted to a mash tun. I thought that was more than big enough, until I tried to do two 10 gallon batches on Saturday. One had 29.5 pounds of grain (BCS IPA recipe), the other 31 pounds (BCS Robust Porter). After mashing-in I almost wasn't able to close the lid it was so full! (1.5qts/pound for the IPA, backed it down to 1.3qts/pound for the porter). Batch sparging for now.

I was really looking forward to 10 gallon batches of beer but this was a bit of a surprise.

What are you guys using out there who do 10+ gallon batches? 100 qt, 120 qt? Basketball-court sized?

Thanks

[ApresSkiBrewer]

Fly sparging w/ a converted keg. I regularly brew in the 1.050-1.070 range, and still have more than enough room if I want to go high gravity. My liquor/grist ratio is usually around 1.25/1 or 2.6L/1Kg... and my efficiency runs about 88%. Brewing 10 g btw, getting about 13 gallons into the kettle pre boil.

Interestingly enough... 15.5 gallons x 4 = 62 qts.... so my tun is actually smaller than yours. Huh. Now I'm confused.

[BayouBrew]

Interestingly enough... 15.5 gallons x 4 = 62 qts.... so my tun is actually smaller than yours. Huh. Now I'm confused.

Yeah, that doesn't sound right to me either. I also brew high gravity beers with a converted keg mash tun (batch sparge), and I have never come close to topping it out with a 1.3 qt/lb ratio. Are you sure that your math was right, or am I missing something?

[ApresSkiBrewer]

Interestingly enough... 15.5 gallons x 4 = 62 qts.... so my tun is actually smaller than yours. Huh. Now I'm confused.

Yeah, that doesn't sound right to me either. I also brew high gravity beers with a converted keg mash tun (batch sparge), and I have never come close to topping it out with a 1.3 qt/lb ratio. Are you sure that your math was right, or am I missing something?

Yeah, I'm far from topping my tun out. I haven't done a huge beer in this mashtun yet, but I estimate I can easily get 35-40 lbs of grain at 1.3qts/lb in there.

Double check your cooler, you sure its 70 qts?

[foomench]

I have no problems doing 10+ gallon batches of IPA and porter in my Igloo Ice Cube Deluxe which I think is 48 or 52 quarts. Could your mash have floated?

[dontblake]

yeah, me too...
I have a 10-gal (i.e. 40 qt) brewpot w/ false bottom that I'm using as a mash tun (have a keggle for boiling).
Recently did a 'big brown' - OG was 1.071 and used something like 28 lbs of grain. Still had a little bit of room (but not much).
I was thinking about getting a bigger cooler so I could do big beers (looking at something like a 50 or 60 qt).

Did you empty your mash tun before adding the ingredients for the second batch

[Quin]

54 qt Coleman cooler. 30 pounds at 1.5 qts/lb is the max for me. For a dopplebock at 36 pounds, I reduce it down to 1 qt per pound.

[Todd]

It's the standard silver Coleman Xtreme... and I THOUGHT it was 70 qts, now you guys have me totally second guessing myself. I'll take a look tomorrow and if need be measure the damn thing and compare to the online dimensions.