Working out kettle & fermenter capacity

[Maltus Maximus]

Hi Guys,

As promised in the introductions I am setting about building my little brewery up, so here goes with question #1:

I'm designing my equipment to have the capacity to produce 50 liters of finished beer, per brew if required.

I'm going to make the kettle and conical fermenter (stainless) myself and so now the query is about the volumetric capacity of these tanks.

I know the reduction of pre-boil volume to post fermentation is a un-exact science, but to have 50 liters at the end do you think I'd have enough space with:

-A kettle with 80 liters capacity.
-A fermenter with 70 liters capacity.

I'm going to start out mashing using brew-in-a bag and heat the mash & boil using gas.

Any help/advice appreciated!

MM

[molc]

One of the trickiest bits there might actually be BIAB with a 50L kit - as you're probably looking at lifting ~10kg grain and 5-8kg of liquid. You'll need a hoist of some form.

As for the sizing:
* Personally, I have 5.5kw giving about 15% evaporation per hour, running at 80% capacity, so preboil would be around 60L. Giving room for expansion, I'd say you would get away with 70L, so 80L should do the trick. Personally, I do 45L batches in a 50L keggle, using a water topup near the end of the boil as I evaporate off some liquid.
* General rule of thumb for the fermenter is 33% headspace, so 66.5L capacity.

If you don't have beersmith, give it a download even for the free trial and put in a sample equipment and recipe. That will give you some capacity calculations.

[Maltus Maximus]

Thanks Molc.

I'll have a solid wall beside where the kettle'll go so I'd thought to affix a pulley arrangement to take the weight of the BIAB as it drains.

Good idea re beersmith and sizing calculations; I had seen it and earmarked it for nearer when I'd start to brew but probably better to get familiar with it sooner than later.

I'll keep you posted how I get on.

MM