Can I use a 15 gallon cooler as a mash-tun?

I cant find small coolers with a hole....and I dont wanna drill a hole in a cooler for the tap. Now my only option is to buy a 15 gallon cooler to use as a mash-tun, but I wont brew more than 5 gallon in it. Will the empty head-space affect my wort? Will the water temperature drop in it because of it (without maintaining a constant temperature for 60 mins)?

Can you? Yes. You might want to look into a 5 or 10 gallon igloo/gott cooler and then you could buy a false bottom as opposed to using a hop blocker/mesh braid. The head space will definitely effect the temp BUT you could use a piece of foam insulation (Cut to the size of your cooler) to take care of that and maintain temp.

It all comes down to what works best for you and your budget. There's no right or wrong way. BUT, If you're going to do 5 gallons of a high gravity beer, you'll have larger grain bills and that extra 5-10 gallons of space will come in handy.

Cheers

I used a 60 quart for awhile and I struggled (I mean really struggled) with temperature control. Unless you're doing 10 gallon batches, I wouldn't mess with the large cooler.

Also, drilling isn't too big a deal as long as you have good gaskets/seals. I haven't had any significant leakage issues with any of my cooler conversions.

yeah, go 5 gallon gott water cooler if your going to only do 5-6 gallons sized batches....

I use a 52qt (13 gal) rectangle cooler for 5 gallon batches. I made a manifold out of CPVC to get the wort out. I don't lose much heat - I add my water, close the lid and through a weight on it to make sure it's a good seal. I also pre-heat my tun with hot tap water.

I like having the extra space in case I want to bigger beers, but for now, it makes stirring in the grain pretty easy.

You can use just about anything to mash in (emphasis on just about) but the more head space you have the higher the heat loss becomes. Once you dial it in a bit and figure out what temp your water needs to be to hit desired mash temps it is a complete non-issue.

Nightshade said:

You can use just about anything to mash in (emphasis on just about) but the more head space you have the higher the heat loss becomes. Once you dial it in a bit and figure out what temp your water needs to be to hit desired mash temps it is a complete non-issue.

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This is well worth remembering. My system (and everyone's is probably a little different) performs very predictably, so that I basically just know how hot to heat the water for a given desired mash temperature, etc. Brewing software not required.
And, yes, my system loses heat over an hour's mash. I think pretty much all static systems that don't use some kind of recirculating continuously heated mash water will do this. I'll usually lose about 3-4 degrees over an hour's mash. Does this matter? Evidently not.....and since conversion basically happens in the first 20 minutes anyway, it's probably irrelevant.

There are a reason the 5 and 10 gallon water coolers are so popular. I live in San Diego and this may be a little atypical; but i left the lid off during my mash to do an experiment on heat loss and it was marginally more than leaving the lid on. I would lean towards a 10 gallon cooler for most home brewing because as your grain bills go up, having some extra space is nice in case you get a stuck mash or want to do a double. There is no drilling required either. But to answer your question what ever you got will work. And no matter what you will end up with beer. But ceteris paribus applies to brewing as well as economics. The less variables the easier to figure out what your doing right and wrong. but hopefully more of the right. But i am still a newb so take my advice as with anything else on the net. Hope you brew turns out awesome!

I use a Coleman xtreme 62 quart (i.e. 15.5 gallon) cooler to great success. I do toss a blanket on top, but I get about 1 degree of temperature loss over the hour mash.

I only brew 5 gallon batches, but I like knowing that I can brew a 10 gallon barleywine, if I so choose.

Almost all Coleman coolers have a drain plug that is relatively easy to remove. My 48qt chest cooler works great, Walmart & Target sell them for about $30. It can hold up to about 24 pounds of grain @ 1.3 ratio, although most of my 5 gallon batches are in the 10-12# range and I experience less than a degree of heat loss during mash.

DON'T buy a 5 gal thinking your going to do 5.5 or 6 gal batches in it. If you were making small beers, or doing multiple sparges that's fine, but at 13 lbs of grain you'll run out of room, and less if you want to go higher than 1.25qt a pound. If you stick with smaller bills at 1.25qt per pound, your mash will fit, but you'll have to split your sparge.

15 might be a bit big for 5 or 6 gal batches, but if you pre-heat the tun and maybe cover it with a small blanket, you'll be fine.

MuddyCreek said:

I used a 60 quart for awhile and I struggled (I mean really struggled) with temperature control. Unless you're doing 10 gallon batches, I wouldn't mess with the large cooler.

Also, drilling isn't too big a deal as long as you have good gaskets/seals. I haven't had any significant leakage issues with any of my cooler conversions.

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I am actually going for bigger batches.....10 gallon batches and thinking of buying a 17 gallon coleman xtreme cooler. What do you think? Will that do?

Yes that will be fine. I would say 50 - 70 quart size is great for 10 gallon batches. I just did a big IPA 5 gallon mash in my new 50 quart coleman xtreme cooler with about 14 lbs of grain, and was much happier using that, than the 5 gallon Igloo that I have been using in the past.