Movin' on Up

Hey everyone. So I just made my first batch via the Mr. Beer kit. It turned out exceptionally (and surprisingly) good although I'm going to let it condition for another couple of weeks. My patience is paying off (as everyone told me it would). Anyway, I desperately want to go bigger. By bigger, I mean I want to brew five gallon batches. I may stay with straight extract beers for the time being but I want to get into partial mashes very soon. With that said, I'd really like to get my hands on a great (and relatively inexpensive) beginners beer brewing equipment kit. I'd like a secondary fermenter but I don't necessarily need all the bells and whistles just yet. I'm reaching out to you guys to point me in the right direction (either a website or LHBS).

Thanks a lot everyone.

local craigslist is always a great place to browse used gear

Good going! 5 gallons batches is the way to go IMO. I'm moving this thread to the beginners forum area because this is the Off Topic (meaning not really related to brewing) area and you will get much better response (much less smart-assery) in the proper forum.

For myself, I recommend your local supply place, or any of the major online suppliers. They will have a wide selection of equipment kits and also recipe kits. I'll mention a few online places by name, but by no means is this a complete list, nor is it an endorsement of any particular supplier.

Northern Brewer
Midwest Supplies
MoreBeer

etc. etc.

There's many out there and most of them are great to work with. You can even check out the review area in case you want to see what others think of a particular place.

A basic kit will contain a fermentor (bucket, better bottle, carboy) and a bottling bucket (bucket with a hole for a spigot) plus airlocks, sanitation chemicals, bottle wand, etc. The prices will vary based on your personal choice of fermentor and added extras (don't worry, this is just the start of your habit of picking up that next needed piece of equipment!

I like buckets, and I think I do perfectly fine with them. They are light, easy to carry, and easy to clean. Others prefer better bottles because they are see the fermentation taking place (I know what it looks like and I don't have to peek at it constantly), and other prefer glass carboys for the same reason and for the added benefit of having approx. ZERO oxygen permeability (Though I think any of th3e options are fine for O2 for the length of time your beer will be in them, if you are careful when racking.) Lots of people use glass, but they have been known to break and cause significant injury, usually unexpectedly. That said, I almost always use my glass carboy for a long secondary on big beers. Just my choice.

Anyway, good luck and hoppy shopping!

I'd say try all the big online vendors for a good price on a beginner kit, such as Austin Homebrew, More beer, Northern Brewer, Midwest Supplies, etc (listed in no particular order).

For the extract kits, I tried all the above except Midwest. I found Morebeer to be the cheapest (including free shipping for orders over 50 bucks I think) with their "10 beers under 50 cents a pint" or whatever they were called. When I was doing all-extract, my last few orders were with them. I'd get 3 extract kits for like 75 bucks shipped. Couldn't beat that deal for modest gravity batches. Do remember they don't include grain steeping bags, so order muslin bags at 75 cents apiece to steep your grains in. They also don't include yeast in their normal extract kits, but did include dry yeast with all the bargain kits I mentioned above. Depending on where you live, don't be in a hurry to brew though. I'd order well in advance, because it would take like 2 weeks to get my order. Can't complain on shipping times when shipping's free, so I just learned to order ahead.

Once you go all-grain (if you ever feel the need to), you can do better at the LHBS. I just go there and pick up a full sack of base grain, which lasted me 6 batches (I think) and go there before each brewday for a couple pounds of specialty grains.

Good luck, and welcome to the obsession!

Here's a link to midwest's basic equipment kit that has options you can add to it,depending on what you do/don't have; http://www.midwestsupplies.com/brewing-basics-equipment-kit.html $65 is a pretty good deal. I bought a set of 4 nested,polished SS stock pots with lids & steamer trays at Giant Eagle a couple years ago for about $25. They go from about 1 gallon to 5 gallon sizes. I use the 5 gallon (20qt) for all my brewing since I started,from AE to PB/PM BIAB I do now.
I use a cake cooling rack in the bottom of the BK/MT to keep the paint strainer bag of grains from burning on the bottom. you can use the 5 G paint strainer bags for steeping grains too. It gives you the ability to stir the grains to loosen dough balls & get the grains evenly wetted for better efficiency/OG's ime.
So the right equipment can last you a long time if properly cared for through many batches brewed in the various brewing styles you'll run across here. I can do 3.5 gallons in my 5 gallon kettle easilly whether AE or PM with partial boils. That way,I can use the same equipment by just adding the paint strainer bag & cake cooling rack. More economical that way to me...There are scads of All Extract kits out there to choose from. You can get them with or without steeping grains. Cheap to expensive depending on what you want to brew,but you'll see how that goes quickly enough.

Four words of advice from somebody only eight batches into the whole 5-gallon thing:

Get a big pot.

Click to expand...

You'll think "gee, it's only five gallons of beer, it'll fit in a six-gallon pot, I've made spaghetti a zillion times, this can't be so hard!" But, throw in at least a gallon of boil-off, at least another gallon to account trub losses going from kettle to fermentor and fermentor to bottling bucket and leaving some volume of gunk behind, and another couple gallons extra space for foam during hot break and hop additions, and the ten-gallon pot is already looking better than the eight gallon.

Don't end up like me, with an expensive six-gallon stainless steel hatbox for your wort-chiller sitting next to your real boil kettle!

If you're doing full boils,yeah. But most kits are tailored to partial boils,& a 5 gallon kettle suits them well ime. Full boils are nice on propane burners,but most stoves won't handle it. I have a link in my profile for some faster electric heating elements that'll get 3.5 gallons from mash temp to boiling in about 18 minutes. I replaced the large burners with them for brewing purposes to speed up brewday a little.
So partial boils of 3.5 gallons in a 5 gallon kettle are fine if you stay right there & work with it. Not much work really,just vigilance. I like my 5G (20qt) SS kettle. Being polished,it's easy to keep shiny clean with a Dobie & some PBW.

So I went to my LHBS for a class on homebrewing n with the class came a 10% discount. So I got my hands on a fermenter, carboy, brew kettle, n all the other essentials plus some n the ingredient kit for just under 260. I'm pretty happy about the price. Thanks for ur help n advice. Got an English brown ale fermenting in the primary already n have a few ideas for when that goes into secondary after a few weeks. This obsession is quickly going to get out of control!!!

Morebeers deal of the day and homebrewfinds can help you grow your equipment on the cheap