Splitting the boil in half?

[chad_]

I have two 5 gallon brew kettles. To account for boil off in a 60 minute boil most places I read call for over 6.5 gallons of wort when you start boiling. My 5 gallon kettles can't handle that much.

Would I be fine if I split the wort in half and boil them separately at the dame time and add half the hop additions to each?

I don't have the extra money for a larger brew pot..

 

[bennie1986]

I split my batch in two pots and use the stronger half to do all my hops in. I'm know i get less hop utilization but if I think it needs more ill just add more next time. I don't change anything to account for boil off and have not had an issue but it also don't do more than a rolling boil.

 

[chad_]

Do you know how much less hop utilization you get? Is it around maybe 10% less IBUs or so?

 

[wilserbrewer]

Would I be fine if I split the wort in half and boil them separately at the dame time and add half the hop additions to each?

.

Yes, this is fine! Split the wort and hops b/w the two pots. You can even stagger the boils by 1/2 hour or so so you can chill one while the other is still boiling.

You will get more boil off with two pots, so just collect and start w/ more wort, say 4 in each pot.

 

[bennie1986]

Do you know how much less hop utilization you get? Is it around maybe 10% less IBUs or so?

I'm not sure exactly but I guess I could plug in the Pre boil gravity from the pot I hop in into beer smith and figure it out that way. If I remember later or have time ill do it and let you know.

 

[bennie1986]

Do you know how much less hop utilization you get? Is it around maybe 10% less IBUs or so?

So I got way to curious and plugged my last recipe into a mobile brewing app and figured I lost about 12% of my ibu's.

 

[SkiNuke]

What I do is I add my hops into one pot, and start the boils at the same time. I typically sparge to about 7.5 gallons and boil down to 5.5. I found through calculations that the difference in IBU's is negligible and that it's pointless to worry, just pretend it's one big pot!

My process is:
1. Collect wort into two pots.
2. Scoop wort back and forth to sort of equalize pre boil OG (not really necessary, half assed job is fine).
3. Measure pre boil OG's and volumes of each pot.
4. Boil both pots, while adding hops to 1 pot.
5. Monitor boil off rate of both pots periodically so I can adjust heat.
6. When hopped pot is done, measure volume and OG of both pots.
7. Start chilling of hopped pot.
8. Do some calculations to determine how much longer to boil non-hopped pot.
9. Take un-hopped pot off heat when you reach your desired OG (remember you are adding two pots with different og's and volumes).
10. chill un-hopped pot after hopped pot is done.
11. Mix in fermenter.
12. Relax and enjoy!