52 QT Cooler Mash Tun Buil

[laserpewpew]

I have been lurking for a while so I figured why not post one of the projects I worked on this weekend. Any comments or critiques are welcome.

I have been looking for an excuse to go all grain after only having brewed for a few months and last week Target had a 52 QT cooler on sale for $21. After reading a lot of different builds I decided CPVC was the way to go. Below is my build which probably took a few hours but could have been reduced had I bought a new saw blade.

I bought two 5 feet sections of 1/2 inch CPVC.

Cuts
5 - 7"
1 - 6.5"
2 - 3"
10 - 2.5"
1 - 1"

Fittings
9 - 1/2" T
4 - 1/2" 90°
1 - 1/2" 45°
1 - 1/2" FIP Adapter

I also bought the cooler bulkhead kit from http://www.bargainfittings.com/ but did not order a coupling as I used the FIP adapter.

 

[WileECoyote]

Nice looking build,

I have one suggestion though, the pipe going from the mid section to the bulkhead is over the top of the collecting pipes, this will leave lots of wort behind in your mash tun, I would move the T to the collection pipe closest to the bulkhead, that way you could tilt your mash tun and collect most of your wort.

Thats just what I would do.

Cheers

 

[laserpewpew]

Thanks for the suggestion. That is something that I played around with, the only problem being that the bulkhead is actually a few inches higher than the pipe sites and there was no easy way to get the manifold to connect to the bulkhead without using some sort of tubing.