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Author Topic: Building own custom kettles?  (Read 2225 times)

Offline PBnKjelly

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Building own custom kettles?
« on: February 03, 2019, 11:53:50 am »
So Im starting the process of building my first all grain system and super excited to get started but want to take my time and build a very strong building block for a good system. Upon looking at alot of products that are out there alot of them seem to be very very similar in design and I thought well why dont I just make my own. I deal with metal and metal fabrication everyday with my full time job so I dont think it would be all that difficult to drill some holes and TIG weld some fittings on for ball valves. Has anyone out there had some good luck doing this? If you have would you recommend taking this approach to anyone else? and do you have a name/brand of some strong plain stainless kettles that have a low price tag to do these with?

Offline kramerog

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Re: Building own custom kettles?
« Reply #1 on: February 04, 2019, 07:57:55 am »
It's been some time since I bought a kettle, but Bayou has a lot of simple kettles for crawfish boils and turkey frying that are or were popular for home brewing.

Online waltsmalt

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Re: Building own custom kettles?
« Reply #2 on: February 04, 2019, 08:31:19 am »
Starting with Mega Pots from Northern Brewer I had a local welder who welds at a dairy weld fitting into my kettles.  He had previously done some work for me and so many people commented on how clean his welding was.  When I got the kettles back it was not as pretty as before.  He said the kettle walls were very tough to work with due to the thickness (pretty standard brewing pot thickness).  The kettles function fine and I haven’t had any issues, but I would with go with kettles from Spike or SSBrewtech if I was to do it over again.  If you are committed to the hobby long term, I think those kettles will outlive all of us. 

Online BrewBama

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Building own custom kettles?
« Reply #3 on: February 04, 2019, 09:12:24 am »
I’ve seen Bobby from Brewhardware use silver solder. I have an ancient history in welding and believe I could do this simply based on the video demonstration. He also does flush mount fittings

https://youtu.be/LIkvP55UbxM

https://youtu.be/_NkHlDql8EU

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« Last Edit: February 04, 2019, 09:14:45 am by BrewBama »

Offline ynotbrusum

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Re: Building own custom kettles?
« Reply #4 on: February 12, 2019, 05:18:42 am »
I’ve seen Bobby from Brewhardware use silver solder. I have an ancient history in welding and believe I could do this simply based on the video demonstration. He also does flush mount fittings

https://youtu.be/LIkvP55UbxM

https://youtu.be/_NkHlDql8EU

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Very cool.  Which points further to the tri-clover fittings as the preferred sanitary route, coupled with butterfly valves, but it’s easy for us to spend the OP’s money!
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Offline macbrews

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Re: Building own custom kettles?
« Reply #5 on: February 12, 2019, 11:04:22 am »
I’ve seen Bobby from Brewhardware use silver solder. I have an ancient history in welding and believe I could do this simply based on the video demonstration. He also does flush mount fittings

https://youtu.be/LIkvP55UbxM

https://youtu.be/_NkHlDql8EU

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Very cool.  Which points further to the tri-clover fittings as the preferred sanitary route, coupled with butterfly valves, but it’s easy for us to spend the OP’s money!
What is the perceived advantage of tri-clover fittings on the hot side?  While I understand that the threaded valves need to be cleaned periodically, I find my tri-clover fittings on my fermenter a headache. They are also more expensive. I can see the increase in flow rate as an advantage for whirlpooling but not much else.


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