I had the same problems with the braided hose, kept clogging, both in my mash tun and boil kettle. in the mash tun I've switched to a copper manifold with slots on the bottom, and the boil kettle I went and bought a $20 stainless splash guard from bed bath bulls*** and more (also available on amazon), ripped the handle off, welded on a piece of stainless to plug up the opening where the handle was (though you could probably use food grade silicone to seal it up as well) cut a small hole in the top for my pickup and works like a charm! I also am completely cone incapable, but ah well. beats the $80 false bottom that home brew stores sell, even if they are a bit beefier.