Homebrewing equipment

From azo.dk

Most people think that homebrewing requires a lot of expensive equipment. Nothing could be more wrong. The absolute basic equipment for extract-brewing can be purchased for less than 500 DKK (75€). But as with many other hobbies, there is almost no limit to the amount of equipment available to high-end homebrewers.

Contents 1 Level of sophistication 2 Extract brewing 3 Partial mash 4 All grain

Level of sophistication

First you have to make up your mind about what level you are going to aim for. Are you starting out as an extract brewer? You only need very little equipment. Knowledge about the different steps of the brewing process is not essential.

Are you starting out with all-grain, then you need some additional equipment. not to say a lot of knowledge and some experince to get it right.

I my opinion, the way to go is to start out with extract brewing, then maybe move on to partial mash, and last but not least, all-grain. This way, the complexity is raised in steps, helping you to master the different steps of the brewing-process individually. Starting out with all-grain is too complex for most new homebrewers because you have to master each step at once in order to brew a successful beer. Lots of thing can go wrong with all-grain, and you risk having some bad experiences with infected or otherwise spoiled beer. Maybe you even quit brewing after a few failures.

Extract brewing

By doing some extract brews, you'll learn the importance of sanitation, how the fermentation process is supposed to be like, and how to carbonate your beer.

Not much equipment is required for extract brewing. Some of it, you can even find in you kitchen. Extract breing does not include mashing or boiling with hops, therefor you won't need a large boiling pot.

• Boiling pot (capacity of about 5 liter)
• Two fermenting buckets or carboys of about 30 liters
• Blowout tube to prevent bacteria from entering the fermentation-bucket
• Hose for transferring the beer from one bucket to another
• Bottles for racking (plastic screwcap bottles can be used)

Partial mash

Partial mash is a variation af all-grain, but

All grain