Home Brewing Tools

The Home Brewing Tools You Need Before Starting

You can’t wait to get started on your new hobby, home brewing. Your mouth is watering with at the thought of sipping that first beer from your home brewing system. Your family is enthused about this new chapter in your life. You have a good friend who is more then willing to help you out. You’ve found the perfect place in your house to set up your home brewing system, and you’ve found a recipe that not only looks simple, it also sounds tantalizing. You are ready to roll. Well almost ready to roll, you still have to set up your home brewing system and before you can set up your system you need to purchase a few home brewing tools.

Tools Needed For the System

One of the most important home brewing tools you need is something to brew your beer in; a brew kettle. Most home brewers recommend that your brewkettle be at least four gallons. Four gallons might seem enormous to a beginner but experienced brewer find that when they use a smaller brew kettle they have a hard time coping with boilovers and often end up scorching their brew. Brewkettles should be made out of stainless steel. You need a couple of containers to use to ferment your brew. You can choose between a food grade plastic bucket with a lid, or a glass carboy with a drilled rubber stopper. Whichever of these home brewing tools you choose should be able to handle five gallon’s of liquid. While you are purchasing the buckets and brewkettle you will also have to pick up an airlock, the airlock is a home brewing tool that allows carbon dioxide, a gas produced during the fermenting process, to leave the fermenter. Make sure you buy six feet of vinyl hose that you can use to siphon your home made brew. Another home brewing tool you will need is a racking cane made out of rigid plastic. The last home brewing tool you should have at hand is a bottle of bleach; you’ll use the bleach to sanitize your home brewing system.

Tools You Need to Bottle Your Brew

Once you have all the home brewing tools needed to set up a home brewing system you will have to purchase home brewing tools that you will use to bottle your brew. You should purchase at least two cases of beer bottles. Make sure the bottles are clean and that they are the non-twist variety. Your beer bottles won’t do you any good unless you pick up a package of caps. A bottle capper will make the job of capping the beer bottles lots simpler.