From my experience, just about everyone gets way too small a brewhouse out the gate. It’s very rare that someone regrets buying too large of a brewhouse-and I’m talking 30 barrels or less, because buying a 50 or 60 bbl brewhouse that’s where you can get yourself in trouble. Even taking the advice of buying a 10 bbl system, I’ve seen so many regret that, sometimes even within a year or two. Now, with markets getting tighter, the conversation of going too big is certainly more relevant, but when you look at what your potential growth could be, especially since labor costs a lot more now than when I first started brewing, you’re gonna spend a whole lot more in labor doing multiple turns in the long run. Plus it’s a lot more expensive to expand after opening than before (you’re very likely could have to move buildings). You really need to know your market and have a realistic 10-year plan. I can’t tell you how many people that buy a 10 or 15 bbl brewhouse and buy only, or mostly only, double-fill tanks out the gate. The amount you could potentially spend in labor in one year will generally pay for twice the size of brewhouse. Also, you can design the brewhouse where it affectively can brew half batches or near half batches depending on the gravity, which makes a whole hell of a lot more sense than setting yourself up with always doing multiple turns. My favorite size is a 20 barrel system because if it’s well designed you can make anywhere from 10 to 15 barrels on it And also go over 20, which you could get away with not ever having to buy another brewhouse ever again. I designed a 3-vessel 20 bbl system that could do about 12 to 15 bbl of a moderate gravity, and I got up to 29 bbl into the boil kettle for a lower gravity beer. Did that order right before Covid hit and that same order a year would have been almost $100,000 more. Don’t just settle with stock designs and dimensions for brewing equipment. If a company doesn’t want to bend at all, then that’s not really a company I care to do business with because there are a lot of designs out there that are pretty shitty; if you’ve never used a pro set up before, then it’s easy to get taken advantage of.

A dark and a pale ale from the brewhouse can be 50 different beers in production. Different mix, different dryhoping, adding isohops, high gravity delution etc. As you said, better have larger fermentationtanks than brewhouse. 2-5 brews in a tank. I would then put some money into some smaller tanks for mixing, dryhoping small products without wasting tank capacity in the large tanks. Or you are stuck with the high selling products, ie lager, pale ale. I work in a brewery with 250 hl brewhouse and 1000 (850+ headspace) hl fermenters. Its like an oiltanker, big and slow. We don't maka anything less than 200 hl and that is wasted capacity. Mostly filled tanks.

Thank you so much for explaining everything in detail. I'm no where near brewing this size but its nice to know info.

I brew beer in my shed but even there good planing ahead helps a lot. Great video, will definitely dive in into your channel as I'm thinking of going big! Greetings from UK.

I am the head brewer at a brewery with a 5 BBL/ 2 V brewhouse, we have 4,5 BBL uni's and 4, 10 BBL uni's. we have 25 beers on tap and sell about 20-30 1/2 BBL's per week. Sometimes we brew 3-4 times per week, sometimes just1or 2. on rare occasions we will do 2 turns of the same beer.

Thanks for sharing all these uncommon knowledge. Good luck with the relaunch of your channel. You deserve to have way more subscribers and views...

This bloke makes a lot of sense.

Nice video, as a homebrew guy this was very interesting, cheers!

Really grounded and quality advice. Top stuff! Thank you :)

Thanks for this video. I've just found your channel and subscribed, and look forward to see more of your content. Cheers!

So much great information …thank you !

Hey man, love the video, it will help me a lot! But i noticed your background... is it from breaking bad?

Great content Hendo!, Looking forward to your future videos.

Cheers Hendo- great video!

Really cool information , thanks a lot Rockstar

Two quetions Hendo. 1. How do I work out my forecast for beer production? 2. What is "high gravity" beer production and what is it about it that makes you so enthusiastic?

Best video yet... good work. Keep it up hendo. Cheers 🍻

saved a lot of time and paper watching this video, cheers mate!!

Great video thank you.

Your tips are awesome thanks a lot

LEGEND

Would a bright tank be a good option for pressure fermentation?

Hey there Hendo, thanks for sharing these tips and tricks, a question I have (similar to the question below) where should I aim for in regards to PH? I know mash is 5.5 / 5.2 and always check my final runnings is not over 5.8 but where do I need to be at kettle up, F/O and final beer or finished beer PH? Cheers Hendo, Mike 🍻🍻

100 cases is 85litres

How do you know how much beer are you going to sell??

What should you calculate regarding revenue? How much income pr hl?

Hey Hendo, I love your videos being technical but concise. My tap water is 800ppm and I manage to get it down to 45ppm with a reverse osmosis. Waste water has 1100ppm and have large amount of this. Can I use this 1100ppm water for my cleaning? Also, should sparge water have the same water profile as the brewing water or RO water is fine? Cheers!

Hey am from south Africa am a learning brewer but my beer shelf life only make one week how can I extend my beer shelf life and what kind of sterilized chemicals must I use. I Wil appreciate you feed back.

What are some filtration options for Hazy IPA'S

nice🍻

Hi Hendo thanks for the great content I'd like to ask about what you said about being able to fill 1 fermentation tank with several brews. How does one go about this? Do you pitch the yeast after the first brew and simply top up the fermenter with more wort and yeast after the follow up brews? Or add the yeast once all the brews are in the fermenter? What is the limit with how long wort can sit in the fermenter without pitching yeast?

High gravity brewing is a technique developed by accountants and engineers to maximise beer volume production over cost. If wort and beer quality are paramount, then HG brewing is off the table.