Boiling 12 Litres On A Gas Stovetop

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Thunderlips

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I reckon I've been trying to boil 12 litres now for near on 45 minutes in a 20L aluminium stock pot.
I'm starting to wonder if it can manage it.

Can it?
Or do I need to get one of those outdoor burners?
 
I can't imagine it's impossible.. is it the biggest burner you have? is the lid on? I could boil 20L on my old webber which was a POS, a gas stove should do it easy. Did you start with hot or cold water? If you started with cold water without the lid on, I reckon itd take forever to get there. Start with hot water and a lid on I reckon itd be sweet as :)
 
I'm doing 12L boils on an electric stove top. It takes a while to get to boil but once there it can maintain a rolling boil. Gas stovetop probably is more effective than electric so you should be fine.
I tend to use the tea kettle to boil water before throwing it in the pot. That speeds things up a fair bit.
 
I can't imagine it's impossible.. is it the biggest burner you have? is the lid on? I could boil 20L on my old webber which was a POS, a gas stove should do it easy. Did you start with hot or cold water? If you started with cold water without the lid on, I reckon itd take forever to get there. Start with hot water and a lid on I reckon itd be sweet as :)
Warmish tap water.

Ooops, the lid is off.

Maybe next time I'll boil some in the kettle first.

Thanks Sammus.
 
The lid sure helps.... I've boiled 20L (with lid on) on my stove top and its electric.
 
I often boil 1x 15 and 1x 10 (so around 13 and 8 L) on an electric stove. I start with the lid on and move it to the side when the boil starts
 
If you want it to boil in under 45 minutes, start it then go and do something that you know will take 30 mins in another room so you have heaps of time to come back and check it...before you know it the thing will be boiling its tits off and have overboiled the pot onto the cat leaving you to have to clean up the mess that a boiling pussy has left on your lounge room after scratching the lounge to piece....otherwise as suggested pop a lid on it :p
 
On an old 1970's Gas oven it took me 1 hour to get 14L to boil.
 
Warmish tap water.

Ooops, the lid is off.

Maybe next time I'll boil some in the kettle first.

Thanks Sammus.

What kind of hot water system do you have? If its instant, you have no problem filling your pot with hot water out of your tap!
 
What kind of hot water system do you have? If its instant, you have no problem filling your pot with hot water out of your tap!

Even if you have an electric one.. just means you don't get a hot shower that night lol
 
Even if you have an electric one.. just means you don't get a hot shower that night lol

Apparently not sure about the science behind it someone will know its bad to do it with any other form of hot water.

Can anybody explain?
 
Apparently not sure about the science behind it someone will know its bad to do it with any other form of hot water.

Can anybody explain?

yeah I've heard guys say that that work on hot water systems because they look a bit gross inside, all the scale build up etc. I've tried both ways though, and apart from waiting for ever to get to strike temp I haven't noticed any difference :p
 
ive done 12 litre boils on one of those $20 camp stove things thatuse the butane can without too much trouble in the past so theres no reason your kitchen stove wont manage the task
 
I reckon I've been trying to boil 12 litres now for near on 45 minutes in a 20L aluminium stock pot.
I'm starting to wonder if it can manage it.

Can it?
Or do I need to get one of those outdoor burners?


I used to do a full sized boil on our gas cooktop in a 20l and a 14l s/s stockpot
Did take ages to reach the boil though.

Now I use an electric urn, still takes ages but doesn't need to be watched as closely - more headspace.

So, yes you should be able to do 12l easily on a gas cooktop - be patient....
 
I've boiled 10L on my stove before took a while to come to the boil and that was straddling two burners.......

I reckon the amount of energy required would see buying an urn as a cheaper option within 6months and from there you could easily go AG.
 
I used to do full boils (30L) in a 40L stockpot on a gas stove.

Used to get from hot tapwater/sparge temp to boiling in 45 - 55 mins with the pot in the centre (lid on) and all 4 burners flat out.

Only real problem was the grate/wire mesh over the burners couldn't handle the weight and used to sag so had to support the pot on some angle iron with wooden blocks at the sides.

Got banished to the bbq after a boil-over and breaking the rangehood :(
 
Had to boil 15L in an 18L pot on a gas flame yesterday with a starting temp of 10C.

Here's how it went down

graph.JPG
 

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