We build two-vessel brewhouses for brewers who need wort production to fit a tight footprint: hotel breweries, brewpubs, and small craft plants running one or two batches a day. A mash/lauter tun and a combination kettle/whirlpool share the work, so mashing, lautering, boiling, and whirlpooling happen in two tanks instead of four. Fewer vessels means less floor space, less piping, and a shorter cleaning cycle between turns.

Materials and fabrication

Shells are 304 stainless as standard, with 316L offered for wort-contact surfaces where chloride levels in the brewing water run high or where acidic CIP chemistry is used aggressively. Cylinder wall thickness is 3 mm. Dimple jackets are spot-welded to the lower cylinder and cone, then tested at 3 bar steam or 4 bar glycol service depending on configuration. Interior welds are ground flush, pickled, and passivated; the visible exterior is brushed, with a #4 finish on the skirt and platform rails.

The lauter tun gets a laser-cut wedge wire false bottom, 0.7 mm slot width for a standard grind. Brewers milling finer should ask for 0.5 mm — you lose runoff speed but gain clarity.

Heating and process connections

Kettles run on low-pressure steam through the jacket, or direct fire with a gas burner for sites without a boiler. Whirlpool entry is tangential, sized to the pump curve rather than guessed, so the trub cone forms and holds. We route wort, hot liquor, and CIP as separate hard-piped runs with DIN or Tri-Clamp ends, and each vessel carries its own rotating spray ball fed from a dedicated CIP supply.

Common questions

Can one vessel do both boil and whirlpool? Yes, with a tangential inlet and a 20–30 minute rest after knockout. Plan the jacket area for the boil duty, not the whirlpool duty.

Steam or direct fire? Steam gives gentler, more even heat and is easier to automate. Direct fire costs less to install but scorches if the kettle runs dry and needs a clean burner air supply.

What about small versus commercial scale? Hotel and brewpub systems up to about 500 L usually run manual valves and a single pump. Above 1,000 L, two pumps, a grants tank, and PLC sequencing save labor on every turn.

Tell us your batch size, beer type, number of fermentation tanks and available space. We can recommend the tank volume, cooling area and configuration for your brewery.