To maintain temp, after pouring in the strike water, I simply put the lid on and pop the pot in a warm oven for the hour. Using the right size pot, so it’s filled to the top, also helps reduce heat loss.

For the sparge, I put around 5 – 6 litres in my 3 gallon brew pot, heat it to the sparge temp and dunk the grain bag in there for about 10 mins.

I discard the grains and the contents of the (2 gal) mash pot is then carefully poured into the larger pot and the boil starts.

This has worked really well for me to date.

Thanks for the comment. I would have to check with the owner’s manual to be sure

Here are my thoughts though: Think of the cooler as a big thermos since it’s the same technology in play. You can use a regular sized thermos to keep hot liquids hot and cold liquids cold. I could put hot soup into a thermos and it would stay hot until I was ready to eat it. Hot soup is generally around those temps…so I think the cooler can take it. Plus, when I have used a cooler before to hold hot wort, it was fine…and many homebrewers use large coolers as mash tuns so I will use their collective experience to back up this process.

Will the cooler be resistant to temperatures that high?

Thanks,
Jim

When I did a partial mash last year with Mike’s help, we used a 2 gallon cooler. It was really easy. We put the grain in, we put the water in, we made sure we hit our mash temperature, and we closed the cover.

An hour later, the mash was still at the same temp.

Without it, I would probably need to turn the burner on and off on my stovetop to keep the mash temp steady. It might help the hour to go by faster, but I have an electric stove and I don’t think the burners react as fast as a gas stove burners do.

I will post my notes after the brew.

Good luck