8 Gal Beer Brewing Kettle w/welded Valve & Thermometer with tri-clad 5mm bottom

Using for brewing beer. I ordered this kettle without reading the many reviews across Amazon for the same kettle from different sellers. After reading the reviews I was fully prepared to return the item if there was anything wrong with it and I was expecting the worst. Please read on because I think this product is a good value but you should know what you may need to do to "set it up". First, the seller shipped the item within the allowed time period and actually 9 days before the deadline. The unit came in good shipped condition safe and sound. Unfortunately the unit did not come with assembly instructions but having had a tiny bit of plumbing experience (just at my own home) I was able to assemble it.The good news is that the pot is very heavy and sturdy. The handles are not only tack welded on but also riveted. The welds for the valve connections looked very professional and smooth, inside and out. Regardless of how it looked I was more interested in if it was watertight and the welded ports were (I quickly tested to 140F). The top was good, tack welded handle which is surely enough to hold the weight of the lid and much more. The ball valve appears to be good quality and the thermometer appeared good quality and was accurate.The bad news was that I had a few bumps in the road getting things situated properly. There is some teflon tape that comes on the male port (at the bottom) and some that comes on the plug which was just barely threaded in the female port (above). After putting the tape on the thermometer and screwing it tight the thermometer was upside down which was unacceptable. When I screwed on the valve it too was not in the place where I wanted. Here is the trick- Buy some extra teflon tape and put a bit more on the threads than comes with it, maybe wrap it 10 more times tightly. When you screw that on it seems to seal and let you leave the valve and thermometer at the desired location (just make sure to get it tight enough to seal properly, its a "feel" thing). If you over tighten it and can't get it to line up where you want you may need to remove and re-wrap (I was told to wrap teflon tape opposite of the direction you end up screwing in). The only real issue I have is that the inside threading on the bottom port has a bit of solder in it and I can't tighten down the strainer tube (bought in addition to the kettle) but maybe 1/2 a turn. I could probably take a file to that thread and make it work within a few minutes but I don't plan on tightening it down between mashing and boiling anyway, just need to keep the wort strained before the boil. I believe the kettle is what they call "extruded" which means they made it from one piece of metal (no seam inside anywhere to leak or rust) and the thicker bottom is some how applied to the bottom on the outside. Stainless appears to be of good quality, kettle and lid.I think if the sellers would share this advice they could eliminate many of the complaints about the ports leaking relative to installation of those items. As far as craftsmanship, I was impressed for the money. It has a smooth milled finish, not highly polished but that's ok with me. The fancier kettles (ie Blingmann) are polished and have some other bells and whistles but are more than twice as much and I only plan to use this once a month. I think it is a good value for the price in my application. Hope this helps!

So far it's been 17 days since I emailed the seller and no response. It appears to be a good quality product from the pictures and description and from the initial unpacking, I guess. However, during the first use I went to pick it up with 5 gallons liquid delight and 1 of the handles snapped right off. Luckily it was when I was picking it up so it only fell inches and didn't spill anything. Also the lid where the handle is welded on appears to be the quality of my first weld. They burned through the lid. The metal flaked right of with a touch, and now I have 4 rust spot there. It looks like there is another weld around the bottom which after washing and drying leaves a little brown rust ring. A little spray of sanitizer on a rag and a quick wipe after it's dry takes care of it, so not a big deal. So all in all, you might get a great product with no problems, I didn't and it seems seller has no intention of correcting the situation.

This is a really high quality pot. It's got a triclad bottom for even heat distribution and is of a thick gauge steel. The lid fits perfectly and the fittings are all SS.Whether you're an extract only brewer (full boils of 5g batches are what this thing was built for) or a newbie who thinks someday you might get into all-grain brewing (this can easily make an excellent HLT or Mash-Tun for batch sparging) this pot is really your best starting place. It's useful for your first extract brew, and your 100th all grain.Now, the drawbacks:The fittings are all no-weld..which is easier to do (it requires no arc-welder), but tends to introduce more crevices to clean so the nasties don't get your beer.Also, as you've probably read, the valve can be a litle difficult to put on. But sufficient tightening (use a pair of channel locks on the inside nut while you tighten by hand from the outside-don't over do it!) and teflon tape will guaranteed fix the problem. I've had to retighten mine on one occasions, but it's never leaked since I first installed it using this method. If I'm not mistaken the silicone gasket goes on the inside, but read the instructions carefully, because using 2 silicone gaskets (one inside and one out) will not help your cause, it will cause you leaks.The Temperature probe of the thermometer is kind of long and sticks out on the inside of the pot. Just try to be a bit careful if you're using grain or hop bags, and use a little nimbleness with your spoon while stirring.That's it for the drawbacks. The thing's 170bucks..if you think you can do better, you're wrong.I made a lot of purchases in my pursuit of brewing...some better then others...but this one was by far the absolute smartest purchase I made. I have now moved to AG brewing and am thinking of purchasing a 2nd one as an HLT.