Investment for a 1st timer on Homebrewing

Have you searched this forum for that question yet? Its a pretty popular question that gets asked several times a month, so you'll get a lot of previous threads with answers if you do a quick search. These came up by searching "initial investment" with good info...
http://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/first-brew-equipment-selection.108880/#post-1602316
http://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/start-up-cost-for-home-brewing.43242/#post-546512

1 gallon batches can be done with most kitchen equipment and a simple kit like this...
http://www.northernbrewer.com/1-gallon-small-batch-starter-kit
but I'm a fan of starting out with 5 gallon batches as its more common and you're less likely to make small mistakes that turn out to be a bigger goof like in a 1 gallon batch.

Check these out and read www.howtobrew.com and then if you have any specific questions, post them up! Welcome to the addiction!

 

Not much...go to your local grocery store and ask the bakery section if they have any spare plastic buckets...bakeries often have extra buckets which are food grade.

A cheap aluminum pot of 8-10 gallon size...some extract and a few hops...can be done under 100$...don't let the stigma of extract fool you...Them IPA's are easy to brew.

 

What's your kitchen look like? If you have a decent sized pot for soup and pasta and a medium powered burner and a food grade bucket, you can do a small extract batch.

 

Sounds like you can do a 1 gallon batch with that kit I mentioned in the previous post and what you already have...or you can jump into 5 gallon batches (because let's face it, after all the work for a 1 gallon batch and you barely get 2 growlers worth of beer out of it, its kind of a let down) with a simple kit like this...http://www.northernbrewer.com/essential-brewing-starter-kit and do partial boil (where you don't boil down to a full 5 gallons but however much your kettle/turkey pot will hold) right on your stove top with the same gear you already have too. You can power shop between the web and your LHBS (Local Home Brew Shop) and find the best deal, but finding your LHBS and getting used to what they offer is always a good idea. Your LHBS is a great place to get advice, meet other local brewers and pick up ingredients faster than having them shipped.

I'm not a fan of using old buckets from a bakery/grocery store because if they are scratched, it will be tough to clean out possible microbes that you don't realize that are there, that can infect and ruin your batches. You'll also have to drill a hole for an airlock and you probably won't get a good airtight seal there. You can buy a fermenting bucket for $15 or less and save a LOT of heaedache!

 

If you are going to be brewing in your kitchen, are you cooking with gas or electric? Your beer batch size will be somewhat limited to how strong your heat source is as respects how much water can your stove bring to a rolling boil? Load your turkey fryer pot with 5 gallons and see if your stove will do it. Electric stoves usually have a problem boiling that much water. Gas should be okay. If you can't boil 5 gallons then you'll likely restrict yourself to brewing smaller batches, which is sometimes good because you don't have as much beer to drink so you brew more often and polish up your brewing skills.

If you have a turkey cooker, I'm going to assume that you must be able to brew outdoors on an LP gas burner, so you just saved yourself that equipment expense.

EDIT: also do a search of this forum using 'equipment' as your search word, and search thread titles only. Howtobrew.com is free to read online, and it has a section about equipment.

 

If you are looking for a deal today, NB is running a 4th of July sale - 10% off and free shipping for $59+

If you got the kit mentioned above you'd still need bottles (and a bottle capper perhaps), a good thermometer and a 2g boiling pot.

The step up kit comes with the bottles, capper and a better fermenter but you can't get a IIPA or DIPA with it.
http://www.northernbrewer.com/go-pro-small-batch-starter-kit

 

You can certainly brew a 5 gallon batch via a partial boil. Lots of folks have started off this way and have made high quality beers. It is not an absolute requirement to brew via a full boil to produce high quality beer.

Read the book How to Brew by John Palmer (either on-line or buy the hard-copy) and you can learn all about it.

Cheers!

 

Depending on the yeast you use. A little over a week to about a month is typical.

 

i would do some research first before diving in. check out howtobrew.com or watch youtube vids. plenty of podcasts such as the brewing network, beersmith, and basicbrewing radio. homebrewtalk is also a great forum. homebrewfinds is where you can find some great deals.

 

What that week to month meant is that you can turn an averagely amazing American styled ipa around from brew day to bottled, carbed up and ready to drink, in between a little over a week to about a month. The yeast are done with their main deal in a matter of days. After that, they do some clean up, and the rest of the time your beer is hanging out and all of those flavors with their strange chemical names are getting into agreement with one another as to what to do in becoming in your case, a west coast IPA.
You're on the right track by accepting the reality that you will be reading a lot.