Can you brew in aluminum pots?

Can you brew and ferment in aluminum?  Or is just stainless usable?

as far as fermentation go's  The pH of beer is about 4.0, but it can be lower in oxidized and sour beers. Yes, there's a reason aluminum cans are lined with a nonreactive plastic. I would not risk it. what you could do if you must ferment  is line the pot with a good trash bag.

I know of several people that boil in aluminum pots, and make fine beers.  It's probably better to let the oxide build up on the pot rather than scouring it down to the metal each time.  So if you like shiny metal, you might stick to stainless, but the heat transfer is better, as is the initial cost of aluminum.

I've noticed that the breweries I've toured have either copper or stainless kettles and stainless tanks (probably because they clean with caustic soda rather than PBW).  For that reason, I have stainless.

h4brewing said:

Can you brew and ferment in aluminum?  Or is just stainless usable?

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Boiling is fine  fermenting I wouldn't