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Hi everyone,
As promised in my first thread linked below, I will do a proper introduction when I am ready for brewday:
http://www.wortsandall.co.za/showthread.php?2222-Mash-tun-temperatures
Any way, lets get started. I am Tones17 from Sasolburg and ventured into the unknown world of all-grain brewing after only two extract kits many moons ago. The control over your recipe that all-grain offers really intrigued me to give this a go.
Below is a pic of my humble set-up costing me really not much money as I found the urn in my father-in-law's garage, the cooler was already just standing around giving me enough reason to get started. The rest of my stuff was sourced from our local Brewcraft retailer.
IMG_20180616_101456a.jpg
So, since I am on leave I thought this is I my time to give this a go and started on Sunday night to grind my grains. I was getting really exited when those grain smells started to fill the kitchen. Now since this is my first brew, I had to gather my strength from another source, as you will see in the picture:
IMG_20180701_190106a.jpg
I got started around 08:00 the next morning after cleaning all my equipment and sterilizing my fermenter. I started with the mashing in. Now since my first post was around my mash tun temperatures, I noted that I mashed in at 70degC and was aiming for 68degC. For a first timer I decided to leave it as such and was probably as close as I would get it. At the 30min mash time, I gave it a quick stir and check my temperature, which now was at 66degC. Losing those 4degC is most likely due to the quality of my cooler box. I will probably replace it once found my stride with my set-up.
Here is pictures of me in my Mash step:
IMG_20180702_093119a.jpg
IMG_20180702_104630a.jpg
After this, I started the mashing out step and followed to slowly let the liquid (is this were we start to call it wort?) drain out allowing the grain bed to settle and act as a filter to get a clear running. Unfortunately I failed to take a temp reading - sorry!!!:
IMG_20180702_105719a.jpg
IMG_20180702_104827a.jpg
IMG_20180702_105117a.jpg
Ok, so this is were things started to get interesting and throwing me a few (or maby more than a few) curve balls. First of all, I do not have Beersmith yet and used an free App on the Play Store as a guide with building my recipe, which I now believe is not really helpful. Let me explain:
I mashed in with around 13L of water and was supposed to do two batch sparges of 6L each giving me a pre-boil volume of just below 26L. The app failed to prompt me and I also failed to take note of the grains ability to absorb water that is basically not coming out. As I made this fascinating discovery, I decided to do a third sparge with another 6L water batch, helping me to get to my target pre-boil volume. Let me also explain that I did not had enough sparge water prepared and had to borrow the wife's kettle to get some more hot water as I was in the process of filling my urn which is also my only source of heating liquid. Here you can see me getting close to my final volume:
IMG_20180702_115803a.jpg
After I was done with the mashing out, I took my pre-boil sample to check my gravity. Apparently was looking for 1.046, and at the time of the picture it read 1.044. After letting it stand a bit longer it went to 1.046 but unfortunately did not take a photo:
IMG_20180702_130133a.jpg
So now the time was around 12:00 and I was really getting exited on the progress of the day and with no major set-backs but I spoke too soon
I proceed to use this opportunity to also insert my wort chiller into the urn to spend the entire boil in the urn, I switched on the urn and away we go. As we approached the boil, I suddenly hear my urn going silent. What the hell!!! I smacked the plug, viciously flicked the self installed power switch on the urn a couple of times....nothing. What now? This was really not the best time for my urn to play tricks on me. I boiled numerous dry batches (water only) and had no issues in preparation for this day. How the hell do I get to the element to inspect the cause when it is filled with that liquid gold? Only idea I could come up with was to transfer my wort into and additional cooler I had that was used to store my strike water in. May I add that the wort splashed somewhat and probably introduced some oxygen into the wort. Really hope this will not be an issue.
Ok, so now my urn is empty and am I able to inspect my wiring. Found a terminal somehow came lose from the switch. I decided to not take any further risks and bypassed the switch completely. Flicked the urn back upright and poured my wort back into, splashing again. I switch the urn back on and we are back on-line. YES!!! Feeling somewhat anxious over what just happened I proceeded to continue monitoring the soon to be boil waiting for that protein break.
You guys wont believe me, but the element starts to act up again. You can hear the element switching on for maybe a minute, then you hear a click sound and then its dead. Few seconds later, that click sound can be heard again and the element goes again. I am not even boiling at this stage. As frustrated as hell I slam the garage door behind me and had to go outside to think about what to do. I decided the only way to save my day was to go and get a new element for the urn and replace it. (I want to add the the element giving me grief was also a new one I installed when I found the urn in the garage) I got back and again transferred the wort back into the cooler. When it was empty I replaced the element and poured my wort back into my urn. I literally had to man-handle my beer to get that urn back on-line and really hope that it will be fine. The fact that I still had to boil my wort, I kept on telling myself that I would eliminate any possible contamination in the boil. I am however not sure if all the pouring and splashing would cause other issues.
Time is now 14:00 and finally I get the urn going again and that much anticipated boil I was working so hard for appeared at 14:30. Trying to control the boil over was really tricky, but managed to keep it under control:
IMG_20180702_143057a.jpg
Another picture after the first hop addition. May I add that my garage was really starting to fill up with a lovely aroma:
IMG_20180702_150955a.jpg
One hour later and I switched the urn off with no further issue during the boil and me being very thankful. Let the cooling down commence:
IMG_20180702_150944a.jpg
I was really getting close to calling it a day with the time now standing toward 16:45, the sun was getting low, I am tired as hell and POOF, by garage lights went dead. I am really starting to wonder at this point what else could go wrong. Luckily I was close to getting done with the cooling and decided I will take a a look at my lights the next day. The cooling coil made a good job at cooling the wort down and at around 35degC, I decided to transfer the wort to the fermenter and move my operation to the kitchen. Seeing that the fermenter was already cold and stood most of the day with sanitizing solution in it, I figured it would assist in getting the wort to pitching temp. The whole day with all the trouble I had for only that amount of potential beer:
IMG_20180702_164034a.jpg
IMG_20180702_164829a.jpg
So here I am busy re-hydrating my yeast as I understand that the yeast performs better this way. I used 110ml water that was boiled and cooled down to around 30-35degC, sprinkled the yeast over and left it for 15min, stirred it and left it for another 5min before I pitched it to my beer wort. I failed to check my wort temperature here, but after the day I just had, I really just hoped for the best
Lastly at around 17:30, I was ready to tuck my fermemter in and hoping that science would take over from here:
IMG_20180702_172811a.jpg
This experience was indeed a baptism by fire and really do hope that the next round will be more trouble free. As I am writing this, I am yet to see action from my bubbler when I check in on it from time to time. I did remove my bubbler this morning and removed some of the water inside it. When I peeped into the fermemter, it did seem to be doing something, so please wish me luck
My recipe was as follows (American Pale Ale):
3.5kg Pale malt
800g Vienna
300g Caramunich II
20g Centennial hop @ 60min
Irish Moss @ 15min
10g Centennial hop @ 10min
10g Cascade hop @10min
Boil for 60min
Batch size 16-17L
Not sure I nailed the recipe as my wort was looking a bit dark for the style I was aiming for?
Planning to ferment for about two weeks and will post an update on my final S.G to see if any fermentation took place. Really not keen on chucking all that effort down the drain.
Any and all comments on my day will be appreciated and I am really hoping the next brewday will be easier.
Cheers
As promised in my first thread linked below, I will do a proper introduction when I am ready for brewday:
http://www.wortsandall.co.za/showthread.php?2222-Mash-tun-temperatures
Any way, lets get started. I am Tones17 from Sasolburg and ventured into the unknown world of all-grain brewing after only two extract kits many moons ago. The control over your recipe that all-grain offers really intrigued me to give this a go.
Below is a pic of my humble set-up costing me really not much money as I found the urn in my father-in-law's garage, the cooler was already just standing around giving me enough reason to get started. The rest of my stuff was sourced from our local Brewcraft retailer.
IMG_20180616_101456a.jpg
So, since I am on leave I thought this is I my time to give this a go and started on Sunday night to grind my grains. I was getting really exited when those grain smells started to fill the kitchen. Now since this is my first brew, I had to gather my strength from another source, as you will see in the picture:
IMG_20180701_190106a.jpg
I got started around 08:00 the next morning after cleaning all my equipment and sterilizing my fermenter. I started with the mashing in. Now since my first post was around my mash tun temperatures, I noted that I mashed in at 70degC and was aiming for 68degC. For a first timer I decided to leave it as such and was probably as close as I would get it. At the 30min mash time, I gave it a quick stir and check my temperature, which now was at 66degC. Losing those 4degC is most likely due to the quality of my cooler box. I will probably replace it once found my stride with my set-up.
Here is pictures of me in my Mash step:
IMG_20180702_093119a.jpg
IMG_20180702_104630a.jpg
After this, I started the mashing out step and followed to slowly let the liquid (is this were we start to call it wort?) drain out allowing the grain bed to settle and act as a filter to get a clear running. Unfortunately I failed to take a temp reading - sorry!!!:
IMG_20180702_105719a.jpg
IMG_20180702_104827a.jpg
IMG_20180702_105117a.jpg
Ok, so this is were things started to get interesting and throwing me a few (or maby more than a few) curve balls. First of all, I do not have Beersmith yet and used an free App on the Play Store as a guide with building my recipe, which I now believe is not really helpful. Let me explain:
I mashed in with around 13L of water and was supposed to do two batch sparges of 6L each giving me a pre-boil volume of just below 26L. The app failed to prompt me and I also failed to take note of the grains ability to absorb water that is basically not coming out. As I made this fascinating discovery, I decided to do a third sparge with another 6L water batch, helping me to get to my target pre-boil volume. Let me also explain that I did not had enough sparge water prepared and had to borrow the wife's kettle to get some more hot water as I was in the process of filling my urn which is also my only source of heating liquid. Here you can see me getting close to my final volume:
IMG_20180702_115803a.jpg
After I was done with the mashing out, I took my pre-boil sample to check my gravity. Apparently was looking for 1.046, and at the time of the picture it read 1.044. After letting it stand a bit longer it went to 1.046 but unfortunately did not take a photo:
IMG_20180702_130133a.jpg
So now the time was around 12:00 and I was really getting exited on the progress of the day and with no major set-backs but I spoke too soon
I proceed to use this opportunity to also insert my wort chiller into the urn to spend the entire boil in the urn, I switched on the urn and away we go. As we approached the boil, I suddenly hear my urn going silent. What the hell!!! I smacked the plug, viciously flicked the self installed power switch on the urn a couple of times....nothing. What now? This was really not the best time for my urn to play tricks on me. I boiled numerous dry batches (water only) and had no issues in preparation for this day. How the hell do I get to the element to inspect the cause when it is filled with that liquid gold? Only idea I could come up with was to transfer my wort into and additional cooler I had that was used to store my strike water in. May I add that the wort splashed somewhat and probably introduced some oxygen into the wort. Really hope this will not be an issue.
Ok, so now my urn is empty and am I able to inspect my wiring. Found a terminal somehow came lose from the switch. I decided to not take any further risks and bypassed the switch completely. Flicked the urn back upright and poured my wort back into, splashing again. I switch the urn back on and we are back on-line. YES!!! Feeling somewhat anxious over what just happened I proceeded to continue monitoring the soon to be boil waiting for that protein break.
You guys wont believe me, but the element starts to act up again. You can hear the element switching on for maybe a minute, then you hear a click sound and then its dead. Few seconds later, that click sound can be heard again and the element goes again. I am not even boiling at this stage. As frustrated as hell I slam the garage door behind me and had to go outside to think about what to do. I decided the only way to save my day was to go and get a new element for the urn and replace it. (I want to add the the element giving me grief was also a new one I installed when I found the urn in the garage) I got back and again transferred the wort back into the cooler. When it was empty I replaced the element and poured my wort back into my urn. I literally had to man-handle my beer to get that urn back on-line and really hope that it will be fine. The fact that I still had to boil my wort, I kept on telling myself that I would eliminate any possible contamination in the boil. I am however not sure if all the pouring and splashing would cause other issues.
Time is now 14:00 and finally I get the urn going again and that much anticipated boil I was working so hard for appeared at 14:30. Trying to control the boil over was really tricky, but managed to keep it under control:
IMG_20180702_143057a.jpg
Another picture after the first hop addition. May I add that my garage was really starting to fill up with a lovely aroma
:IMG_20180702_150955a.jpg
One hour later and I switched the urn off with no further issue during the boil and me being very thankful. Let the cooling down commence:
IMG_20180702_150944a.jpg
I was really getting close to calling it a day with the time now standing toward 16:45, the sun was getting low, I am tired as hell and POOF, by garage lights went dead. I am really starting to wonder at this point what else could go wrong. Luckily I was close to getting done with the cooling and decided I will take a a look at my lights the next day. The cooling coil made a good job at cooling the wort down and at around 35degC, I decided to transfer the wort to the fermenter and move my operation to the kitchen. Seeing that the fermenter was already cold and stood most of the day with sanitizing solution in it, I figured it would assist in getting the wort to pitching temp. The whole day with all the trouble I had for only that amount of potential beer:
IMG_20180702_164034a.jpg
IMG_20180702_164829a.jpg
So here I am busy re-hydrating my yeast as I understand that the yeast performs better this way. I used 110ml water that was boiled and cooled down to around 30-35degC, sprinkled the yeast over and left it for 15min, stirred it and left it for another 5min before I pitched it to my beer wort. I failed to check my wort temperature here, but after the day I just had, I really just hoped for the best
Lastly at around 17:30, I was ready to tuck my fermemter in and hoping that science would take over from here:
IMG_20180702_172811a.jpg
This experience was indeed a baptism by fire and really do hope that the next round will be more trouble free. As I am writing this, I am yet to see action from my bubbler when I check in on it from time to time. I did remove my bubbler this morning and removed some of the water inside it. When I peeped into the fermemter, it did seem to be doing something, so please wish me luck
My recipe was as follows (American Pale Ale):
3.5kg Pale malt
800g Vienna
300g Caramunich II
20g Centennial hop @ 60min
Irish Moss @ 15min
10g Centennial hop @ 10min
10g Cascade hop @10min
Boil for 60min
Batch size 16-17L
Not sure I nailed the recipe as my wort was looking a bit dark for the style I was aiming for?
Planning to ferment for about two weeks and will post an update on my final S.G to see if any fermentation took place. Really not keen on chucking all that effort down the drain.
Any and all comments on my day will be appreciated and I am really hoping the next brewday will be easier.
Cheers
some mistakes was oddly familiar. Oh yes, you can't brew proper beer without something pink in the brew house, you sir are sorted
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