another "did my first AG today" thread.

[chainsawbrewing]

went well. a little recipe concocted, trying to clone a warstiener dunkel type beer.

only issue i had was while my grains were mashing, i ran out of propane, so i had to jet down to the store down the road, and get a new tank, and run back home, get some water up to temperature for sparging while the grains were mashing. i made it in time though! my OG was calculated to be 1.054 and it turned out to be 1.057, and according to an online calculator i mashed 69.2% efficiency. i batch sparged, using a 5gallon igloo cooler for my HLT, and another 5gallon igloo cooler for my MLT.

the only thing that was really "different" than the extract brews i've done is the wort was "grainy" or "speckled" looking, lots of itty bitty peices of "stuff" in it. i'm sure it will all sink to the bottom of the fermenter, and i imagine that might even be part of what makes a "fuller" beer thru AG brewing, but it was odd to me, and unexpected. all in all thought, it really was easy, just like everybody said it would be, and i hope it turns out great! thanks to everyone on here for the help and reassurance they've given me!


brian

[greg75]

Originally Posted by brian williams

only issue i had was while my grains were mashing, i ran out of propane, so i had to jet down to the store down the road, and get a new tank, and run back home, get some water up to temperature for sparging while the grains were mashing. i made it in time though!

That's funny, almost the exact same thing happened to me. I heated up my mash water, and got the mash going. While sitting there, I had a funny feeling that my propane tank may be on the low side (I had a tank from a gas grill that I hadn't used in two years...Weber all the way for me now ). Unfortunately, the tank I had wasn't empty yet, so I had to suck it up and pay full price for a new tank. I got back just in time to drain the mash water, and heat up the sparge water.

It's a good thing I erred on the side of caution, because I ran out of propane on the first tank literally two minutes after firing up the burner to heat up the sparge water. Thirty seconds later, the new tank was connected, and I barely missed a beat.

I'm actually kind of glad that I bought a second tank. Now, I'll always have a backup. I have a Bayou Classic Banjo Burner, which is rated at 265,000 BTUs, IIRC. They boil wort like a champ, but they're definitely not on the efficient side of propane consumption.

[chillHayze]

Nice! 70% is a great eff. for your first AG, let along a batch sparge.

Just wail till you drink the beer and know that you actually made it, instead of dumping in a bag of mystery powder.


Your brewery has a cool name, why not make a cool logo?

[Willsellout]

that "stuff" is hot and/or cold break. You don't see it with extract brews very much. First time I saw it was with my partial mash a couple weeks ago.
No worries, it's good for the beer

Dan

[chainsawbrewing]

Originally Posted by chillHayze

Your brewery has a cool name, why not make a cool logo?

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f46/my-logo-idea-whatdya-think-23086/



done dude. i've done a couple labels also for some different brews. heres one from my first batch.

[IMG][/IMG]

[chillHayze]

sweeeeeett

[BierMuncher]

Congrats. Beleive it or not, if you buy a second tank, it'll pay for itself over time because you won't be paying full price for a fill that isn't really a full-fill.

Sure as anything, we all give the tank a shake and there's some in ther. Is it enough? Maybe. Maybe not. Don't want to take any chances though, so off we go.

With a second tank standing by, let your current tank run dry and then swap it out.

By the way, welcome to the cold break club:

[shlap]

Originally Posted by brian williams

done dude. i've done a couple labels also for some different brews. heres one from my first batch.

Buddy...that's one of the coolest labels I've ever seen. Great work!

[McCall St. Brewer]

I wish I could be that ambitious to do labels like that. I put labels on some of my first 2 or 3 batches and then quit. Most of my beer is consumed by me. I suppose if I were making it for other people I would put the labels on it more regularly.