Flame On!

OK, so I was hoping to start brewing at 8:00am. It's now 5:09pm and I just got my flame going. I'm brewing the Cream Ale tonight and the Barleywine / Barleywine Jr. tomorrow. Here's to brewing!

LOL, Hey I know how those days go!

Brew on Cheese! :rockin:

Ize

My prop tank is about to die.

Home Depot has Banjo Cookers on sale for $45, if anyone's interested.

What a friggin disaster!

First problem: my burner didn't have enough power. I swapped out tanks, I scrubbed out the burner holes. Took forever to heat up my mash water.

Second Problem: Impatience. After waiting over an hour to get water heated to 160, I immediately dumped it in my MLT and put my grain on it.

Third problem: mash water topped out at 136' on the grains. I heated up more water (took another half-hour to get it to 160) but it really didn't up the temp very much.

Fourth problem: Took almost an house to get my sparge water up.

Fifth problem: Took FOREVER to get my wort to boil. After an hour (and a temp of 155) I moved the keggle off the burner and cleaned it again. FINALLY I loosened up whatever piece of crud was gumming up my burner. So now my burner is back at full power.

Sixth problem: With fully boiled wort ready to go, I couldn't get my CFC to flow strongly enough. Eventually I tried feeding my autosiphon through it, but that didn't do much good either.

Seventh problem: While fiddling with my CFC, the water feed hose came loose, drenching me with water. Did I mention it's 36' outside?

Eighth Problem: Don't think I hit my target gravity. Looks like a little over 1.030, but who knows. Wort tasted good.

There were several other minor catastrophe's as well. SMBO's mad because I took too long to brew and didn't pay attention to her.

If this beer turns out, it'll be an Easter miracle.

Man that is horrible, talk about Murphy's law at its fullest extent.

It sounds like this beer's been infected with a curse of unimaginable proportions...have you considered dumping it? I mean, why put sorrow like that in your keg/bottles?

I'm sure it'll all turn out fine. Like you said, it tasted good.

greg75 said:

It sounds like this beer's been infected with a curse of unimaginable proportions...have you considered dumping it? I mean, why put sorrow like that in your keg/bottles?

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No dumping. It'll be fine. It's just being an Arrogant Easter Brew...

It always tastes better when you've had to work for it.

Ize

Ize said:

No dumping. It'll be fine. It's just being an Arrogant Easter Brew...

It always tastes better when you've had to work for it.

Ize

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Another one of those brews where I ended up with my hands all up in the wort. OK, well I O2'd the hell out of it and I made a big starter last night so I had a BIG cake to dump in there. Hopefully that'll beat out any wild arm yeast.

Cheese, sorry to hear about your problems. Relax, have a home brew. I think it was your Avatar. He looks so stressed.

I think you need It would have saved the day (if you had a backup propane tank).

Dont' sweat it and have a Happy Easter with SWMBO.

EdWort said:

Cheese, sorry to hear about your problems. Relax, have a home brew. I think it was your Avatar. He looks so stressed.

I think you need The Power of the Banjo Cooker. It would have saved the day (if you had a backup propane tank).

Dont' sweat it and have a Happy Easter with SWMBO.

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The burner is back to rock-star form. I just need to figure out the CFC. That's the only problem now.

Cool. But you still gotta change that avatar. It's stressing me out. Something more relaxed is in order. Perhaps this one. If not Roobarb will probably snap it up.

wow..... I mean wow.... Not sure if I wanna see her hoo hoo nannies.... The onlything I can imagine between them is her belly button......... Yes it it a much less stressful picture but come on. Maybe a bit more quality over quantity?

Pride forbids me from getting pwned by a brew session like last night. I took some time this morning while cleaning out the gear and figured some stuff out. I fixed my burner - problem was that it ws too tight, so I loosened it up and bored out the gas nozzle. She's purring now!

Figured out the CFC as well, and I think I'll get it to work today.

Barleywine mash water is getting heated right now. Wish me luck!

Cheesefood said:

Wish me luck!

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Good luck man!

Sounds like you're having fun in the trenches!

Atta way. Get back on that friggin brew-horse.

Going much better so far. Mashed in 18.5 pounds of grain with 5-3/4 gals of 168' water. Mash temp is now 145.2 and holding. It's been just about a half-hour in the mash, I'm goign for a 90 minute mash. Water heated up rather quickly. I have a big old starter going (Per BP's instructions).

Sorry about your brew day man....at least you didnt end up with a nice burn on your forearm! (Its not as bad as I thought it was going to be, but damn 210* water is hot!)

Spare tanks are definatly a necessity for brewin with outdoor burners. Having a camper and gas grill, I always have a couple extra around.

Cheesefood said:

Going much better so far. Mashed in 18.5 pounds of grain with 5-3/4 gals of 168' water. Mash temp is now 145.2 and holding. It's been just about a half-hour in the mash, I'm goign for a 90 minute mash. Water heated up rather quickly. I have a big old starter going (Per BP's instructions).

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Right on Cheese! Glad you got the CFC functionable. :rockin:

Brew on man!

Ize

The Barley wine brewing went as smooth as a shaved beaver. Didn't hit my efficiency numbers on it like I'd hoped, and my overall volume ended up short. No problems, other than SWMBO being fed up with me for brewing two days in a row while our son was sick. I think I'm getting the hang of this all-grain thing.

The CFC isn't as fast as I'd wanted, but it worked great. I couldn't believe all the break material that ended up in the bucket. My home-made hop-stopper worked pretty well, but I ended up with a LOT of sludge at the bottom - perhaps a gallon or more worth of liquid sludge.

The keggle is awesome. No more worries about boil-overs! Woo hoo! I really need a site-tube installed though, it's not easy to see inside that thing.

MLT worked great. I'm thinking of adding a stainless braid to my arsenal. I doubt it would have been usefull on a 19 pound Barley wine grist, but it'd be nice for normal brews especially if it can help raise my efficiency.

Next steps are to work on calibrating my equipment for Beer Tools, get the site tube and get that braid together. Finally, I got a little money this weekend as my inheritance from when my grandpa died a few years back. I'm thinking of getting a grain mill.

Cheesefood said:

I really need a site-tube installed though, it's not easy to see inside that thing.

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Just get yourself a nice mash paddle. Then cut a notch in it for preboil, and then one in it for your finished level.

I thought about a sight glass, but figured its just something else that needs to be taken apart and cleaned afterwards. This is just as accurate as much easier.

Chimone said:

Just get yourself a nice mash paddle. Then cut a notch in it for preboil, and then one in it for your finished level.

I thought about a sight glass, but figured its just something else that needs to be taken apart and cleaned afterwards. This is just as accurate as much easier.

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Yes, but no. I have a spoon marked out.

Problem is that there's so much vapor in the kettle that it makes the entire spoon as moist as Orpheus' Mom at the zoo. I couldn't figure out the water line at all.

The easiest thing to do is to shine a flashlight inside and look at where the waterline is. In my keggle, the bottom of the lowest band is the 5 gallon mark.

I also need to figure out better hopstopping. I'm like to make something like a false bottom so that more of the wort drains from the hop trub. Or maybe I just need to go back to using a hop bag.

Cheesefood said:

as moist as Orpheus' Mom at the zoo.

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OMFG. LOL....

Cheesefood said:

I also need to figure out better hopstopping. I'm like to make something like a false bottom so that more of the wort drains from the hop trub. Or maybe I just need to go back to using a hop bag.

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Still have to worry about cold break though....right?

Dude said:

Still have to worry about cold break though....right?

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[ame]http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&hs=eZc&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=cold+break+beneficial+for+fermentation&spell=1[/ame]

I don't know...lots of conflicting reports. Hard to say that it's worth the effort to remove since I'm blasting the wort with O2.

Cheesefood said:

SMBO's mad because I took too long to brew and didn't pay attention to her.

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Shiznick, I hear you there. Had a friend over to brew with on Sunday. Had an AG and PM going side by side, and my friend was making some mead. He invited this friend of his over to my house to hang out, and the guy had the nerve to take my wife's parking space. Pissed her off something nice. So she didn't come down to the patio the whole time we were brewing, and I couldn't leave my mashes or boils unattended. She was not happy.

Cheesefood said:

I also need to figure out better hopstopping. I'm like to make something like a false bottom so that more of the wort drains from the hop trub. Or maybe I just need to go back to using a hop bag.

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I use my false-bottomed MLT. Works great. And if I need to top-off with any tap-water, I can just pour it through the hop bed, which rinses any wort into the primary.

You see Cheese, that's the source of all your problems right there! When you bad mouth my mom, the universe takes revenge upon you!

Sorry to hear about your comedic brew day. My double brew day was marred by an empty propane tank right after getting up to steeping temp and my second stock pot being only large enough to hold 90% of my ingredients. I had to run around town getting propane and trying to find another stock pot for cheap quickly.