Recent content by McKraut

what would that setup look like to incorporate a pump? what are all the advantages? i was hoping to just be able to start a whirlpool manually and leave it alone, and siphon it off avoiding most of the trub in the middle cone if possible... i'm not opposed to going that route if the results...

i did stir quite a bit, and even gently hit the coils periodically thinking that maybe the colder water would tend to flow only in the middle of the coils. my goal though was to start a whirlpool though at some point and be able to leave it alone so the trub settled out at the center...

i started out all grain recently, and to go along with that, built myself a nice simple immersion chiller out of 20' 3/8"D copper tubing. it worked pretty well i thought, but had a tough time getting the temps down below 100F... to remedy this, i went out and bought 50' of 3/8"D copper...

where are you placing the strainer bag? in the kettle before hop additions, and just boiling it the entire time, and lift it out at the end after chilling? or, in the fermenter bucket, and siphoning into that? i've heard of people also using a bag on the end of the siphon tip on the intake...

let's see... more details... i got my supplies from austin homebrew, so i kind of used their suggested directions, which was 1.25 quarts/pound (10 lbs) so i mashed with 10.25 quarts (plus about .5 quart to bring the temp up a bit). i then continuously sparged with 5 gallons, until it was...

I did my first all-grain on Saturday, and it mostly went okay I thought... except I didn't take into account the amount of wort I would lose due to avoiding the trub/hot break material at the bottom of the boil kettle after cooling it. As a result, I ended up with about 4.7 gallons, but was...

Thanks for all the advice. i ended up not making any starter as suggested, and just went with the washing process Friday night. I boiled my mason jars, and used some of the boiled water once cooled as my washing solution. I ended up harvesting probably 3/4 of the yeast... I'm not sure how...

I'm about to attempt my first time doing all grain with a pretty standard american pale ale, and also have a pretty standard IPA that is ready to be bottled (from primary, no secondary). I wanted to try reusing the yeast for the first time also, so I was thinking about transferring to bottling...

thanks for the info; i wish the AHS instructions with their kits would have more appropriate details for pitch temps... as i think every one of them just tells you to pitch after you've added some cooler water to your 80F wort, leading me to believe that's around low 70's temp range... but i...

i used White Labs Irish Ale WLP004, no starter, pitched about 75 degrees after very good (manual) aeration; same method i've used for all of my beer so far. i will give it a few days in this slightly higher temp and check it again, and i guess bottle soon if it's stil the same. i just also...

I brewed an Irish Red (liquid extract) kit from AHS, along with two other beers back in December (12/21), and racked them all to secondary on 1/3. My problem arose from haste, and I didn't check gravity on my Red before racking; though I did check the other two which were just about at FG. I...

yeah, i thought the bottle was pretty high quality... is that normally what happens when it reaches the point of too much carbonation? or do they ever just explode in a thousand pieces? or on capped bottles, does it just simply pop the cap off?

i will definitely incorporate all of these... i've always just opened the packet of sugar and dumed it in, really regardless of volume of actual beer i was bottling. in hindsight, i can't believe i did that! and for b) i have tried to stir as i bottled, but it can be tough when it's just me...

yeah, that was another problem... i'm in a third story apartment in dallas that has my beer wardrobes/cellars that are in the dining room that has windows aplenty, facing west, so at about 3pm through 7pm in the summer, it's like 80 degrees in here even with the AC maxed :(

all the knowledge here is refreshing! my next batches will A) not involve growlers (though, i have used smaller flip top bottles, i.e. grolsh without issue), and B) adjust sugar downward. also, i attached a pic.