Brew Day Fiasco!!

Ok, my wife left town so I hit the brew store for the first time to use my newly acquired (Xmas) brew gear. It's my first attempt at AGB. Ok, honestly, my first time brewing period. I'm typing as I go along, but if I don't start chronicalling now, I'm sure I'll miss some kodak moments you may enjoy.

The Brew: shooting for a malty IPA. 11 Lbs 2 row, 4 Lbs Munich, .5 Cara-Pils, .5 Caramel 40. 2 oz. Simcoe during the boil, 2 oz Amarillo steep, 2 oz Cascade dry hop. Target OG 1.070, IBU 79.8, IBV 7.4.

First, I'm sure you all know, but don't try to use a 7 gal cooler for a MLT for a 5.5 gal recipe (Damn thing is really only 6.5 gal anyway). Spent 3 hours building the manifold though so was way proud, so for sure I was using it even though I had my suspicions about it's pending evil intent. Was shooting for a mash temp of 152, hit 146-148 after strike. Had no room in the cooler to add hot water, so had to drain off some wort (2 QT x 3), nuke it to 175*ish (I know, I know) and put it back in. Of course as I'm stirring (trying to be gentle) I'm sloshing wort all over because I'm at the rim of the cooler. At least the dog enjoyed it. Oh, and in the middle of the crisis, my 9 YO asks me to play James Bond with him on Xbox. It wasn't the time for that question. I'll be getting him ice cream later. Anyhow, took 60 of my 75 minutes to finally hit 152. A small victory, but a victory none the less.

Lautering went better, but my sparge water temp ended up low again at 162 because my stove turned off when the sparge pot hit the knob. I measured the wort gravity after 1 gallon of running, but I think I somehow misread it because I ended up with 1.165 (adjusted). End running after 6.75 gal = 1.016. Final reading of the whole batch was 1.055, about 10 lower than my target.

On to the boil. Everything ran pretty smooth. Boiled for 100 minutes (@201F here in Denver), hopped it up a few times (wow, someone should warn a guy about the foam when you put the pellets in. That was close), then steeped 1oz of Cascades for 10 min.

Cooling was fine. Used a chiller I built with 25' of copper I had in the garage. Took 30 minutes to go from 180F to 72F. Oh, did I mention is snowed this morning. Should have took that as an omen. Started snowing again as soon as I took the wort outside to chill it. Snow in the wort. It's an act of God so I'm sure it's fine. Just the Big Guys way of helping with the chilling (that and it's 20* out). Oh, and it's now dark outside, so I'm using a flashlight to see.

Took it in and poured it into the fermentor. Grabbed a sample for gravity (1.064) and pitched the yeast I started yesterday. Gave it a good stirring and popped on the airlock. Now all I can do is sit back and wait.

Moral of the story: You can read about it, study it and spend $30 on brewing software to tell you about it, but at the end of the day, you don't know jack until you experience it.

In all seriousness, I had fun (ok, frustrated fun). I'm really curious on how this thing turns out. Anyone out there have a similar experience that can offer a prediction? Thanks for hanging it there on this. I'd really like to get more reps under my belt so that maybe I'll be able to be the guy giving the advice!

Sounds exciting... I'm glad in the end things didn't go irrecoverably awry. Let us know how it turns out!

Chris5899 said:

Anyone out there have a similar experience that can offer a prediction? Thanks for hanging it there on this. I'd really like to get more reps under my belt so that maybe I'll be able to be the guy giving the advice!

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Everytime i brew

9 times out of 10 it will still turn out great no matter how big a fiasco. After some repetition you will have relaxed fun rather than "frustrated fun."

Fun post, bring back memories when i did my first AG 2 years ago. From now it will be easier

You have done more homework leading up to your first brew than 90% of the beginners out there.

Unless things to terribly wrong (which it didn't) you will always have beer as an end product!

One minor counter-intuitive suggestion...put a lid on your pot as its cooling. Yes it will slow it down, put it will help keep bacteria from falling into the cooling wort during its critical temperature range!

My guess- it'll be great! Good work, a chance for a cool snow related name for this brew.

Sometimes breaday will keep you on your toes. I had a black esb I was cooling with a wort chiller and had a bunch of water from it drip in and I feared greatly about infection but it turned out great!

Read, brew, read about mistakes, repeat! I've been doing it that way for 10+ years and haven't ran out of mistakes yet!!! All things considered, if your pitch was healthy and the wort well aerated, you should have a tasty brew on your hands in a few weeks...

haha! sounds a lot like my first time

Chris5899 said:

. wow, someone should warn a guy about the foam when you put the pellets in. That was close)

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My second batch was a Black IPA and luckily I was already brewing outside with a burner. I had added hops, thought I tamed the foam, turn around a BAM!! I heard a sizzling sound so I turned around and saw an eruption out of the kettle. There were hops EVERYWHERE! There must have been at least 1/3 if my already added hops on the ground and all over the outside of the kettle. That clean up was fun

Thanks for the support! I feel better with the reassurance. I'm waiting for the yeast to get active (nothing yet after about 4.5 hrs), but its probably a bit early for that. I'll be sure to give updates on the results.

About the boil over with hop additions- I would recommend killing the flame when you add them!

Glynn said:

Everytime i brew

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Hahaha!
I feel ya: last brewed 10gal AG CDA or BIPA. Burned myself a couple times as normal but also took a shovel to the back of the head.

Could be a more interesting story but it really was just stupidity ( hurt like hell though!)

Always a new experience even when it's your 20th batch

Demus said:

Read, brew, read about mistakes, repeat! I've been doing it that way for 10+ years and haven't ran out of mistakes yet!!! All things considered, if your pitch was healthy and the wort well aerated, you should have a tasty brew on your hands in a few weeks...

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Agree, if your yeast pitch is healthy even if there was some bacteria in the wort from lidless critical temp the yeast should outcompete the crap out of biological contaminants.
Congrats on the brew!

How much headspace do you have in your fermenter? With an accidental step mash like that I would bet you have more fermentable sugar in there than you planned for...

Might want to consider hooking up a blow-off tube just in case.

Can't wait till my first all grain!!

Making beer always better than working!!

(wow, someone should warn a guy about the foam when you put the pellets in. That was close)

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We did. You didn't listen.

I've seen those hops want to boil over a bunch of times and it worries me but not terribly. I have a big spoon and stirring when I add them seems to help.

Sounds like you had a decent brew day honestly, I've had worse. Get your process down on your current system. Consistency and predictability from your setup is crucial. All that aside welcome to all grain, it's way better than extract!

Woke up this morning to my airlock bubbling like crazy. No foam coming through, but I'll probably take the advice and hook up a blowoff tube for a couple of days.

How long do you guys suggest waiting until checking the gravity to see if the fermentation is done? (and what number do you suggest I look for with a starting gravity of 1.064). I'll be racking to a secondary to do the dry hopping.

Chris5899 said:

Woke up this morning to my airlock bubbling like crazy. No foam coming through, but I'll probably take the advice and hook up a blowoff tube for a couple of days.

How long do you guys suggest waiting until checking the gravity to see if the fermentation is done? (and what number do you suggest I look for with a starting gravity of 1.064). I'll be racking to a secondary to do the dry hopping.

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Why? Lots of us have success with dry hopping right in the primary. You'll want to wair until the fermentation is over to dry hop or you will lose a lot of your aroma with the CO2. Try about 2 weeks and then check the gravity. If it is at or very near the predicted FG, drop your dry hops in and put the lid back on for another week, then bottle or keg it.:rockin:

Glynn said:

Everytime i brew

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+1

...it will be beer....

Welcome to the fray.

It will turn out fine as long as you dont get an infection! I was brewing one day and a salesman was scheduled to come over. I thought he was going to be gone in 20 mins but ended up spending like an hour and a half trying to sell me a whole house water filter. I was about 30 mins into my mash when he pulled up. I mashed out after about 2 hours. I thought I ruined it but went on anyways it ended up being one of the best beers I had ever made lol. It tasted exactly like SNPA.

Also back when I was doing AG all the time about 99% of my brew days turned out similar to yours I only had to dump one batch which was a hefe that had some kind of infection.

Keep a spray bottle full of water by the kettle and when it gets close to boil over spray the foam. Works great, easy peasy. I keep the nozzle on a wide spray and a few squirts now and then is all it takes, no boil over! My prediction for your beer, it will be BEER! Enjoy.

After all the trials and tribulation, everything seems to be on track. I measured the FG today, day 7. It measured out at 1.007, which appears to be very good attenuation as the OG was 1.064. Beersmith calculates 7.5 abv, projected was 7.4.

Any advice on bottling? I'll be dryhopping over the next 7 days, then it goes in the bottles. Do I need to add sugar, or does it go in as is?

Thank you all again for all the advice.

1.055 pre-boil SG
6.75 pre-boil gallons

55 x 6.75 = 371 gravity units (GU's)

371 divided by 5.5 (I'm assuming that this was your target volume) = 67

So you should have ended up with a final OG of 1.067 (if you got 5.5 gallons out of the deal). Did you account for the final temp of the hydrometer sample? That might change it a point or two. Most hydrometers are calibrated at 60°F.

Target OG of 1.070
Target volume is 5.5

70 x 5.5 = 385 GU's
385 divided by 6.75 = 57

Your target pre-boil gravity should have been 1.057

You were two points low, so you could have added .5 lb of dry malt extract to get two more points for a five gallon batch.

If my memory serves me correctly that .25 lb of DME is needed for each point of gravity for a 5 gallon batch. I could be way off on that one.

Chris5899 said:

How long do you guys suggest waiting until checking the gravity to see if the fermentation is done?

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I check mine weekly, makes it easy, unless I know its still fermenting. I don't worry about what the fg should be, the yeast is going to do what it wants anyway. When its done you can calculate your attenuation and abv.

Yes you need sugar for bottling. Corn sugar is most common. Boil a couple cups of water and dissolve the sugar in that.....somewhere in the area of 4.5 oz of sugar. Cool it, add it to the bucket and rack the beer on it. The natural swirling of the beer entering the priming bucket should be enough to mix it. Then bottle away.