DFH 120 minute clone

Jsmith82 said:

I purposely stopped and landed my beer in the 16% range, it's wonderful. You could take it higher and the body and hops will back you up especially if you brewed SL's adjusted clone with the extra hops. Let's face it, that's a lot of hops!

I do feel though 16% made a balanced end result for me, 20+ is a little gimmicky - it's fun to brew and the priceless look on someones face when you pour them a pint then warn them the one beer has the same effect as a six pack of bud light is sweet, but even the potential behind a real DFH120 in the end seems blinded by the amount of alcohol in it especially as it warms in your glass.

I'll probably brew a 3gal batch and try to take it as high as it can go but for 5-7 gallons of this expensive time consuming monster, 15-17% is a safe tasty range (IMO).

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Alright you guys sold me. Crashing this beeotch this evening after work. Should be back to 1.008-1.010 by then (16.8 - 17.1%). Or would it be better just to let it finish on its own to allow for yeast cleanup activities?

I just can't believe I got this much out of only using 2L starters for both the 1056 and the 099. I usually have a problem with under-attenuation. Now I can't stop the biggest dragon I've ever tried to slay (brew).

Also, after the volume loss (6 gallons at start of boil) between boil-off, SL's hop boil schedule, trub, yeast cake and SL's dry hop schedule, I think I'll be lucky to have 3 - 3.25 gallons left to keg/bottle. Luckily, I was able to Parti-Gyle 4 gallons of a regular (1.055) IPA from the second runnings. Such a waste of ingredients going on here.

kosmokramer said:

Is it better to let it sit for a couple months before dryhopping?

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I'd recommend you age the beer however long you plan to age it prior to bottling. Then 3 weeks or so before you bottle, dry hop then.

wooby111 said:

Alright you guys sold me. Crashing this beeotch this evening after work. Should be back to 1.008-1.010 by then (16.8 - 17.1%). Or would it be better just to let it finish on its own to allow for yeast cleanup activities?

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I've never brewed one of these monsters, and no planning to. I'll quit at 14% with a yeast that I know will still carbonate.

Why crash? Why not prime and bottle while you still have active yeast. If you put this on tap it, you will be tieing up a tap with a beer that you only want to drink occasionally .......

Calder said:

Why crash? Why not prime and bottle while you still have active yeast.

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Playing with fire with that one... I am going to make this to about 14%, but when it comes time to bottle I am going to make a small champagne yeast starter, and bottle when it's nice and active.

Calder said:

I've never brewed one of these monsters, and no planning to. I'll quit at 14% with a yeast that I know will still carbonate.

Why crash? Why not prime and bottle while you still have active yeast. If you put this on tap it, you will be tieing up a tap with a beer that you only want to drink occasionally .......

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I don't want to crash because I want the yeast to cleanup. But it shows no sign of stopping 1.007 tonight. I know I've heard to add .010 because of the alcohol throwing off the reading, but how dry is too dry for this? I mashed VERY low (146-ish) and long and I'm afraid there are barely any nonfermentables from the malt left.

Decisions, decisions. I think I will just see how low it decides to go and add sugar to keep the reading around 1.008 - 1.010. The whole point was to take this to ~20% anyway, and with the 7+ ounces of dry hopping I'm planning, maybe it won't be the alcohol carpet bomb others have experienced. Heck, i dunno.

I started on mine today. I'm not really following anyone's recipe, but I want to post here since I am following the idea that this thread gave me. I took 6 gallons of 1.105 wort to my 7.5 gallon carboy. Used 4 ounces of cascade leaf in the mash just to get the party started. Then went in
2 ounce warrior 90 min
2 ounce simcoe 30 min
2 ounce Columbus 15 min
4 ounce cascade 15 min
1 ounce simcoe 0 min
3 ounce centennial 0 min

I haven't run that through my software yet but I feel like its a lot of hops. I have about 4 lbs of American hops in the freezer, and I would like to see one of them go into this beer via dry hopping.

I pitched about a trillion American Ale II cells in, and I am going to wake up part of a huge slug of 099 tomorrow. I am going to add 2 lbs of dex to this beer, and hopefully finish at 1.010 giving me 14.25% ABV, which I am hoping a small starter of 099 pitched on bottling day will be able to carbonate. I plan to ferment, clarify, cold crash for 2 weeks, then dry hop for 10 days.

wooby111 said:

but how dry is too dry for this? I mashed VERY low (146-ish) and long and I'm afraid there are barely any nonfermentables from the malt left.

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I believe the consensus in this thread is get it low. Mine finished at .006 and its by no means dry. I have 14.87% and its smooth, huge mouthfeel and nice finish with little to no alcohol present. I brewed yesterday with my friends and cracked one open for them to try. At 8 weeks this beer is great. I already have a little carbonation, lacing on the glass with a little haze from the dry hops. I also mashed at 150*F while scottland and JSmith agree to mash lower to help out with the fermentation. Dont worry on drying the beer out. It wont trust me. I let the 099 ride out, the lowest so far thats been posted is .005 and that took a long time it seemed. After my 4# of sugar additions I still had a thick krausen for 2 weeks before it died down.

Dont know if this helps or not.

Cheers

hopcop said:

I believe the consensus in this thread is get it low. Mine finished at .006 and its by no means dry. I have 14.87% and its smooth, huge mouthfeel and nice finish with little to no alcohol present. I brewed yesterday with my friends and cracked one open for them to try. At 8 weeks this beer is great. I already have a little carbonation, lacing on the glass with a little haze from the dry hops. I also mashed at 150*F while scottland and JSmith agree to mash lower to help out with the fermentation. Dont worry on drying the beer out. It wont trust me. I let the 099 ride out, the lowest so far thats been posted is .005 and that took a long time it seemed. After my 4# of sugar additions I still had a thick krausen for 2 weeks before it died down.

Dont know if this helps or not.

Cheers

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Super help, dude. Mad Thanks! Gonna let it go now, but if it finishes around 1.006, I'm gonna be in the upper 17%. Hope it's not too untastey. I plan 2 months of aging before dry-hopping and then force carbing.

I still haven't finished the full 4-lb. bag of corn sugar I bought for this (down to the bottom, though). The reason my alcohol is high is because I boiled from 6 to 5.25 gallons and lost another 1.25 gallons to hops and trub, leaving me with 4 in the primary..which I feel will become 3 after dry hopping.

wooby111 said:

I still haven't finished the full 4-lb. bag of corn sugar I bought for this (down to the bottom, though). The reason my alcohol is high is because I boiled from 6 to 5.25 gallons and lost another 1.25 gallons to hops and trub, leaving me with 4 in the primary..which I feel will become 3 after dry hopping.

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Explain! I understand the increase in gravity due to the boil off to 5.25 gallons, but do not understand the higher alcohol due to the 1.25 gallons of hops and trub.

Calder said:

Explain! I understand the increase in gravity due to the boil off to 5.25 gallons, but do not understand the higher alcohol due to the 1.25 gallons of hops and trub.

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I dont think it was spoken correctly. The volume lost to hops and trub contains alcohol so although it decreases overall volume it does not increase concentration of the remaining volume

kosmokramer said:

I dont think it was spoken correctly. The volume lost to hops and trub contains alcohol so although it decreases overall volume it does not increase concentration of the remaining volume

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My point is, 4 lbs. of corn sugar added to 4 gallons of primary wort leads to a higher alcohol concentration than 4 lbs. added to 5 gallons. It's not "more concentrated". There's less OF it.

wooby111 said:

My point is, 4 lbs. of corn sugar added to 4 gallons of primary wort leads to a higher alcohol concentration than 4 lbs. added to 5 gallons. It's not "more concentrated". There's less OF it.

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That makes sense. The way I read it, was that you were taking credit for the wort being more concentrated due to the large amount of trub and hops, which is incorrect.

Calder said:

That makes sense. The way I read it, was that you were taking credit for the wort being more concentrated due to the large amount of trub and hops, which is incorrect.

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Nope. Left all that crap behind.

Used a hop bag for the hops and after 16+ ounces, it stole a good .60-.75 gallons alone. First time I've used one and I am VERY concerned about the hop efficiency of the 20 minute to flame out adds.

Crikey. I left for work today with the beer fermenting at 64 degrees in the house which is 62 degrees. I've done 6 beers in the last 2 months exactly like this. I come home today, and this freakin beer has climbed to 78 degrees! 63 in the house. I took it out in the garage an dropped it in a water bath. Hopefully not too many esters from that, it was day 3 of fermentation and it can't have been that high for more than a couple hours. I've never seen anything like that.

bottlebomber said:

Crikey. I left for work today with the beer fermenting at 64 degrees in the house which is 62 degrees. I've done 6 beers in the last 2 months exactly like this. I come home today, and this freakin beer has climbed to 78 degrees! 63 in the house. I took it out in the garage an dropped it in a water bath. Hopefully not too many esters from that, it was day 3 of fermentation and it can't have been that high for more than a couple hours. I've never seen anything like that.

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How much did you pitch? I did mine with only 2L starters of each yeast (1056 - slurry only; 099 - completely fermented starter from 1.095 brewed wort). I was scared to death I under-pitched, but both were steady and deliberate with no temperature spikes over 6-8 degrees.

wooby111 said:

How much did you pitch? I did mine with only 2L starters of each yeast (1056 - slurry only; 099 - completely fermented starter from 1.095 brewed wort). I was scared to death I under-pitched, but both were steady and deliberate with no temperature spikes over 6-8 degrees.

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I'm pretty sure I overpitched. The beer dropped 50 gravity points yesterday so that explains the spike. I tasted my hydro sample, still had a nice clean flavor to it, no fusels or heavy esters. Should be ok.

If it were ever possible to catch a beer on fire, I bet this would be the one lol.

Jsmith82 said:

If it were ever possible to catch a beer on fire, I bet this would be the one lol.

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Seriously. I was amazed at the temp of my WLP099 7L starter. I didn't have a temperature strip on my bucket, but it felt like it was a good 10degF above the ambient (68degF).

Man what a crazy brew. Last night after the temperature spike I put it in a water bath in the garage, and it cooled down to 64 in about an hour. I checked on it before bed, and it was chugging away. Then, sometime last night, it completely erupted like a volcano, popping the airlock out and spewing over the sides of the carboy. I've never had a beer just decide to do that suddenly on day 4 if fermentation. Pitched the SHG yeast this morning. Going to start feeding it tonight.

I like the recipe..not to derail the thread...I'm interested in your tool box build and rims system. Mind sharing?

bottlebomber said:

Man what a crazy brew. Last night after the temperature spike I put it in a water bath in the garage, and it cooled down to 64 in about an hour. I checked on it before bed, and it was chugging away. Then, sometime last night, it completely erupted like a volcano, popping the airlock out and spewing over the sides of the carboy. I've never had a beer just decide to do that suddenly on day 4 if fermentation. Pitched the SHG yeast this morning. Going to start feeding it tonight.

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Sounds healthy

bottlebomber said:

Man what a crazy brew. Last night after the temperature spike I put it in a water bath in the garage, and it cooled down to 64 in about an hour. I checked on it before bed, and it was chugging away. Then, sometime last night, it completely erupted like a volcano, popping the airlock out and spewing over the sides of the carboy. I've never had a beer just decide to do that suddenly on day 4 if fermentation. Pitched the SHG yeast this morning. Going to start feeding it tonight.

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You are a brave, brave man doing this beer in a carboy. I decided to do it in a bottling bucket to make the hydro checks and sugar adds easier. Drew the samples and 1-2L volumes to mix sugar off the bottling spigot.

wooby111 said:

You are a brave, brave man doing this beer in a carboy. I decided to do it in a bottling bucket to make the hydro checks and sugar adds easier. Drew the samples and 1-2L volumes to mix sugar off the bottling spigot.

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I only did because it's the biggest thing I've got, at 7.5 gallons. My buckets are only 6

Had to make the switch. I've never had a beer act like this. Every few hours it has a huge surge of krausen and blows the top off. Crazy stuff... I'm not too worried about infection since its 5000 IBU and currently about 12% ABV after only 4 days

bottlebomber said:

Had to make the switch. I've never had a beer act like this. Every few hours it has a huge surge of krausen and blows the top off. Crazy stuff... I'm not too worried about infection since its 5000 IBU and currently about 12% ABV after only 4 days

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I had to change airlocks 5 times for this brew. At one point my lid on my bucket was domed! I've never had this happen either. It's a fun brew cause usually after I get done brewing I want to brew again right away. This kept my mind off of that. After I bottled this beast I couldn't believe how much yeast was all over the bucket. I thought I was keeping it clean but I found yeast in places that I couldn't imagine got there.

On a side note. I brewed a Rye IPA on Saturday with my generation 5 1056 and I've had to change the airlock twice since. Either I've got some serious healthy yeast on my hands or I have some wild yeast moshing around in the bucket. I love the fermentation step!
Cheers

I am entering the homestretch on my take on brewing this beer. I followed the basics that I've seen in this thread,
Here are my notes

- I did a 30 min bulk bittering addition at 120 and continuous hopped the last 90 mins
- I found a measuring spoon that doled out just the right amount of mixed hops at 3 min intervals into a hop bag. No dixie cups.
- Hit 1.098 OG
- Pitched on fresh WLP001 yeast cake in plastic conical in a cool basement
- Let the yeast slowly work it down to 1.019 over 5 days at <65*.
- On 5th day pitched 3L WLP099 starter with 2# dextrose (it dropped 24 pts on Day 4)
- Rather than measured amounts, I managed the gravity and adjusted the sugar additions. I prepared 6 and 8 oz baggies and mixed and matched.
- Added sugar to target 1.022 for 4 days.
- Added sugar to target 1.016 for 4 days
- Warmed it up and let it drop to 1.009, then 1.006 FG Beersmith estimated OG 1.143 ~18%
- Accidentally overheated it to about 93*, so racked off yeast to a secondary and repitched some spare WLP099 from the starter
- Begin dry hopping in small bags that I sewed up from paint strainer bags.

Take aways:
- The conical works great for this beer.
> I drilled a 1" or so access hole in the top for my funnel, so I never took the top off, which makes up for the big headspace.
> The racking port makes hydro checks clean and simple and also mixes the dextrose easily without a whisk.
> If I were doing this in a bucket, I'd consider putting a racking port/bottling tap on it, a bottling bucket would be too low.
> With all the yeast and potential for muck in this beer, it's nice to dump the trub and mix the yeast up every few days.
- I oxygenated the wort a couple times, but not after day 3. Oxygenated the WLP099 starter on the stir plate. Not sure it's needed when pitched on a cake.
- It tasted good every day. 1.020 tasted noticeably sweet, which is why I kept it much lower than I thought I would though the sugar additions.
- Need better fermentation temperature control.
- It's going to be a long month or so waiting for the the first bottle.

Jddhammer: I'm super jealous about the conical. That would have made it much more simple!

scottland said:

Jddhammer: I'm super jealous about the conical. That would have made it much more simple!

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i just picked up a 14 gallon blichman and cant wait till i can afford to brew this sucker again with the new conicle

kosmokramer said:

i just picked up a 14 gallon blichman and cant wait till i can afford to brew this sucker again with the new conicle

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After buying a $600 fermenter, there would probably be a lot of things I couldn't afford

bottlebomber said:

After buying a $600 fermenter, there would probably be a lot of things I couldn't afford

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lol, i got a great deal from a member on here..... 350 for the fermentor and blichman plate chiler and thrumometer! definitely not cheap, and im not even set up for 10 gallon batches yet but it was a price i couldnt pass up

a side note question.... i need to dryhop and have no bags, i do have about 70 yard roll of chease cloth i got in a cl buy from a wine brewer. how can i use the cheesecloth as a hop bag? i tried tying up all for corners but the bag seemed very tight

You don't like the paint strainer bags from the hardware store?

to dryhop? i have never tried that... i have 8 large grain bags i got in the same cl purchase that i have never used.. i was planning on dryhopping this in the keg,,,should i just clamp the lid with a bit on the bag sticking out?

kosmokramer said:

to dryhop? i have never tried that... i have 8 large grain bags i got in the same cl purchase that i have never used.. i was planning on dryhopping this in the keg,,,should i just clamp the lid with a bit on the bag sticking out?

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I guess if depends on how quickly you're going to drink it lol... I've dry hopped for 2 months with no ill effects. Otherwise there is a ton of advice for dry hopping in the keg on the forum. I don't keg yet personally

kosmokramer said:

to dryhop? i have never tried that... i have 8 large grain bags i got in the same cl purchase that i have never used.. i was planning on dryhopping this in the keg,,,should i just clamp the lid with a bit on the bag sticking out?

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try unflavored floss or very thin fishing line.

badbrew said:

try unflavored floss or very thin fishing line.

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Word. Its hard to get a seal with a little bit of the bag coming out of the lid.

I wasnt planning on serving with the hops in there... just dryhopping for two weeks then pulling out to carb and bottle off the keg

Man I lost a lot of yeast to blow off... When I went to change over to an airlock I had a good solid inch of beautiful white yeast compacted in the bottom of the bucket the blowoff tube was sitting in.

hopcop said:

I believe the consensus in this thread is get it low. Mine finished at .006 and its by no means dry. I have 14.87% and its smooth, huge mouthfeel and nice finish with little to no alcohol present. I brewed yesterday with my friends and cracked one open for them to try. At 8 weeks this beer is great. I already have a little carbonation, lacing on the glass with a little haze from the dry hops. I also mashed at 150*F while scottland and JSmith agree to mash lower to help out with the fermentation. Dont worry on drying the beer out. It wont trust me. I let the 099 ride out, the lowest so far thats been posted is .005 and that took a long time it seemed. After my 4# of sugar additions I still had a thick krausen for 2 weeks before it died down.

Dont know if this helps or not.

Cheers

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This thing finally stopped bubbling last Wednesday/Thursday and is holding at around 1.002-1.003 and 18.5%. It's been in the primary 3 weeks today.

Question...should I rack it off the cake today, or give it a few more days to clean up? There are still bubbles on the surface (by no means glassy yet), but it's definitely done. I worry about keeping it in there too long.

wooby111 said:

This thing finally stopped bubbling last Wednesday/Thursday and is holding at around 1.002-1.003 and 18.5%. It's been in the primary 3 weeks today.

Question...should I rack it off the cake today, or give it a few more days to clean up? There are still bubbles on the surface (by no means glassy yet), but it's definitely done. I worry about keeping it in there too long.

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I would rack off the cake a couple days after the gravity was consistent. These guys racked that soon after fermentation was done. I kept mine on there for 6weeks but my alcohol was lower.

That's some wicked numbers you got there! Nice job on accomplishing that! Seems like as people try this out the numbers get better.

Cheers!