The SWMBO wants a blueberry beer so I says... "sweet... you wanna Blueberry beer, you're makin' it". So, I ran her through the whole process. I showed her how to load a recipe up into BeerTools Pro... explained what all of the variables meant (SRM, IBUs, OG, etc.). She conditioned the grains. I fired up the rig... and away she went.
(I have a 45 gal "semi-automated" herms system. It is all "flip a switch" to turn on pumps and solenoids)
So... single infusion.... she dumps the grains in... pumps in the correct temp and gallons... boom, hits the strike temp dead on. She circs through the herms heat-ex to keep temp. Perfect. 75 minutes at 151 on the button.
Ok... let's run off and then spahdge (we're from Boston). She spahdges... bada bing bada boom, hittin' temps left and right... run off into the boil kettle... WHAMMO... bout a gallon over on final volumn. No prob... we'll boil an extra 30 minutes.
Boiling away a crystal clear runoff since it has been running through the grain bed for 75 minutes... all of the hop additions are dead on. A lb of honey for the hell of it.... irish moss... boom boom boom... like freakin' clock work.
Ok... time to chill.
her: "How do I do that?"
me: "Hook up the hose to the plate chiller, turn it on, and flip these two switches. Know what? I'll just do it quick... no real 'learning' behind that and I'll take care of it for you."
Yeah...
so...
Her PERFECT beer that she had made the entire day?? Yeah... I've made a TON of batches on my rig and while my rotund buddy PTN will make fun of me, I've only had a real mechanical breakdown once... on my first batch... so this has NEVER happened before.
I flipped the wrong switch and instead of pumping through the plate chiller... I pumped the entire batch back into the mash tun that was still full of grain.
DOH!!!!!!
NO good. So... LUCKILY... I'm looking at the mash tun temp and the wort was chilled enough that it only brought the mash temp up to about 165.
I ran off completely into the boil kettle again and boiled for about 10-15 just to re-sanitize. Then I chilled AGAIN and ran it off into the fermenter.
So!!! Whatta ya think of THAT F-up?? I'm trying to figure out what is gonna be wrong with the beer and I haven't come up with anything.
The "Re-mash" wasn't hot enough to pull tannins or anything like that I don't think. Maybe some DMS due to the short "re-boil"??? I'm not going to have the same hop profile since I had a 0 minute addition that got cycled through a freakin' grain bed and boiled for ten minutes.
Any theories on what is gonna be f-d up about the final product?
(I have a 45 gal "semi-automated" herms system. It is all "flip a switch" to turn on pumps and solenoids)
So... single infusion.... she dumps the grains in... pumps in the correct temp and gallons... boom, hits the strike temp dead on. She circs through the herms heat-ex to keep temp. Perfect. 75 minutes at 151 on the button.
Ok... let's run off and then spahdge (we're from Boston). She spahdges... bada bing bada boom, hittin' temps left and right... run off into the boil kettle... WHAMMO... bout a gallon over on final volumn. No prob... we'll boil an extra 30 minutes.
Boiling away a crystal clear runoff since it has been running through the grain bed for 75 minutes... all of the hop additions are dead on. A lb of honey for the hell of it.... irish moss... boom boom boom... like freakin' clock work.
Ok... time to chill.
her: "How do I do that?"
me: "Hook up the hose to the plate chiller, turn it on, and flip these two switches. Know what? I'll just do it quick... no real 'learning' behind that and I'll take care of it for you."
Yeah...
so...
Her PERFECT beer that she had made the entire day?? Yeah... I've made a TON of batches on my rig and while my rotund buddy PTN will make fun of me, I've only had a real mechanical breakdown once... on my first batch... so this has NEVER happened before.
I flipped the wrong switch and instead of pumping through the plate chiller... I pumped the entire batch back into the mash tun that was still full of grain.
DOH!!!!!!
NO good. So... LUCKILY... I'm looking at the mash tun temp and the wort was chilled enough that it only brought the mash temp up to about 165.
I ran off completely into the boil kettle again and boiled for about 10-15 just to re-sanitize. Then I chilled AGAIN and ran it off into the fermenter.
So!!! Whatta ya think of THAT F-up?? I'm trying to figure out what is gonna be wrong with the beer and I haven't come up with anything.
The "Re-mash" wasn't hot enough to pull tannins or anything like that I don't think. Maybe some DMS due to the short "re-boil"??? I'm not going to have the same hop profile since I had a 0 minute addition that got cycled through a freakin' grain bed and boiled for ten minutes.
Any theories on what is gonna be f-d up about the final product?