My First AG Brew Day! (With Mucho Pic's since We all love that)

It was a lovely 70 degrees outside with a nice breeze Friday afternoon in the middle of BFE Tennessee--a perfect day for my first AG! I brewed:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/bee-cave-brewery-haus-pale-ale-31793/
since i was told it was easy and widely liked.

(on a side note: I can only post 4 images for some reason...I had 11 to share)

Ingredients & ph stabilizer:
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I planned to mash in at 153* with my newly built cooler mash tun! Thus, i preheated water to 180* let it sit for 5 minutes to warm the cooler and let it cool to 170* before i doughed in my grains @ a 1.25 qt/lbs ratio. Looks like I hit it dead on.


While I waited on my 60 minute mash to complete I figured a nice glass of Yooper's Dead Guy Extract clone would go well with the weather. (I know the glass is ****ty but that was all I had at home. lol )




Time to drain the mash tun! I did the double sparge, No mash out method seen here: All Grain
I hit 1.044 OG @ 6.5 gallons preboil doing this with the Brewmasterswarehouse crush.
Not too shabby for my first try!
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Boiling time! 60 minutes. Grilled some steaks up during this time and continued to help myself to homebrews...
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Post boil chilled with IC to 68 degrees and pitched rehydrated notty. Post boil gravity was 1.050! That's almost dead on!
This morning it was bubbling away. How exciting.
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It went pretty well overall. Minus the auto siphon's hose coming out of the carboy during transfer and getting wort all over my pants...ha. I hope everyone likes the pics.

(Soooo, with a pre boil OG of 1.044 and a post boil OG of 1.050 what would my efficiency be?)

You can only post four pics in each post. Create another post in this thread and put those other pics up! Nice first brew day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BTW, plug your numbers in here for efficiency.

Looks very nice, I just kegged a modified batch of that same recipe and I'll be tasting it tonight (even though it won't be fully carbed up).

Great job!

It's fun isn't it?

I'm going to throw a wild stab at your eff %, if you were aiming for 1.051 and got 1.050, you're probably in the range of 73-74% eff, very well done for your first AG, in fact excellent, my first two were 58 and 62% respectively, it wasn't until my third that I got 75%

Congratulations on what looks like a successful brew day!

Are you boiling with a propane burner on a wood deck ?

I have this same brew in primary waiting to crash cool and keg. Looking forward to trying it as well.

Cheers

cytokine said:

Congratulations on what looks like a successful brew day!

Are you boiling with a propane burner on a wood deck ?

I have this same brew in primary waiting to crash cool and keg. Looking forward to trying it as well.

Cheers

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Whats wrong w/ boiling with a propane burner on a wood deck? I do it, no problems here...it'd be pretty difficult to cause any damage, except for sticky wort spillage.

illin8 said:

Whats wrong w/ boiling with a propane burner on a wood deck? I do it, no problems here...it'd be pretty difficult to cause any damage, except for sticky wort spillage.

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I do it too. I think many people think the same thing can happen when frying something with oil. Boiling wort is not flamable. If your BK gets knocked over you are going to have one helluva sticky mess, not a fire.

double_e5 said:

I do it too. I think many people think the same thing can happen when frying something with oil. Boiling wort is not flamable. If your BK gets knocked over you are going to have one helluva sticky mess, not a fire.

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The literature that comes with the Banjo Burners says not to use it on a wood deck. I know companies often state such things to avoid even the slightest chance of a lawsuit.

My neighbor uses a propane burner on a wood deck with a big 'ol piece of tile under the burner. I thought that was a great idea. Maybe pick something up from a fireplace shop (for those that are concerned about it).

P.S. I brewed this same beer (10 gallons) on Sunday with the help of Denny Conn and Tom Fries (thanks guys!). It was fun and I can't wait to go for it again! I'll post the pics when I can find the time in the next week or two.

I figured your efficiency was 73.3% into your BK and 63.8% into the fermenter.

As far as using the burner on the deck, I would just set the burner on some cinder blocks as a heat shield.

Congrats on your first AG

Yeah it is ambient temp inder my burner(heat rises) and reflects off the galv. pan under there. It would be damn hard to start a fire on a wood deck with it in any possition.

I'm going to have to give this one another try. My first attempt (my 2nd AG) was my only dumped batch to date.

Thanks for the replies. Yea the wood deck doesn't really even get hot in all actuality thus I'll not worry. If my eff was 63% going into the fermenter then that's pretty crappy. I was under the impression I was at 73ish % in total. It didn't even occur to me that there was a pre and post eff. Honestly, I don't see my Eff increasing at all if I keep using brewmasterswarehouse crush. I did everything completely correct to my knowledge. Hit all my temps dead on.. stirred very well...correct mash times.. etc..
Ugh... who knows...

Perhaps I should let it sit 5-10 minutes after I add my sparge water. Note: I did the double sparge no mash out technique. .. so that's 2 equal portions of sparge water.
Also, if I drain my MLT faster wouldn't that pull more of the sugars out with the wort..or would it make any major difference at all.

Thanks fellow homebrewers

jonbrout said:

Thanks for the replies. Yea the wood deck doesn't really even get hot in all actuality thus I'll not worry. If my eff was 63% going into the fermenter then that's pretty crappy. I was under the impression I was at 73ish % in total. It didn't even occur to me that there was a pre and post eff. Honestly, I don't see my Eff increasing at all if I keep using brewmasterswarehouse crush. I did everything completely correct to my knowledge. Hit all my temps dead on.. stirred very well...correct mash times.. etc..
Ugh... who knows...

Perhaps I should let it sit 5-10 minutes after I add my sparge water. Note: I did the double sparge no mash out technique. .. so that's 2 equal portions of sparge water.
Also, if I drain my MLT faster wouldn't that pull more of the sugars out with the wort..or would it make any major difference at all.

Thanks fellow homebrewers

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63% is not bad at all on your first go around, I was in the low 50's on my first try.

I'm not sure what the temp of your sparge water was, but once i started sparging with 185* water, I got a pretty good jump in efficiency.

I would mash a bit thinner as well, closer to 2qts/lb, if you can fit it in your mash tun.

And Yes, you should let it sit at least 10 mins when you add your sparge water, after you give a really good stir. I like to let it sit for 15 mins, but that's me. Don't sparge too fast, you want to give the grain bed time to setup then you can open it up.

There really is no reason to let it sit after you add the sparge water. Conversion should be complete, so you are just rinsing the sugar from the grain. Just stir really well and drain.

I sparged with 180* water. I'll try 185* next time. Does doing a thinner mash have any effect on the recipe? I just used 1.25 since it is the norm.

Does doing a thinner mash have any effect on the recipe? I just used 1.25 since it is the norm.

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No it doesn't. The only downside is you'll have less sparge water, but w/ a smaller grain bill like Ed's haus ale...you'd be fine. I generally try and stay around 1.33-1.5 qts/lb as a good compromise.

jonbrout said:

I sparged with 180* water. I'll try 185* next time. Does doing a thinner mash have any effect on the recipe? I just used 1.25 since it is the norm.

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This thread has some great info on water/grist ratio.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/2qt-lb-mash-97302/index15.html

a thinner mash is typically much easier to stir, so if you're getting doughballs at all, it might help with that (doughballs that you don't get mixed in will lower your efficiency)