KA6GZJ
Active Member
09:15 and i find myself standing in front of this metal monster i created feeling a tad bit intimadated. But my starter is ready so it's time to face the unknown. It can't be too bad, after all someone here said it was easy.
I spent a lot of time gleaning info from this forum and found a recipe i liked, so no more excuses. After connecting water and power, i started weighing out the grain bill, 27.5# total. then took a scoop full and tested the mill (new to me also), milled grain looked good so i loaded the hopper flipped the switch and let her fly.
Opened the valve to the HLT filled it and lit the fire and waited. When the water hit 160 i opened the the drain valve and put 7gal into the mashtun, started the recurc pump, set my timer and waited. (I found myself doing a lot of waiting) At 60min the starch test looked good so I set up the sparge arm, moved the pump discharge line to the boiler and started to runoff into it. forgot, i had to add more water to the HLT and wait for that too.
Anyway, managed to sparge 14gal to the boiler with no stuck mash or stuck sparge, my two greatest fears. Now the boiler and I are old friends, so as long as i don't take my eyes off of it life will be good. (a watched pot may never boil, but an unwatched pot will boilover everytime) Boiled, hopped to schdule, through the cooler and into the fermenter, pitched the yeast, cleaned everthing and put away.
total time 6hrs. Seemed like a long day.
I know i can shave some time with a little multi tasking and considered this but i let common sense prevail for the first batch just incase i got into trouble somewhere.
While i was boiling i tested some runoff from the MT, it was a 20, not sure if thats good or bad. The gravity out of the boiler came out a 52 so i think i'm in the ball park for a SNPA clone. Checked fermenter at 21:30, it had kicked off and going strong, once again, life is good!
Next? I'm thinking an oatmeal stout (for the Wife)
sorry this got so long, but the one thing i can atest to is, with AG, the greatest fear seems to be, fear itself.
JIM
I spent a lot of time gleaning info from this forum and found a recipe i liked, so no more excuses. After connecting water and power, i started weighing out the grain bill, 27.5# total. then took a scoop full and tested the mill (new to me also), milled grain looked good so i loaded the hopper flipped the switch and let her fly.
Opened the valve to the HLT filled it and lit the fire and waited. When the water hit 160 i opened the the drain valve and put 7gal into the mashtun, started the recurc pump, set my timer and waited. (I found myself doing a lot of waiting) At 60min the starch test looked good so I set up the sparge arm, moved the pump discharge line to the boiler and started to runoff into it. forgot, i had to add more water to the HLT and wait for that too.
Anyway, managed to sparge 14gal to the boiler with no stuck mash or stuck sparge, my two greatest fears. Now the boiler and I are old friends, so as long as i don't take my eyes off of it life will be good. (a watched pot may never boil, but an unwatched pot will boilover everytime) Boiled, hopped to schdule, through the cooler and into the fermenter, pitched the yeast, cleaned everthing and put away.
total time 6hrs. Seemed like a long day.
I know i can shave some time with a little multi tasking and considered this but i let common sense prevail for the first batch just incase i got into trouble somewhere.
While i was boiling i tested some runoff from the MT, it was a 20, not sure if thats good or bad. The gravity out of the boiler came out a 52 so i think i'm in the ball park for a SNPA clone. Checked fermenter at 21:30, it had kicked off and going strong, once again, life is good!
Next? I'm thinking an oatmeal stout (for the Wife)
sorry this got so long, but the one thing i can atest to is, with AG, the greatest fear seems to be, fear itself.
JIM
