brutal brew day

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GrogNerd

mean old man
Joined
Oct 3, 2012
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Sterling, VA
just finishing cleaning up a brew day that started at 1:30 this afternoon.

tired. but a GOOD kind of tired; beer has been made today. BIG beer.

think I might have bit off more than I could chew with a bunch of 'firsts'.

first batch in the new MLT, a converted 70-quart cooler with a DIY manifold

first barley wine for club competition in December. I'm not a big fan of big beers, yet. Still kind of shiny, haven't tried too many different styles.

first parti-gyle. paired the BW with a Irish Red Ale, should be ready by St. Paddy's Day.

hit temps fairly close, and started the first running. I was using my bottling bucket, since it has volume markings on it. Dang if I forgot to close the spigot, stepped away and noticed it when I got back. at the time, I didn't know how much I lost, but I was 1¼ gallon short at the end of the IRA running.

boil over on 2ᴺᴰ hop addition. that was an hour 40 minutes into the boil, the level was around the middle of the kettle, I thought there was room for containment. there wasn't.

end of boil, couldn't use my immersion chiller, because the friggin' garden hose was frozen solid. ended up in the kitchen sink with some ice water. actually chilled pretty quickly, got a good cold break.

boil off was significant; a full gallon short of estimated, but gravity was HUGE. dumped a gallon jug in and mixed it in good. ended up at 1.090. nice big beer. not huge, but wasn't going for huge.

finally pitched some WLP005 at 10pm and it's sitting in a nice 65° area of the basement.

egads, I have another beer that needs a boil.

that will have to wait until tomorrow
 
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