Grainfather sales now live in U.S.! Woohhooo

Brewed my third beer tonight with the grain father. First time i used the App. The grain father is worth every dollar. The App is a C-

pagrider said:

Brewed my third beer tonight with the grain father. First time i used the App. The grain father is worth every dollar. The App is a C-

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I agree!!!

I want to comment as a user on two comments

1. I have several STC1000's and the inkird converted STC 1000. The controller on the grain father holds temp better than my old RIMS system and cooler combo with a MYPIN PID hookup.
2. I brew 5 gallon batches and the boil is not an issue. Its a full on rolling boil. It does take time to boil though and an additional heat stick will save some time. Someone posted about a $9 heatstick on amazon I ordered one and am going to give it a try and see how much time it saves.

3. its gets boring using the Grainfather there isn't much to do.

I will comment on my brews once I start pouring in about 10 days.

I've read few issues with controlling mash temps with this unit? Are the founded. I want to order, but I'm nervous to drop this kind of coin on something that can't be trusted.

No issues on controlling mash temps here. Just need to keep a few things in mind, it is actually the temp of the wort below the grain so it will fluctuate a bit at the beginning but settles down after 5 or 10 minutes. The whole time the grain bed is good.

5 brews in and the Grainfather is terrific. I did get the $9 heating element from amazon and that sped things up. 3:40 total brew day including cleaning up with 60 min boil and mash. I was worried because I was torn between the Grainfather and the Pico Brew glad I made the choice I did. If the pico Brew did 5 gallon batches I may have spent another $1000. Thankfully my local shop talked me into the Grainfather.

So far so good. I am pretty happy!

A couple of questions....and I apologize if these are dumb in advance!

Can I brew smaller 2.5 gallon batches using the Grainfather? It is what I currently do with my BIAB setup and its really perfect for my use. I'm not going to be kegging any time soon. Bottling 2 to 3 gallons is a bit of a chore.. I'm not sure I can handle five.. and I just don't drink beer fast enough.

How long does sparging take most of you?

Overall it looks like a pretty awesome product and I love the price savings over the Zymatic and Braumeister.

Cheers.

I have done several 3 gallon batches and it worked great. Sparging takes about 10 minutes. It's a great product.

Thanks Pagrider... I'm leaning toward getting a Grainfather in early 2016.

you want be disappointed. The wort is so much clearer and everything goes so fast you end up brewing a lot more.

They say sold out on their web site last I looked. Where are you buying them from? This seems like a really good deal and I am very interested in one myself.

RMS said:

They say sold out on their web site last I looked. Where are you buying them from? This seems like a really good deal and I am very interested in one myself.

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After a long internal debate on just what to get I decided on the Grainfather and just ordered it last week, should see it later this week. Williams Brewing has them in stock.

http://www.williamsbrewing.com/THE-GRAINFATHER-P3957.aspx

What is everyone getting for a boil off rate with the US version?

.65 per hour

Jkane101 said:

After a long internal debate on just what to get I decided on the Grainfather and just ordered it last week, should see it later this week. Williams Brewing has them in stock.



http://www.williamsbrewing.com/THE-GRAINFATHER-P3957.aspx

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Did you get yours yet? One thing I was wondering. Do the units they sell come with the newer version of the pump filter? The folks at Grainfather recently changed over to a different one improving your chances of not getting a clogged up pump.

DarkUncle said:

Did you get yours yet? One thing I was wondering. Do the units they sell come with the newer version of the pump filter? The folks at Grainfather recently changed over to a different one improving your chances of not getting a clogged up pump.

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Yes it has the updated pump filter and a good thing. Yesterday's brew involved 6oz of pellet hops, which I added into a hop bag and man that filter was packed. Not enough to cause a complete blockage, but it was slow. As it turns out that was okay as I probably would've had to adjust the flow through the chiller anyway.

I Just ordered the GrainCoat!!

Me too! Best part is though, I don't even own the Grainfather yet! [emoji3]

If anyone has been deciding whether or not to buy a Grainfather---there is a sale going on right now until 12/21/15...check out www.williamsbrewing.com

I ordered mine today. Looking forward to more brews in 2016!!

Maybe... If there is a sale at income tax return time.... Otherwise it will be BIAB or my 3 tier propane rig.

I kinda want one...mostly because of their new distilling add on but that's a lot of $$ to drop at once

90 bucks off is pretty nice, but my wife won't pay that much for my Christmas present!

It's worth it!! Stress free and no more back pain brew days. Just brewed my second batch a Belgian triple. If your on the fence watch the grainfather website and signup for there emails. I got mine on Black Friday. They had 10% off there whole site and free shipping. I've already decided if they have the same sale next year I'm going to order the alembic pot attachment to display my grainfather!

It is a lot of dough no matter how you look at it. It is my wife's gift to me and I will be working overtime to pay for it for the next few months.

Win / win as far as I'm concerned.

I having been brewing on a 25 gallon 3 vessel direct fired rims system for the past 5 years. I recently relocated and don't have the room to set that system back up, so I decided on a Grainfather to get back to brewing until I move again.

I have just one brew down with the GF, and while it is very easy, it is also very slow. I know it is unfair to compare to my gas system, but going from a system I had down to 4 hour brew day, to over 7 hours is a real let down. I will note that I heated up my sparge water in the GF, then drained that into a round 5 gallon cooler, and heated my strike water. Next time I will heat all of my water, then drain out the water I need to sparge into my cooler.

In my opinion the heating system is very under powered. I read some of these heat times and I am surprised. It took at least 90 minutes to get to a very slight boil. I guess this could be due to altitude. I am basically at sea level. I cannot get a gently rolling boil (indoors) unless I keep the lid on! Granted, I did have a full 8 gallons in the GF.

I will definitely be looking to supplement the heat source with something like a heat rod. I also just made a jacket for it from reflectix insulation.

I hear you. Automation sounds great after 13+ years of messing with equipment. Would rather focus on the recipe, yeast and hops.

I researched the GF a lot. The design is very nice and the price is very aggressive but I can not get past the need to heat sparge water separately and the low power. I called the company and shared my concerns but they have to go with what they got.

I have 220v in my Garage and when I brew 5 gallons I turn on 8000w of power (two heating elements) and it still takes time to heat the liquid up. Now way somebody will convince me ~2000w is plenty.

So I am waiting on the Brewie to be released and see what issues (or hopefully not) it might have.

I asked the question about 220v GF for US market
This was response
Estee replied:
Hi Paul,

We are currently looking into this , we are not sure when and if this will roll out however.

Best to sign up to our news letter so that we can send you an update on this.

Thanks

Kind Regards

Estee Slabber
Technical Advisor