First brew ever, a 10gal all grain.

Hi guys, I'm new here... and new to brewing....an old hat at drinking however

I converted two kegs to a HLT and a boil kettle, converted a 60qt Ice Cube to an MLT with copper manifold and fabricated an immersion chiller. The system appearently worked the way it was supposed to. I brewed a 10gal batch of a Boulevard Wheat clone yesterday. My OG was really close to target, coming in at 1.048. I split the batch between two 5gal carboys, pitched one smack pack of Wyeast 1050 between the two and had visible evidence of aggressive fermintation within a matter of hrs.

My plan is to keg everything once it's time.

One question i do have is about secondary fermintation as opposed to leaving the wort in primary. What is the advantage to transferring to secondary and can I get the same results leaving the batch in primary?

Thanks for your input!

racking to a secondary is a good way to get nice clear, finished tasting beer.

Quick question...... How did you go from not brewing to a ten gallon all grain setup? I assumed that many people (like me) started with an $90 kit and worked their way up from there.

i would say leave the beer in the primary for 3-4 weeks. i used to rush out of the primary but i definitely get better results leaving it on the yeast longer-allows them to clean up after themselves a little better. it also gives time to form a nice hard yeast cake that is even easier to rack off of. i would personally go 3-4 in primary, 1 in secondary (to let any remaining/transferred sediment to settle) then bottle (keg in your situation). thats my 2 cents, there are much more experienced members on here.

Dude, hell of a start! Sounds like you've got a nice setup, especially great for a first time brewer. I do not secondary any of my beers unless I plan to store them for over 8 weeks, or I want to dry hop them. Some people use a secondary to get clear beer, but I have clear beer by just using an exended primary (about 6 weeks), and about 3 weeks in the keg. The first couple pints are a bit cloudy, but after that it's all clear beer!

silvervan83 said:

racking to a secondary is a good way to get nice clear, finished tasting beer.

Quick question...... How did you go from not brewing to a ten gallon all grain setup? I assumed that many people (like me) started with an $90 kit and worked their way up from there.

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I simply decided to start there. I knew I wanted to do all grain once I heard what it entailed. I fabricated what I needed to, bought what I couldn't build. I did my homework on the whole process with an emphysis on the mash. I ordered the ingredients and followed the recipe.

Is it me or was there a couple posts on this thread that were deleted? Mods? Anyone?

mine was deleted earlier today, but it's back now...weird.

oh, i see what you did there....and it's called a double post! My posts didn't get deleted...they're right here!

Paraops said:

I split the batch between two 5gal carboys, pitched one smack pack of Wyeast 1050 between the two and had visible evidence of aggressive fermintation within a matter of hrs.

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I know that you said you had an aggressive fermentation within hours with this approach, but next time I would recommend using at least two packs/vials of yeast (1 per batch) or better yet, making a big starter (1-2L per batch) of a single strain and splitting that between the two. In the end, you'll be better off getting consistent results.

It involves a bit of planning ahead, as opposed to going to the brew shop, purchasing, and then brewing, but one of the reasons I wanted to start brewing 10 gallons was to test out some of my favorite recipes with different strains and do side by side comparisons.

I also don't often use a secondary. The only time I'll do it is to dry-hop and IPA, and I usually let that sit in the primary for a good 4 weeks or so.

Congrats on a huge first batch, that's impressive.

Thanks a lot Heinz.

Two Heads..... LOL I just realized the same thing (Double post) I'm a dumb a$$

Maybe one of the Mods can consolidate the two threads. Sorry guys!

Sure thing.

So I'm curious, you said that your OG was close coming in at 1.048, but what was your efficiency?

The expected OG was supposed to be 1.042. i came in above that at 48. Pro Mash spit out an actual efficiency of 70% with the data I gave it after the brew.

That's impressive, congrats. I bet you could squeak the efficiency into the 80's without much trouble.

Thanks man. Do you think my efficiency would increase significantly by fly sparging, instead of the batch sparge I did for this batch?

After I measured my OG before the boil, I was suprized actually. If anything, I thought I was going to be below the 042 target. The fact I got the OG I did when batch sparging was the really suprizing thing to me I guess.

Beginner's luck Heinz!! I won't expect the same level of success with all my brews...I'm wiser than that!

BTW, I did add some "5-2" to the mash. My tap water is sofened well water with a pH of 7.0. Adding the 5-2 had to have something to do with my efficiency don't you think?

Paraops said:

Thanks man. Do you think my efficiency would increase significantly by fly sparging, instead of the batch sparge I did for this batch?

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You will hear both sides, some saying yes, some say it doesn't make a difference.

I would suggest not splitting a single smackpack any longer, however. Best way to go is to begin using starters and washing your yeast (see the "Yeast Washing Illustrated" thread).

As far as use of secondary goes, I use it for clearing, bulk aging, freeing up space, and if I am dry hopping. The only exception is wheat beers (you don't want all that "stuff" to fall out and don't need super clear beer) so I go straight from primary to bottle or keg

Well it sounds like you're hitting your volumes well. The other main aspect that you're probably also doing well is hitting your temperatures. This is all assuming you're getting a decent crush.

I batch sparge as well and consistently get ~85% efficiency. I'm a fan of the double batch sparge, and when I switched from a single to double batch sparge my efficiency shot up almost 10 points.

Bobby_M has a really good All Grain Primer

Also, Flyguy put together a great post about Maximizing Efficiency when Batch Sparging

I guarantee you'll find some useful information in these articles. The best part is practice makes perfect, and practice means more beer.

I was fanatical about the temps. I did a dry run with the whole system and documented heat loss during mash duration using both a non-pre -heated and a pre-heated MLT, with the water volumes I was going to use with my initial batch. I used the data collected from the dry run and combined it with the numbers that Pro Mash gave me for strike water and mash out temps and was within 1 degree of the target mash temp of 155 throughout the 70min mash.

My volumes all worked out well. I think I was a bit below target post boil volume, but not by much. The way I have my vessels put togather, I have a 2 gal dead space to account for, which is no big deal really.

I'll read all the articles you suggested.

Thanks to all the posters on this thread. I really appreciate the advice. Don't worry....I'll be back with more questions! The next brew is coming up next weekend. (10gal batch of a Fat Tire Clone)

Damn, I guess you're a firm believer in the "Go big or go home" philosophy. Hell of a start, but you're making the rest of us beginners look bad LOL.

Congrats and great job. You started almost exactly like I did. I started brewing beer all grain as well with an almost identical set up. Only thing I did different was I made a big yeast starter from a tube of White Labs yeast and split it between the two fermenters of wort. I did start by fly sparging with a home rigged sprinkler we made out of PVC pipe. We then went to batch sparging a few batches later. I then switches to Igloo coolers with a false bottom and a fly sparge setup from 3B. The Igloos kept a more consistent temp for me.

All grain is really easy and no one should be intimidated about starting this way. There is so much information right here on this forum that anyone can do it with minimal equipment. I found John Palmer's How To Brew invaluable when I started and kept the book handy when brewing the first few batches and refereed to it if I had a question during the brew. That book and his other book with Jamil, Brewing Classic Styles can give anyone new to all grain a great primer and set of recipes that help make great beers out the box. I even tried three extract batches (pre-assembled kits from a large online retailer) later on after I had brewed a few all grain beers to see what it was like and if it was even worth brewing all grain. Worst beers I have ever made. I tell everyone I know that brew extract to jump to all grain. If I can do it, anyone can.

My first setup

Gmrpr7 said:

Damn, I guess you're a firm believer in the "Go big or go home" philosophy. Hell of a start, but you're making the rest of us beginners look bad LOL.

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Yeah, I tend to become a little obsessive/compulsive with some things I get into. Plus, I'm a firm believer that if you do your homework, you'll be ahead of the game way before it starts. A little beginner's luck doesn't hurt either.

Smurfe hit it on the head.....all-grain is really easy and no one should be intimidated by starting out this way.

Remember....I haven't tasted the beer yet!! It could end up being a 10gal batch of @$$.

LOL, took me a year to go from "On the stove extract" to 10g All-Grain, and I still have to have help cause I'm using one pot putting my mash into buckets and then back the pot that was heating the sparge water. Lot of lifting of 12+ gallons of water at some points. Congrats on the new setup and welcome to the obsession. I thought I had made a quick journey to 10gal All grain.

Thanks a lot evandam. Like i said, I may have brewed a 10gal batch of @$$...won't know until I taste it. The process, numbers, color...everything worked out well so far, just have to wait and see how it turns out in the end. Let you guys know in about a month!