Hi Guys and Gals,
I just started getting into All-Grain from Extract and have 3 batches under my belt so far, I like light and bitter IPA's and Pale Ales as a preference.
I'd appreciate it if anyone has the time to take a quick look at this post and let me know what I can do better, improve, add, or remove to my process.
Here is my rig that I'm working with
First thing is do is rinse and star san all equipment. I'll even star san the HLT, then run it down the fly sparge into the MT, and into the BK, through the pump and into the Chill Plate.
On the Chill Plate I'll toss into the oven prior and bake at 450˙ for an hour or two. Use a siphon hose and pump the crap out of it all the char, then hook up to a hose garden hose and blow out as much as I can, then soak in star sSan
I just did a recipe to copy the Firestone Walker 31 in the pics here.
This is for a 5 gal batch and with 10 lbs of grains I heated up a little over 3.75 gal of water to a little over 160˙ targeting 145 as asked for. At the same time I heated up 7 gal in the HLT to 180˙
I then inserted my grains into the MT and stir as to get no dough balls, then covers up the keggle with water heater insulation as well as the outer wall
I let it sit for an hour and I didn't loose so much as a degree during that duration.
BUT, here is where i was thrown. The recipe says "Recommends mashing at 145˙ for 45mins, then bringing your mash temp to 155˙F for 5-10mins prior to mashout at 168˙
I was not sure on what that meant, do I spark up the burners and raise the temp or add water form the HLT to raise? So I skipped this process
My MT
So I then began to vorlauf about 2.5 gals until I thought it looked clear
I then began to flysparge
Another questions.....before I flysparge and vorlauf should I stir it few more times? This is did not do.
I fly sparge a small stream as shown above, too slow?
I try to balance as much water going in the MT as leaving to the brew kettle
The target Sparge temp was 168˙and I got pretty close to it
A visual of my process
I had more water in my HLT than needed just in case
I turned on my burners to the BK as I'm bringing it in form MT
I got 6.5 gal into the brew kettle and turned it off. I probably should have added an extra grain but I bought a kit online.
I added some hops (Fuggles & Chinook .25oz each) and boiled to 90 minutes uncovered
I also added in last 5 min of boil a clarifier, what are the pro's and cons of these?
At boil end I popped in 1 oz of both Cascade and Centennial
I then hooked up the BK to the pump and and began pumping, gravity feed at first then pumped from the BK > Pump > Chill Plate > Fermentor
I brought it into the Fermentor pretty slow and it was 85˙F once in the fermentor, maybe i should have went slower, for some reason it was a little warmer whereas most times I can get it to 78˙F ?
I finished at 8pm last night and the temp was 85˙, so I had to wait until this morning to pop in the yeast
I took a stirring spoon and inserted it into my drill and whirlpooled the fermentor to aerate getting ready for the British Ale yeast. I popped the yeast in at 76˙F which is as low as the temps would go with equal ambient room temps
With boil off and sediment in my BK I was only able to bring in 4.5 gallons which was small and the smallest I've ever brought in before.
3-5 days I'll dry hop
Any advice, criticism, comments would be deeply appreciated
I just started getting into All-Grain from Extract and have 3 batches under my belt so far, I like light and bitter IPA's and Pale Ales as a preference.
I'd appreciate it if anyone has the time to take a quick look at this post and let me know what I can do better, improve, add, or remove to my process.
Here is my rig that I'm working with
First thing is do is rinse and star san all equipment. I'll even star san the HLT, then run it down the fly sparge into the MT, and into the BK, through the pump and into the Chill Plate.
On the Chill Plate I'll toss into the oven prior and bake at 450˙ for an hour or two. Use a siphon hose and pump the crap out of it all the char, then hook up to a hose garden hose and blow out as much as I can, then soak in star sSan
I just did a recipe to copy the Firestone Walker 31 in the pics here.
This is for a 5 gal batch and with 10 lbs of grains I heated up a little over 3.75 gal of water to a little over 160˙ targeting 145 as asked for. At the same time I heated up 7 gal in the HLT to 180˙
I then inserted my grains into the MT and stir as to get no dough balls, then covers up the keggle with water heater insulation as well as the outer wall
I let it sit for an hour and I didn't loose so much as a degree during that duration.
BUT, here is where i was thrown. The recipe says "Recommends mashing at 145˙ for 45mins, then bringing your mash temp to 155˙F for 5-10mins prior to mashout at 168˙
I was not sure on what that meant, do I spark up the burners and raise the temp or add water form the HLT to raise? So I skipped this process
My MT
So I then began to vorlauf about 2.5 gals until I thought it looked clear
I then began to flysparge
Another questions.....before I flysparge and vorlauf should I stir it few more times? This is did not do.
I fly sparge a small stream as shown above, too slow?
I try to balance as much water going in the MT as leaving to the brew kettle
The target Sparge temp was 168˙and I got pretty close to it
A visual of my process
I had more water in my HLT than needed just in case
I turned on my burners to the BK as I'm bringing it in form MT
I got 6.5 gal into the brew kettle and turned it off. I probably should have added an extra grain but I bought a kit online.
I added some hops (Fuggles & Chinook .25oz each) and boiled to 90 minutes uncovered
I also added in last 5 min of boil a clarifier, what are the pro's and cons of these?
At boil end I popped in 1 oz of both Cascade and Centennial
I then hooked up the BK to the pump and and began pumping, gravity feed at first then pumped from the BK > Pump > Chill Plate > Fermentor
I brought it into the Fermentor pretty slow and it was 85˙F once in the fermentor, maybe i should have went slower, for some reason it was a little warmer whereas most times I can get it to 78˙F ?
I finished at 8pm last night and the temp was 85˙, so I had to wait until this morning to pop in the yeast
I took a stirring spoon and inserted it into my drill and whirlpooled the fermentor to aerate getting ready for the British Ale yeast. I popped the yeast in at 76˙F which is as low as the temps would go with equal ambient room temps
With boil off and sediment in my BK I was only able to bring in 4.5 gallons which was small and the smallest I've ever brought in before.
3-5 days I'll dry hop
Any advice, criticism, comments would be deeply appreciated
