Making the AG Leap!

[fu_gazi]

After a couple years of successful on and off extract brewing, I am finally making the leap to AG Sunday. I went to my LHBS and got the ingredients to make a Saison.

I have been watching AG tutorials, and have been reading How to Brew, but what experiences, advice and/or tips can you guys offer a AG newbie?

 

[ApothecaryBrewing]

Use the google search bar on this website

 

[fu_gazi]

I have many times, and in fact used it prior to this post, but in addition to the information I found, there may be other users willing to spark up a conversation and offer advice not found through a search...

 

[SwivelHips]

My best advice is to dive right in, learn by doing, make some mistakes and learn from them. You will probably make good beer.

 

[Tupperwolf]

Relax, don't worry, have a homebrew!

Don't stress about time (I felt like my 60 minute mash had to be exactly 60 minutes and I hurried to sparge and fumbled through the steps, as an example)

Take your time. Preheat the mash run with some boiling water in the last few minutes while heating strike water. Have some ice cubes and a separate half gallon of boiling water ready to make corrections to the mash temp. After doughing in wait a good few minutes for the mash temp to stabilize before considering adding a couple of ice cubes or a splash of boiling water.

 

[ApothecaryBrewing]

Overshoot your strike temp. It is easier to cool it down than heat it up. Stir thoroughly and make sure there aren't any dough balls. Also don't dislodge whatever you have in palce in terms of false bottom, screen or whatever. I ended up floating my SS braid on my first batch and missed my numbers.

 

[Sloobie]

Overshoot your strike temp. It is easier to cool it down than heat it up. Stir thoroughly and make sure there aren't any dough balls. Also don't dislodge whatever you have in palce in terms of false bottom, screen or whatever. I ended up floating my SS braid on my first batch and missed my numbers.

I second this. The online calculators for strike temp don't assume heat loss to the mash tun or the air around it as far as I know. It's usually a good idea to overshoot by a couple degrees and then just stir it to cool it down.

I'm pretty new to AG with an MLT myself. I had done BiaB for a while, and now I'm wondering why I hadn't gone AG sooner. The tin-foil to disperse your vorlauf water is a good idea so as not to disturb the grain bed (grabbed that from someone on here). I batch sparged once before going to a fly sparge system. My efficiency jumped from 65% batch sparging to 75% fly sparging, and my most recent batch was around 82%. I'd almost recommend fly sparging as it's a bit more relaxing to just sit back and watch the wort flow, though it does take longer. Just my 2 cents. Batch sparging can get really high efficiencies as well, I just didn't have the patience to perfect my technique.

 

[Fiziks]

Just go for it!

Contrary to popular belief, all grain really is not all that difficult. All you need is a few pieces of extra equipment and a little extra time. My first batch ever was an extract kit and it got infected. After that I went "all or nothing" and switched to all grain. The only real extra work is the mash/sparge (which is mostly just waiting, anyway). Other than that it's pretty much the same. If you batch sparge, that's super easy to start with.

The only extra pieces of equipment I started AG with was a cooler and a strainer. I just opened the valve and used the strainer to keep the grain out of the kettle. Worked fine for me, and you can improve this later if you decide it's necessary (not because other people say you have to).

Take notes on what you do and after you're done, think of ways to improve what you did and what you can change next time to make it go easier.

 

[acidrain]

Take notes on what you do and after you're done, think of ways to improve what you did and what you can change next time to make it go easier.

This^
Careful notes, especially of any mistakes.
Take as many temp readings, gravity readings, etc. as you can. Take readings of each mash and sparge step.
Make accurate volume measurements.
Note how much temps drop or rise of each addition.
Don't drink too much while you're doing this... you'll mess up for sure. Well you'll probably mess up something anyway, but you may not care enough to make a note of it.

 

[Cyclman]

Post and see if a local all grain brewer is willing to join you.

Homebrewers are pretty cool people, and part of the homebrewing mojo is to help others.

Look for a club in your area, contact them.

All grain isn't particularly hard, after a few batches you learn lots to improve your process. The first time always takes longer, as you just haven't learned the proces yet.

 

[JPFuller]

Your not likely to have great efficiency the first time out, don't worry about it. Also you will probably have a hard time maintaining temps initially, again don't worry about it, reserve some boiling and some cool water and adjust as needed and just try to come as close as you can until you learn your system.

In the long run though, probably the best thing you can do, as mentioned above, is take careful, detailed notes, times, volumes, (boil-off too) temps, gravity etc at differen't times in the process. A notepad and pen near your brew area will suffice.

Above all, don't worry much, it will be beer. Good Luck

 

[Gaylord]

I did extract batches for 6 months before I jumped into all grain. This video here is very helpful, I watched it a couple times the night before:



Also write down your steps in order and check them off as you go, that way you'll be prepared and won't forget anything.

Good luck.

 

[stevehardt]

As others have said, take good notes, and have ice and hot water handy.

Also, pre heat your mash tun with warm water to minimize heat loss.

Most importantly, just go for it. It really isn't that hard

 

[fu_gazi]

Thanks for all the replies! My wort chiller didn't ship because of the weather in the South last week, so my brew day has been pushed back to Tuesday. I plan on taking plenty of notes as a few of you suggested.

 

[RazorUK]

Just made the jump myself. First all grain batch was a week ago. Took a lot longer than I expected for that batch, spent time adjusting up and down on the mash.

Brewed again yesterday and hit my initial strike water to 180 and dumped it in the cooler, I let it come down to temp on its own and I nailed my target temp for my mash.

For me I think that has so far been the hardest part of making this leap.

I enjoy the process though, made for a relaxing Sunday morning making 10 gallons of a northern English brown ale.

It really sounds harder to do than it actually was, at least that's my perception before I get to taste the final products!

 

[devils4ever]

Go for it! I brewed for years before switching to AG. Now, I wish I did it sooner.

I have dozens of AG brews under my belt and I'm still learning.