Finally was able to brew this weekend using this new equipment. I was out of the country for 17 days which was very hard--not the travel, the knowing I had this stuff waiting for me at home and not able to use it. 
Well, the travel was no bargain either.
Anyway, thumbs up on all of those items. Prior to this weekend I'd done 24 batches using a sort of turkey-fryer burner, a Northern Brewer Silver Serpent chiller, and a Northern Brewer 8-gallon kettle. They made good beer but as is often the case, we start this journey and it involves upgrading equipment.
Blichmann Hellfire
The Hellfire is a beast. It will allow you to dial up or down the flames, from a very slow simmer to...well, a Hellfire. It drastically speeded up the task of heating water or boiling wort. This was part of my upgrade strategy, to reduce the time of a brew day.
I neglected to time the heating, but at one point I was running nearly a 10-degree increase per minute as I was heating 4 gallons of water. That's pretty fast. And I didn't have it maxed out.
I bought the leg extensions for the unit, very stable, very solid. It's a fine piece of engineering.
The only thing you may wish to know is that the kettle retaining bars on which the kettle sits, which have the upright triangular piece to hold the kettle in place, will only go in so far. I still had about an inch between my kettle and those pieces. It's not hard to center the kettle, but if you were thinking with a smaller kettle you could snug those up to the kettle, it won't happen.
Spike Brewing 10-Gallon Kettle
I may regret not buying the 15-gallon kettle if I ever get to doing 10-gallon batches, but for now, I'm satisfied with the 10-gallon capacity.
Excellent kettle. There are a lot of decent kettles on the market, this one is excellent. I was able to get it with two horizontal welded fittings, so that I won't have a thermometer probe extending halfway up from the side of the kettle.
With the Hellfire is included a shield to protect the valve and thermometer from the hellfire heat. The Spike kettle fittings are about 70 degrees apart, which meant they both were protected against that flame. This is a good thing.
I like those welded fittings. Very nicely done, btw. I was never completely happy w/ weldless fittings; I struggled at first to get the ones on my NB kettle to seal correctly, whereas the welded fittings have no such issues.
All the equipment is top notch; bought the thermometer with the adjustable face, and the 3-piece ball valve. I use the short dip tube for now, and what Spike says on their website is correct: this ball valve/dip tube combination will move wort or water fast.
At some point I might buy the false bottom but for now, no need. I don't whirlpool so most of the trub just goes into the fermenter.
Jaded Brewing Hydra immersion chiller
It's fast. Really fast. Very strange to watch the kettle thermometer moving constantly as I stirred the wort past inside the chiller.
I did not time it, but it couldn't have been more than 3 or 4 minutes to take that 5.5 gallons of boiling wort to 72 degrees F.
BTW, that Hydra is heavy. I suppose it should have been obvious from all the copper tubing but it is hefty. Moreso too when it's filled with water.
I'm extremely impressed with it. I want to reduce my brew day times and between the Hellfire and the Hydra, I'm probably reducing it by 15-20 minutes, maybe more. I did a double-batch day so I can't really tell how much less time it would have been with a single brew day, but I was done in 7 hours (equipment set up the night before). That wasn't bad.
**************
I've been sneaking looks at complete systems like Blichman's Top Tier, but for now, I'll keep doing this.
**************
A buddy helped me brew yesterday despite temps of 25 degrees. We have developed a way to exhaust steam out a garage window, and use a portable propane heater to heat up the makeup air coming in through a cracked service door. Shirt-sleeve weather in the garage!
The Hellfire caused the table behind it to be slightly warm to the touch, but that was all. We never left it alone, and never ran it without a kettle full of water or wort on it. Blichmann warns against using it indoors or in a garage, but we were pretty careful with it. A lot of the heat it generates is going into the kettle and out again as steam, and the airsteam made sure that heat went outside. And we used a CO detector just in case, which never went off.
We're pretty excited about this--we can brew year-round almost regardless of temperature (I wouldn't do it at lower than 10 degrees), and do so comfortably.
Well, the travel was no bargain either.Anyway, thumbs up on all of those items. Prior to this weekend I'd done 24 batches using a sort of turkey-fryer burner, a Northern Brewer Silver Serpent chiller, and a Northern Brewer 8-gallon kettle. They made good beer but as is often the case, we start this journey and it involves upgrading equipment.
Blichmann Hellfire
The Hellfire is a beast. It will allow you to dial up or down the flames, from a very slow simmer to...well, a Hellfire. It drastically speeded up the task of heating water or boiling wort. This was part of my upgrade strategy, to reduce the time of a brew day.
I neglected to time the heating, but at one point I was running nearly a 10-degree increase per minute as I was heating 4 gallons of water. That's pretty fast. And I didn't have it maxed out.
I bought the leg extensions for the unit, very stable, very solid. It's a fine piece of engineering.
The only thing you may wish to know is that the kettle retaining bars on which the kettle sits, which have the upright triangular piece to hold the kettle in place, will only go in so far. I still had about an inch between my kettle and those pieces. It's not hard to center the kettle, but if you were thinking with a smaller kettle you could snug those up to the kettle, it won't happen.
Spike Brewing 10-Gallon Kettle
I may regret not buying the 15-gallon kettle if I ever get to doing 10-gallon batches, but for now, I'm satisfied with the 10-gallon capacity.
Excellent kettle. There are a lot of decent kettles on the market, this one is excellent. I was able to get it with two horizontal welded fittings, so that I won't have a thermometer probe extending halfway up from the side of the kettle.
With the Hellfire is included a shield to protect the valve and thermometer from the hellfire heat. The Spike kettle fittings are about 70 degrees apart, which meant they both were protected against that flame. This is a good thing.
I like those welded fittings. Very nicely done, btw. I was never completely happy w/ weldless fittings; I struggled at first to get the ones on my NB kettle to seal correctly, whereas the welded fittings have no such issues.
All the equipment is top notch; bought the thermometer with the adjustable face, and the 3-piece ball valve. I use the short dip tube for now, and what Spike says on their website is correct: this ball valve/dip tube combination will move wort or water fast.
At some point I might buy the false bottom but for now, no need. I don't whirlpool so most of the trub just goes into the fermenter.
Jaded Brewing Hydra immersion chiller
It's fast. Really fast. Very strange to watch the kettle thermometer moving constantly as I stirred the wort past inside the chiller.
I did not time it, but it couldn't have been more than 3 or 4 minutes to take that 5.5 gallons of boiling wort to 72 degrees F.
BTW, that Hydra is heavy. I suppose it should have been obvious from all the copper tubing but it is hefty. Moreso too when it's filled with water.
I'm extremely impressed with it. I want to reduce my brew day times and between the Hellfire and the Hydra, I'm probably reducing it by 15-20 minutes, maybe more. I did a double-batch day so I can't really tell how much less time it would have been with a single brew day, but I was done in 7 hours (equipment set up the night before). That wasn't bad.
**************
I've been sneaking looks at complete systems like Blichman's Top Tier, but for now, I'll keep doing this.
**************
A buddy helped me brew yesterday despite temps of 25 degrees. We have developed a way to exhaust steam out a garage window, and use a portable propane heater to heat up the makeup air coming in through a cracked service door. Shirt-sleeve weather in the garage!
The Hellfire caused the table behind it to be slightly warm to the touch, but that was all. We never left it alone, and never ran it without a kettle full of water or wort on it. Blichmann warns against using it indoors or in a garage, but we were pretty careful with it. A lot of the heat it generates is going into the kettle and out again as steam, and the airsteam made sure that heat went outside. And we used a CO detector just in case, which never went off.
We're pretty excited about this--we can brew year-round almost regardless of temperature (I wouldn't do it at lower than 10 degrees), and do so comfortably.
