Today I screwed up by...

[Jhedrick83]

We’re all human, we’re all going to screw up. Thought it might be fun to have a thread where we post our screwups.

for example, this morning I took a phone call while getting ready to pull my bag out at the end of the mash. Then, not remembering to takeoff my Refelectix wrap, I cranked the gas up to high. Didn’t take long to notice the burning Reflectix smell or the flames coming up the side of my kettle! Got it put out quickly so all is well.

So, what’s your latest screw up?

 

[NewJersey]

We’re all human, we’re all going to screw up. Thought it might be fun to have a thread where we post our screwups.

for example, this morning I took a phone call while getting ready to pull my bag out at the end of the mash. Then, not remembering to takeoff my Refelectix wrap, I cranked the gas up to high. Didn’t take long to notice the burning Reflectix smell or the flames coming up the side of my kettle! Got it put out quickly so all is well.

So, what’s your latest screw up?

Sounds like the problem is brewing using gas.
Come to the electric side!

 

[Barbarossa]

Sounds like the problem is brewing using gas.
Come to the electric side!

Come! We have cookies!

 

[Jhedrick83]

Sounds like the problem is brewing using gas.
Come to the electric side!

Come! We have cookies!

I’m in the middle of a home addition and right now the garage is stuffed full of materials. I’m debating building a brew stand in the garage and going to induction when that wraps up around the end of May.

 

[NewJersey]

I’m in the middle of a home addition and right now the garage is stuffed full of materials. I’m debating building a brew stand in the garage and going to induction when that wraps up around the end of May.

Don't bother with induction OR a brewstand. (Imo anyways)

 

[ReaperOnefour]

A few months ago i brewed an American red ale. Everything went well. Boiled, chilled the wort, then transferred it to the fermenter. Then just like Jhedrick83 did i took a phone call & i got distracted. I sealed up my fermenter & put it away. The next morning i checked on it & i noticed it had not yet started to ferment. I checked on it again that night, still nothing. At this point I was starting to get a little concerned. It was then when my wife found the packet of US-05 sitting on the kitchen counter. She found it while she was cleaning. You know that feeling when you do something really stuiped, & your face gets hot. HAHAHA. I pitched the yeast, luckily the beer still turned out good.

 

[Jhedrick83]

Common theme is just never answer the phone!

 

[ReaperOnefour]

Hahaha. Yeah. I haven't answered a phone call since. Either that or I have my wife answer the phone, & say that I'm busy.

 

[bracconiere]

Come to the electric side!

 

[seatazzz]

Couple of years ago I was brewing what was supposed to be a nice light IPA with Mosaic. Mash went well, got it on the boil, set the timer on my phone, then settled in for a 45 minute nap to first addition. 45 minutes turned into 2 hours. Wound up with 3 gallons instead of the intended 5, a LOT stronger than I wanted, but it turned out good. About 5 brews ago, dropped what I THOUGHT was the bittering hops into the boil; after about 30 minutes to check on it, found the solo cup with the bittering hops still sitting next to the brewstand. Added marbles to the bag, forgot hops. Still turned out okay.

 

[Murphys_Law]

Brewed a pilsner yesterday and about 40 mins into the boil I realized I never added the calcium chloride in my (RO) water addition. Oh well. We'll see how this one turns out!

 

[zacster]

On my last batch everything went smoothly until I told my wife to turn on the spigot that my chiller was attached to. It was then I saw the packet of whirlfloc. Oh well. I threw one in and everything is OK almost 2 weeks later and the beer is cold crashing nice and clear.

 

[pvpeacock]

Poured my yeast starter into my conical and heard the stir bar go "plunk" into the fermenter. I didn't worry much about it figuring it would come out when I dumped the trub and yeast a few days later. When I went to dump the trub/yeast, the stir bar got stuck in the ball valve so I couldn't close it. If I couldn't figure out a solution quick, that meant as much as 5 gallons of beer all over my garage floor. Luckily, the trub/yeast was so thick, I had time to grab another ball valve and attach it to the end of the stuck ball valve and close the second valve. I finally got the stir bar out of the stuck ball valve after I transferred the beer to a keg a week or so later. That was a few years ago......but I did it again just a few weeks ago! Luckily, I immediately knew what do do this time.

 

[day_trippr]

Ahahahaha! ^epic^! And quick thinking!

 

[wepeeler]

Brew day tomorrow! Made a yeast starter on Tuesday. Built it up so I could harvest, which I did tonight. Went to cold crash the flask in my keezer, and boy did I crash it - right into my CO2 tank! Flask cracked and all my yeast went swimming to the bottom of my keezer. Managed to salvage some from the bottom of the flask, and I can still use what I managed to harvest. What's that saying? RDWHAHB? FML...

 

[day_trippr]

^yikes^

Good luck!

 

[TalonsUpPuckDown]

Finished bottling a Zombie Dust clone and reached for the distilled water to start the yeast washing process. Unfortunately the bottle I grabbed, which had the same size, same color, and same looking label as what I was looking for, was not distilled water but instead ... distilled vinegar. Oops. Well, so much for that batch of yeast.

I now keep a stock of distilled water stored with my brew equipment that's physically separated from the household supply cabinet.

 

[Bill Tong]

First time i used an auto siphon to transfer my heavily dry hopped APA from primary to bottling bucket the tubing didn't fit properly. It was sucking in more air than beer.

Then when it was all transferred, i saw a massive leak on the spigot of the bottling bucket. I still had to wash and sanitize some bottles, with my beer dripping out.

Beer turned out fantastic! It did start to drop off by month 5 or so, but by then i only had 2 bottles left anyway.

 

[danimal92sport]

Letting my 5lb CO2 tank empty itself through a disconnected ball lock connector

 

[seatazzz]

Today. Keep telling myself every brewday that I need to herd cats earlier; youngest one knows to the second when it's time to go in the house, and hides in the rafters of the garage. No amount of shaking the treat can would budge him, little sh*t. Managed to get chilling done by just cracking the garage door and shoving hoses out. Then....could NOT find the bung for the fermonster to save my life. I have three; two I know where they are (currently in use) but the third one flew somewhere. Hurried up and changed out a bung for a carboy cap/blowoff setup and back in business, but the delay from this and chasing idiot cat cost me .5 gallon in volume that boiled off, in a rather expensive (hop-wise) IPA.

 

[Tom R]

I was hoping you were going to find out that the cat had the bung.

 

[seatazzz]

I was hoping you were going to find out that the cat had the bung.

When he was a kitten he DID play with the smaller ones (the ones that fit in the bucket lids) but he can't get his mouth around the bigger ones to hide them.

 

[Snark_Wolf_Brewing]

Didn't screw up today...but two days ago, I screwed up by buying a brand new mini fridge without measuring to be sure my kegs would fit. (door won't shut with the keg in the fridge. D'OH!!!! ) My father-in-law said he might do some horse trading with me and let me have a freezer he has no use for in exchange for the fridge. If I don't hear something from him soon, I'm going to go ahead and modify the fridge to fit my keg by adding a wood collar screwed together out of some 2x6 lumber to the front and re-attaching the door and hinge assembly.

 

[Jhedrick83]

Making two batches today. First one went off without a hitch. Just got done mashing in the second batch and I grabbed my pure pitch pack to see how warm it was getting. Then, I noticed the best by date on it. 1/9/21.... I just picked it up from LHBS on Thursday. To make it worse, brew number two is a Belgian triple. Expecting an OG of 1.096. LHBS is closed tomorrow and I have nothing on hand to make a starter with. Looks like I’m going to pitch it anyway and just see what happens.

EDIT: then my O2 tank ran out like 10 seconds into aeration. Totally crushed brew #2 today.

 

[3 Dawg Night]

Didn't screw up today...but two days ago, I screwed up by buying a brand new mini fridge without measuring to be sure my kegs would fit. (door won't shut with the keg in the fridge. D'OH!!!! ) My father-in-law said he might do some horse trading with me and let me have a freezer he has no use for in exchange for the fridge. If I don't hear something from him soon, I'm going to go ahead and modify the fridge to fit my keg by adding a wood collar screwed together out of some 2x6 lumber to the front and re-attaching the door and hinge assembly.

I did exactly that for my mini-fridge fermentation chamber, based on this thread.

 

[kevin58]

It wasn't today but a couple of weeks ago on my first brewday since last November... I put the false bottom into my mash tun upside down so that it was laying flat on the bottom with no dead space. Didn't notice until cleanup.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

I was brewing a NEIPA and my son and nephew wanted to learn about the process. I was showing them how I use the same hoist that's for lifting the brew bag to hang a bucket of grain when doughing in. That way I can stir with one hand and tilt the bucket of grain to pour it in with the other.

I'm feeling really good about my setup and what I'm teaching them. To let them get involved, I have them add the grains, check for dough balls, etc. which took quite a bit longer than usual. At that point I realize I hadn't shut off the induction burner and the mash is at 168. Ugh.

I went through the process, but it wasn't really fermenting to well ("FG" was at about 1.028. I just added some of the enzymes I use for brut IPAs to the fermenter and let 'er rip. Turned out...OK.