What are some of the mistakes you made...where your beer still turned out great!

Williams 728
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did not even think of evaporastion @ boil, with my first beer. mashed and lauter way to low. Sucked on the tube to mash out and automaticaly (as one would with petrol/ "gas") spat out the fluid.........right back into the copper????? hops much more bitter then planned if your volume is a 3rd less the expected.

used a soda bottle for the last 400ml or so after botteling, I tried it a few times right out of the bottle and screwd the lid back on............till it was carbed.......no infection !!!!
you need to really mess it up to........well ......mess it up?
 
My first batch, I didn't cool my wort at all...I just dumped it right into the primary with enough water to bring it up to 5 gallons. I'd estimate I pitched my yeast at somewhere around 110 degrees. THEN, I fermented it in a heatwave in an area that was around 85 degrees.

Luckily, it was a Belgian. Came out pretty good.
 
1. Didn't sanitize properly. Got an infection. Followed the advice on HBT and let it ride. Now I have a tasty sour.

2. Mashed in at the correct temperature but for whatever reason I read my thermometer wrong (mixed C and F) later during the mash, thought my temp was way to low so I raised the temperature way to high, realized my mistake, lowered it again and finished the mash. Ended up with 90% eff (go figure... Way higher then I wanted) and the beer is great!
 
I brewed a wit and used dried orange peels for the first time. I had no idea how big those chunks would swell but I found out pretty fast. They clogged the racking port on my conical, then managed to plug my CFC and pump. I had to quickly empty and clean my mash tun(converted keg), strain all the remaining orange peel from the wort into the mash tun, backflush the entire system. By now the wort's been sitting for an hour so I decided to bring it back to a boil to kill any nasties. No problem there, but I also didn't notice that all the ice in my ice bath for the prechiller and CFC had melted. So when I finally got the wort into the 2 buckets it was still around 90F. Off to the store to buy a tub big enough for 2 buckets and enough ice to cool the wort so I can pitch the yeast. While all this was happening I was supposed to be at my boss's birthday party.
After the party I pitched the yeast, put the blowoff hoses in and relaxed and had a bunch of homebrews. 5 days later I brewed a porter and since fermentation had slowed way down I replaced the blowoffs with airlocks so I could use them for the porter. 2 days later I go to the beerroom and both lids have blown off, there's krausen everywhere. I have no idea how long the buckets were uncovered. The beer was magnificent in spite of me.:ban:
 
I don't make mistakes...I do perform unanticipated creative detours on occasions, though. ;)

My first batch EVER I attempted an Old Rasputin clone AG. I tried to do the mash in an aluminum turkey fryer pot over flame. The mash was too thick and could barely stir it. I ended up scortching the grains on the bottom. It tasted like an ash tray. BUT 8-9 months later it was a very nice stout.

My second batch, I attempted a huge doppelbock (OG 1.113). I was told that I would be ok using only one vial of wlp yeast on this 6gal batch...BAH. Looking back, to my amazement, I was able to maintain lager temps in my garage closet. But I had the hardest time getting that beer to ferment. Had to toss a few more vials of yeast in and some amylaze enzyme, swirl, the fermentation dance ritual--basically a circus. If I recall, I think I got its down to 1.03 or 1.033, but still too sweet. So I dry hopped this doppelbock:eek: with some cascade. Bottom line, it turned out amazing...actually one of my favorites.

I brewed an AG IIPA, planning on a six gallon batch. I don't know how (been a long time/don't have notes), but I ended up with 9 gallons. So naturally I threw in some extra cane sugar and honey to make of the difference in gravity. This one took home a medal from a prominant regional competition.

This is a good thread! When I read some of the noob questions I have to do a "face-to-palm," but now thinking about some of the outlandish things I tried in the beginning makes those questions seem quite reasonable. :mug:
 
My first solo AG brew was this past Father's Day and I was brewing the Belgian Pale Ale from "Brewing Classic Styles." I had everything going perfectly until it was time to boil the wort.

I use a 10 PSI turkey fryer burner for heating the sparge water and for also boiling the wort and while I had no problems heating the water for my mash-in, it took a little longer than normal to heat my sparge water for my batch sparge.

Lautering to my boiling pot goes fine and I begin to start the boil. The receipe called for a 90 minute boil to avoid any DMS issues. The problem is I cannot get the wort to boil. 20 minutes passes, 30 passes and still no boil. The temp is sitting right about 205 to 206F and will not budge! I suspect that something is wrong with my regulator or hose or something but there is not much I can do without stopping the process and since I am SO close to boiling I don't want to risk it.

After at least an hour of this, I complain to my wife that it is just not happening and I'm not sure what to do. She suggests that I use my neighbors burner (an avid homebrewer who has a nice brewing rig in his garage), but in order to do that I have to lug 7 gallons of nearly boiling wort across my rutted front lawn into his garage.

After cursing my burner for another 10-15 minutes, I finally turn off the burner, grab some oven mitts, and begin the haul. I get the pot over onto his rig and fire up his burner. The wort starts boiling within 5 minutes and I do a 60 minute boil. I figure I had my wort at an "almost" boil for nearly an hour and a half so 60 minutes should be fine.

The rest of the process went fine and it ended up being the best beer I have ever brewed.
 
oh, as a noob, this thread is going to be very useful.
Thanks!
I will have to post all the mistakes I made from my first batch after I know whether the beer turns out to be tasty or not. :tank:
 
My first AG batch was in January and I didn't preheat my MLT properly. The recipe was the Oak Butt Brown Ale from How to Brew, and the mash temp was supposed to be 152°. My water to grist ratio was pretty high already (2 qts/lb), and I couldn't raise the temperature past 147° for the life of me. So I mashed for 90 minutes instead of 60, and got a really fermentable wort. The beer ended up a deliciously biscuity/toasty and very dry brown ale.

Also, one of my first partial mashes was a red ale I made early last year. It was the first time I tried a late extract addition, and didn't know that I was supposed to adjust the hops to compensate for higher utilization in the thinner wort. The result was an overly hoppy red ale with way too much Cascade that burned the tongue. But I drank all of it to remind myself of the learning experience ... except for one six-pack that I lost in the back of my closet. I just found that six-pack a couple of weeks ago and the beer tastes better now than it ever did. I'm serving these last few bottles in brandy snifters.
 
I just managed to unintentionally create a surprisingly excellent brew after:

- pre-boil efficiency fell waaaaaaay below expectations. I can't identify what went wrong.
- 90 minute boil reduced to 60 minutes due to unforeseen intervening events.
- Pitched four hours late due to said unforeseen intervening events (still managed to get temp down w/in 10 min. of flameout).

This was to be a Stone IPA from an old edition of BYO that ended up being a quasi-mini-me IPA, or more like a standard pale. I was stunned at how well it actually came out. So stunned that I want to make this part of the rotation. Now the challenge is figuring out how to recreate it since I don't usually set out to miss efficiency as badly as I did.
 
First AG, mashed without a false bottom, ended up draining by tilting the pot and pouring it through a strainer. The subsequent brews went a lot smoother with a DIY false bottom.

Thought I chilled a batch down enough, should of stirred first...pitched yeast at 100*f, still a liveable environment for yeast, but I filled the tub up and cooled it down, then pitched another yeast.

Caught my shirt on fire.

Exposed to sunlight, stoppers in carboys, fell asleep on a chilling batch...just had to go for four batches in a day.

Great learning experiences.

Write everything down.
 
First batch in years, first solo batch (just a month or two back), couldn't get wort cool, pitched at over 100* F, hot spell, fermented at near 80* even in the basement.

When I went to prepare for bottling, I managed to drop the empty foil packets for the hops into the fermented beer.

Somehow, the hefeweizen ended up drinkable, if not entirely perfect.
 
Cape Brewing said:
I let PaulTheNurse co-brew

Beer shockingly still came out really good.
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roflmaoing.gif
 
Thanks for this thread Revvy! I read all of it last night and it really put my mind at ease.

My biggest goof so far (I've got one batch in bottles, and 2 batches in primaries), is setting the spoon down on the sink and rinsing it off and calling it good. Also got 2 ice cubes from the ice bath in the wort, but quickly scooped them out (with said spoon).
 
-Measured out bitter orange peel in ounces instead of grams...
-Smacked a smack pack too hard and exploded it everywhere. Dumped what was left into a "somewhat" sanitized measuring cup until brew was ready.
-Mashed for 5 hours instead of 90 minutes because something came up.
-Pitched yeast at close to 100 degrees.
-False bottom came apart in mash tun. Had to dump the whole thing out into my boil kettle, fish through the 156 degree hot mess, reasemble it, dump everything back in and sparge as normal...

I'm sure there's more, but I've blocked them out.
 
Expected the racking filter to clean when i ran sanitizer through.
Didnt boil my first batch.
Didnt pay enough attention int he primary until AFTER my beer had already fermented through its first 2 weeks at nearly 90 degrees thanks to my newly broken fridge.
Stashed bottles away from myself to let age, then forgot what they were completely.
Didnt throw away these disgusting purple mulberry cider geyser bottles, Instead left them as traps for pilferers, with great enjoyment.
Oh, and along time ago, used to put the fermenters on the front porch in the sun during the cold winters to keep them going. everyone still liked most of them
 
Cold crashed in my fermentation fridge and forgot that I had a gallon of starsan attached by a blow off tube. I managed to suck at least two quarts of starsan into a finished honey brown ale. I've had several die hard miller drinkers pull a full pint after tasting a sample.
 
One of the first brews I did was a Cooper's Bitter kit. I mixed with unboiled tap water, pitched the kit yeast at 34C, fermented in the high 20's, i primed with raw sugar added to each bottle with an unsanitized measuring spoon and I didn't sanitize the bottle caps. It was pretty crappy but I drank it because it was beer and I had made it...but about a year and 20 batches later I found a left over bottle on a shelf in the basement. I thought about throwing it out but threw it in the fridge instead. I drank it the next day and it was good! It was smooth and had a fantastic head. A 3.5% beer that was treated horribly at all stages of its life but it aged well.
 
My first pumpkin(3rd brew) which i thought needed improvement,well 9 months later im thinking out its number 2 or 1 short of shipyards smashed pumpkin but they had higher alcohol than mine.MIne was average avb, Pretty nice when you can compare it with well at least a few of the better pumpkins and it was just an ametuar brew,now im inspired to make it and just revise it a little.
 
A few months ago I brewed a fat tire clone (NB Phat Tyre) and had it cooling in an ice bath in the kitchen sink and when I was taking it out, I got some of the water from the icebath into the wort. I did not clean the sink before. I thought that beer was screwed, but it turned out great.
 
just dropped my strainer into my english pale ale. doh! I hope it will turn out ok and great results reported on this very thead.
 
I tightened the bottling bucket spigot too much, which deformed the gasket and caused a leak. Of course I didn't notice that until too late and I had to reach into the bucket to fix the nut. In the process, I tilted the bucket to keep the level away from the spigot and, at the same time, reach over to my starsan spray bottle. I awkwardly sprayed my hand and then reached in. Just then the bucket slipped a little and some beer spilled out the top. Not much, but it was a big dark porter so when it hit the ground, it splashed up and all over the pale yellow walls, the wood cabinets, door, and somehow got into the mud room and on the upper cabinets. Got the rest of the batch bottled though.
 
In college I worked at a microbrewery, and in the mornings I would usually start up a brew day alone before classes. One time after filling up the mash tun (100+gallons) I walked away to get other things ready. Foolishly I didn't properly close the valves so it created a suction and drained all the wort back into the hot liquor vat! By the time I came back to the brew house there was wort and grain dumping out of the hot liquor vat overflow!!
I shut the valves and then frantically started trying to call the brewmaster (I was alone, only 21, and hadn't been running brewdays that long). After 15 minutes of panic and no answer from the brewmaster, I decided to drain the hot liquor vat into the mash tun once again. The grain bed was intact (and bonedry), so I didn't want it disrupt it. I filled from the top and had to deflect the incoming wort (100+gallons) with a paddle and I probably oxidized the hell out of it in the process.
In the end of course the OG was low, but the house yeast stepped up and created a little more alcohol than usually. People loved the beer and it sold out before any oxidation was detectable ;)
Lesson learned: Don't start brewing before the morning coffee has kicked in!
 
TwoHeadsBrewing said:
I once had a collapsed braid on my mash tun, and therefore a VERY stuck sparge. I dumped the entire contents of the MLT, grains and water into my bottling bucket to fix my braid, then dumped it all back in the MLT. 3 times I did this, but it kept getting stuck. The last time I just stuck my arm in the mash (don't do that...it's hot), and ripped the braid out (make sure to throw the braid into the street and yell loud obscenities at this point). Then I had one of my buddies open the valve while I held a muslin bag over the kettle. Everything came out, grains and wort, into the bag and I strained the wort into the kettle. I also did the same thing for the sparge, and when the bag got full I would just dump the contents back into the MLT.

This was an IPA, and it turned out fantastic. No astringency, no hot side aeration, just hoppy and dry...go figure!
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LOL this is hilarious, because sometimes things go downhill so fast and you're like "F*** it, I gotta do this!"

I had a very similar experience and my beer turned out fine, too.
 
alpo said:
This is not a mistake with the beer itself, but I once turned on the valve to my wort chiller with the output hose pointing right at my foot and I was wearing flip flops. That sucked
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Done that...only with heated sparge water though
 
OK....

Back when I first started I had a recipe kit arrive that I was planning to brew on a Sunday. On Saturday night I went out bar hopping with some friends and, well, I don't remember anything past around 9:00 that night. No clue how I got home, what time I got home, nothing.

Woke up on Sunday morning to see a carboy of DIPA happily bubbling away.

Most of my brew gear was still in the closet, I had only brought out the absolute bare necessities to get the job done. In particular, my bottle of star san and the bucket that I mix it in were still sitting right where I had left them, and bone dry. Who knows what I did as far as sanitation goes? Probably just rinsed things under the kitchen faucet. If that.

To this day, I'm still wishing I could figure out how to make a beer that tasted as good as that one did.
 
My first all-grain brew (a Wit) was on deck, and I heated the kettle for dough-in, hit the strike temp and put in the grain. The temp didn't come down as much as expected, so I threw in a bit of ice to bring it down. Temp actually went up, and I figured out that the burner must still be hot even though it was off. Took the pot off the burner added more ice, still it went up. By now I've added almost a full gallon of ice, and it's still hot. Finally I figured out the digital thermometer I was using was broken when I put the probe in the freezer and it registered 175. Found another thermometer and checked the mash and it was down around 100. By the time I got it into the fermenter, it was 1 AM.
 
I was working a seasonal job in Boston and all my brew equipment was back in Wisconsin. I wanted to brew anyway. When I went to the LHBS I told them my situation and that all I needed was the bare minimum to brew. They kept saying that what I was doing was going to produce a bad beer. "Maybe so," I said...

I decided on a Fat Tire clone extract recipe. I didn't have a thermometer, no hydrometer, and I used a beer bottle to measure the DME and then put it in a 2 liter soda bottle in the microwave to boil the DME for priming prior to bottling. I called it Rusty Chain.

Before I left Boston I gave each of my coworkers a six pack. They all loved it and while I don't think it was my best beer (obviously), it did taste pretty good.
 
Had a pale ale fermenting with Wyeast 1056 in the basement this summer that got into the upper 70s. Had planned earlier on transferring the yeast cake for the IPA I was doing next and never tasted the pale ale before hand. Wound up with a couple of still pretty decent accidental Belgians.

Also has brewing up an amber ale and realized at the end of the mash that I forgot my turkey fryer after brewing with my uncle and no way to heat the keggle. Did the boil spread out over an electric stove full of pots.
 
mrbippers said:
,,,Also has brewing up an amber ale and realized at the end of the mash that I forgot my turkey fryer after brewing with my uncle and no way to heat the keggle. Did the boil spread out over an electric stove full of pots.
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That is how I usually boil. I use three pots on a gas stove.

Winter works better. Summer it is an extra tax on the AC.
 
Made a double batch of IPA and accidentally poured the double-starter into first carboy. With no other yeast around I decided to toss in Fleshman's bread yeast in the 2nd to see what would happen. Well it tastes like beer and not horrible either. maybe the hops covered up some of the craziness.
 
Most recently, I boiled the elastic bands in 2 paint strainers I was using for hop bags in a 5G batch of IPA. :eek:

My beer home-brew competition judging buddy didn't taste anything "off." :p
 
Made a double batch of IPA and accidentally poured the double-starter into first carboy. With no other yeast around I decided to toss in Fleshman's bread yeast in the 2nd to see what would happen. Well it tastes like beer and not horrible either. maybe the hops covered up some of the craziness.
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Drink the fleshman's first! Age will not be good to it.
 
Lets see.
I have added too much primeing sugar= open bottle and when it stopped foaming drink 2oz of beer.
I have tried to seal a keg after adding my beer and faught with it for 20 minutes before I realized I was changeing gaskets and did not replace the gasket to the gas in post.
I have tried to save a few cents and use one hops bag with a large hops schedule and lost the top of the bag spilling what I think was a ton of hops pellets into my boil. Then it all made it into my primary (because I was lazy and the kids were getting up from a nap). I will move it to secondary soon. We will have to wait to see how it turned out.
As for all my mistakes everything has turned out to be beer in the end.
And as my kids say when they bang there sippy cups of milk together "Cheers"
Drink Up
 
Gunrunner said:
I have tried to save a few cents and use one hops bag with a large hops schedule and lost the top of the bag spilling what I think was a ton of hops pellets into my boil. Then it all made it into my primary (because I was lazy and the kids were getting up from a nap). I will move it to secondary soon. We will have to wait to see how it turned out....
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This beer will be fine, I never use hop bags and always get a ton of crap in the fermenter. If thats the all that went wrong, worst case is the krausen ring on your fermenter might be extra crusty and the yeast cake at the bottom will be huge as it will have so much trub in it.
 
gbx said:
This beer will be fine, I never use hop bags and always get a ton of crap in the fermenter. If thats the all that went wrong, worst case is the krausen ring on your fermenter might be extra crusty and the yeast cake at the bottom will be huge as it will have so much trub in it.
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I just moved to seconday and tested for fg and tasted the test sample and it was better than good. Lots of hops and a good clean finish. I do not have a valve on my fermenter so I rack it out so I can keep it off the bottom and leave all the trub behind (I do suck up a little for the seconday so the yeast can still do its thing.
 
Dropped a filthy tape measure right into my cooled pale ale's wort before I pitched the yeast. I called her Good Measure Pale Ale.

I also at one time forgot to take out the stirring spoon from the wort and it sat in the beer for the entire duration of the beers fermentation. I called her the All Saaz and Spoon Ale.

Beer is some resilient stuff. Its resistant to human stupidity.
 

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