1-Gallon Brewers UNITE!

[cheesecake]

Now to breakfast stout I brewed the large batch of is in the bath tub around 68 and that's doing good also. I enjoyed brewing the large batch until cleanup time then I kicked myself. No place to clean it out easily.

 

[dadshomebrewing]

My porter was going like gangbusters in the carboy when I left the house.

So far, so good.

 

[divrguy]

I brewed the Brooklyn Brew Shop Bourbon Dubbel this weekend and I gotta say those Brooklyn kits are impressive little kits.
I may end up giving this one away though. When I tasted the wort, it reminded me of most of the other Belgians I didnt like. I guess I better stick with APA's...IPA's...Stouts...Bitters....Porters...Heck I better get brewing!!

 

[brewman !]

This can be scaled down or kept as is for a gallon set up. I would love to do this put electricity scares me.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f170/110v-recirculating-ebiab-2-5-gallon-batches-341219/

Its nice, but its BIAB, not AG (no mash tun) and I don't see a pump or a chiller.

It get excited thinking about doing small batches in the house but then I start thinking about the equipment I'd need (basically a full on brew stand, but smaller) and my wife complaining about the house smelling like a brewery and I revert to thinking I should just brew 5 gallons in the garage and throw out what I don't like.

Any advice ?

 

[cheesecake]

Brew in a bag is all grain....

 

[cheesecake]

And there is a pump and chiller just not mounted all fancy.

 

[brewman !]

Brew in a bag is all grain....

Yeah, sort of. Having done all grain with a mash tun, even if I did BIAB, I'd want a pump for recirculating the wort while "mashing" and then also for pumping it through the chiller.

By the time I muck around with a couple kettles, a pump, a chiller and hoses, I've recreated a brew stand on a smaller scale. I might as well brew on the big stand I'm building and throw out what I don't like. I can buy a lot of ingredients for what I'd spend putting together a small system.

Or am I wrong ? Has someone been done this road and have experience to share ? Does anyone have a full on large batch brewstand and still found it very handy to brew 1 gallon batches ?

Thanks !

 

[brewman !]

One more thing... at the 1-2 gallon batch size, is there anything wrong with putting a pot onto a regular stove burner instead of embedding a hot water heater element into the pot ?

Does anyone know of a good brew pump that is smaller/cheaper than the typical March/Chugger pumps ?

 

[flipfloptan]

That's what I'm in the process of building.

Are you keeping it at the 2.5 gallon volume or going smaller? Do you have an electrical background?

Please have a brewcast when you start using this rig.

 

[rawkstar320]

Fuggle would be a great choice if you want i can throw that into beersmith and adjust the bitterness with the hops you have. Do you know the aa on the fuggles

I plugged it into my app (BrewR - Android app) and was able to work with the fuggles. I will probably use them (since I have them, a little bag goes a long ways in 1 gallon brews). I'll keep everyone posted!

 

[divrguy]

Yeah, sort of. Having done all grain with a mash tun, even if I did BIAB, I'd want a pump for recirculating the wort while "mashing" and then also for pumping it through the chiller.

By the time I muck around with a couple kettles, a pump, a chiller and hoses, I've recreated a brew stand on a smaller scale. I might as well brew on the big stand I'm building and throw out what I don't like. I can buy a lot of ingredients for what I'd spend putting together a small system.

Or am I wrong ? Has someone been done this road and have experience to share ? Does anyone have a full on large batch brewstand and still found it very handy to brew 1 gallon batches ?

Thanks !

One more thing... at the 1-2 gallon batch size, is there anything wrong with putting a pot onto a regular stove burner instead of embedding a hot water heater element into the pot ?

Does anyone know of a good brew pump that is smaller/cheaper than the typical March/Chugger pumps ?

Brewman, btw, BIAB is all grain... All the way. On the cheap. You don't need fancy pumps. Just a paint strainer bag... They cost almost 2 bucks. You already probably have a 4-5 gallon pot and a milk jug can be used as a fermenter. So, where are you going to go broke with this set up?

I do all grain big batches as well so I know. I have more money in my big mash tun than my entire small batch setup. Lol

 

[JollyIsTheRoger]

Great thing about small batches biab, I am not worried about the 66% rye beer that I am brewing up this week. Would be really hard to stick the sparge on a bag.

Thinking about casting it too. Anybody up around 8am-12ish central on wed thats not working?

 

[cheesecake]

Are you keeping it at the 2.5 gallon volume or going smaller? Do you have an electrical background?

Please have a brewcast when you start using this rig.

I have a electric 10 gallon pot that i use. Im going to keep it 2.5 gallon but i really want to be able to do 1 gallon batches in it so im still on the search for a narrow pot. when its done it will be like that with the pump to recirculate the mash water. And of course ill brewcast:rockin:

 

[cheesecake]

Great thing about small batches biab, I am not worried about the 66% rye beer that I am brewing up this week. Would be really hard to stick the sparge on a bag.

Thinking about casting it too. Anybody up around 8am-12ish central on wed thats not working?

if only it was thursday..

 

[cheesecake]

There is a video of my large pot. Function over form....

Thats what everyone says when they make ugly junk....LOL

 

[jwalk4]

Wow, Cheese that's a sweet pot! How long does it take you to boil?

 

[cheesecake]

It's not too long I dont remember exact times. That was its first ever test run.

 

[flipfloptan]

Cheesecake

Is the thermometer underneath the element?

 

[cheesecake]

No the rtd is off to the side. Under the element is the dip tube pre bent and cut. The temp was off because I had to callibrate the pid and make the temp adjustments still.

 

[user 83772]

So, brewday is upon me and I could use some advice. I just loaded my strike water into my kettle and set up my grain bag, and I've only got about an inch of headspace left in the kettle - am I gonna have room for my grain (about 2.5lbs)?

I'm considering removing about a half gallon of water, then doing a small sparge once the mash-in is overwith and the grain bag has been removed from the main kettle to bring it back up to volume before the boil.

Not worried about any of this, per se - just want to know what the best course of action is. Thanks y'all!

 

[dadshomebrewing]

bottled my Christmas Cranberry today, and for the first time ever i can actually TASTE the different ingredients (including the cranberries).

i haven't decided if i like it, but i can taste them.

now to wait for "time in a bottle".

 

[BigRock947]

So, brewday is upon me and I could use some advice. I just loaded my strike water into my kettle and set up my grain bag, and I've only got about an inch of headspace left in the kettle - am I gonna have room for my grain (about 2.5lbs)?

I'm considering removing about a half gallon of water, then doing a small sparge once the mash-in is overwith and the grain bag has been removed from the main kettle to bring it back up to volume before the boil.

Not worried about any of this, per se - just want to know what the best course of action is. Thanks y'all!

Give me the particulars and I'll put them into promash to figure out the volume or try http://http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml

 

[user 83772]

@BigRock: No worries man, but thanks. I was just about to come back and call off the request for advice - I decided to back off a half gallon and sparge after the initial mash to bring it back up to full volume. I'm determined not to take this first batch too seriously, so if it doesn't work out, so be it. I bet it'll be good though.

Now, if y'all will excuse me, I'm gonna go have me a Wookey Jack while my kettle heats up.

 

[BigRock947]

@BigRock: No worries man, but thanks. I was just about to come back and call off the request for advice - I decided to back off a half gallon and sparge after the initial mash to bring it back up to full volume. I'm determined not to take this first batch too seriously, so if it doesn't work out, so be it. I bet it'll be good though.

Now, if y'all will excuse me, I'm gonna go have me a Wookey Jack while my kettle heats up.

No worries...That was my usual procedure when I was brewing 2.5 gallon batches with my 2 small brew pots. Mash in one - sparge in the other.

Good luck

 

[huntingohio]

So, brewday is upon me and I could use some advice. I just loaded my strike water into my kettle and set up my grain bag, and I've only got about an inch of headspace left in the kettle - am I gonna have room for my grain (about 2.5lbs)?

I'm considering removing about a half gallon of water, then doing a small sparge once the mash-in is overwith and the grain bag has been removed from the main kettle to bring it back up to volume before the boil.

Not worried about any of this, per se - just want to know what the best course of action is. Thanks y'all!

That is entirely possible, I have done something similar.
Youll need 2 pots to do a quasi sparging biab sparging. I put 3.5 quarts in one pot and did the normal steeping, then mash out. I pulled the bag and put it in a colander above the pot to drain while I heated the other pot too steeping temp. I dropped the bag into the other pot and gave it a good stirring to try and get all the sugars out. i gave it a few minutes to rest and removed the bag, combined the pots and hit my preboil exactly. Once i boiled off I had 1.5 gallons, fermented it in a LBK from a mr beer kit. worked out dang near perfect. It only raised my efficency by a couple of percent, not really much but enough to warrant 20 extra minutes.

I have been thinking of buying some of the insulation people use to wrap there keggles to wrap my kettle in, has anyone else tryed this?

 

[JollyIsTheRoger]

Brewday again tomorrow, super excited because the long wait has happened and I get to finally open a batch 001(of small scale) bottle to see how it turned out. I will be brewing batch 007, so its been a hard wait to get this far without opening something yet, but didn't want to risk opening a bottle when it didnt have enough time to carb. Again if anyone is gonna be up and wants to watch a stream in the morning of my brew day just let me know. I'll probably just do it anyway and post the link here.

 

[cheesecake]

post it up ill try to watch some while at work.


Ordered my pot for my 2.5 gallon setup ill measure when it comes in to see if it will be doable with 1 gallon batches

 

[cheesecake]

also hopefully brewing thursday or friday.....

 

[divrguy]

bottled my Christmas Cranberry today, and for the first time ever i can actually TASTE the different ingredients (including the cranberries).

i haven't decided if i like it, but i can taste them.

now to wait for "time in a bottle".

Dads... Keep us posted I LOVE cranberries ... And blueberries actually! Never heard of a cranberry beer so I'm super curious and I have had a few blueberry ales that were not so good! Hope yours conditions very well and you have good stories coming up!

 

[divrguy]

That is entirely possible, I have done something similar.
Youll need 2 pots to do a quasi sparging biab sparging. I put 3.5 quarts in one pot and did the normal steeping, then mash out. I pulled the bag and put it in a colander above the pot to drain while I heated the other pot too steeping temp. I dropped the bag into the other pot and gave it a good stirring to try and get all the sugars out. i gave it a few minutes to rest and removed the bag, combined the pots and hit my preboil exactly. Once i boiled off I had 1.5 gallons, fermented it in a LBK from a mr beer kit. worked out dang near perfect. It only raised my efficency by a couple of percent, not really much but enough to warrant 20 extra minutes.

I have been thinking of buying some of the insulation people use to wrap there keggles to wrap my kettle in, has anyone else tryed this?

No but if you find out what the insulation is let me know. I went to depot the other day and I found water heater blankets but the thought of fiberglass near my beer .....nahhh so I have seen some folks wrap with something but I'm not sure what it is. I would love to wrap something around the 5 gallon kettle to hold temps. Right now I'm using a flannel sheet with about 4 towels and lose about 4 degrees... Not bad but I'd like to be able to keep it closer. Wife does NOT like me bringing wort in the house!! Lol