All-grain first time mistakes?

[aaronanddelania]

Thanks so much for all the tips. You guys are great.

 

[doby]

Good thread. I just did my first all grain BIAB. I think I really suffered with wort extraction from the bag. I wasn't used to having so much grist in there and could hold the bag up and squeeze it at the same time. I believe I will have to sort out some sort of a pulley mechanism so I can squeeze with two hands while its suspended. I think this is why I was off on my OG. I couldn't get the wort out of the bag. It was still really wet (dripping) when I was cleaning it out. Disappointing.

I also really screwed up the volume going into the boil kettle. My mash was way, way to thick. I ended up adding 3 litres to the mash from my tea kettle. Having such a low mash volume meant that I was supposed to sparge with 20 litres.... That seemed crazy to me as it was supposed to be a 35 litre boil. I ended up with way too boil volume and topped up with about 9 litres post boil. Not what I was looking for.... Good learning experience tho.

IMHO if you have to go to the trouble of rigging a pulley system you may as well batch sparge, the equipment with a little planing cost very little, plus with the exception of heating water quickly and the boil can be done in your kitchen

 

[doby]

I've learned techniques and improved my efficiency to the point that an all grain batch takes about the same amount of time that an extract batch. It can be done.

I agree! my first all grain took 6 hours but with experiance I got it down to 4 hours 10 min, when I brew with extract I always do mini mash and that takes 3 hours 50 min

 

[fartinmartin]

I bottled today two batches, first batch 40 - 500ml bottles nice smooth operation. Then batch two just a small brew 12 - 250ml bottles all smooth, then after capping the last one realised I hadn't primed the second batch, so had to individual prime and recap, what a PITA !

 

[alphagolf]

Nice work fartinmartin. I once racked to my bottling bucket without prepping my priming solution but I caught it before getting the bottles filled. I feel your pain though

 

[ACarver]

Make sure all valves are closed!!!

Luckily never happened to me, but had a friend the other day lose most of his first runnings when draining to kettle from his mashtun. I finally caught it and after sparging only had about half his estimated pre-boil wort.

Next lesson has already been discussed previously in the thread. Don't worry so much. We just laughed it off, added some more water and threw in a pound of DME. Still a little low in gravity, but will make a nice session ale.

Welcome to all-grain!

 

[aaronanddelania]

Aaron made the yeast starter yesterday. We're brewing on Sunday. It seems to be a very basic recipe for all grain so fingers are crossed. Since we alternate brewing a beer for me and brewing one for him, I'm really hoping this turns out as this one is for me. Midas touch.

 

[chikincoop]

on your first try, you will most likely not hit your OG, so go with something that doesnt have a billion IBU's, or it could end up tasting like a weird salad. This is assuming adding DME to offset wont happen with everything going on.

 

[brewpool]

Reading and arithmetic in my case. Brewed my first all grain batch, an American Wheat, yesterday. I had to add extra water to the mash to raise the temp and figured I'd just subtract the extra from my sparge volume. Except I misread my sparge volume as 6 gallons not the 5 it should have been so I sparged with an extra gallon of water, dropping my gravity 10 points. D'oh. Lesson learned for next time I suppose. :smack:

 

[ReverendJ]

Pre-heat the mash tun, first time I did an all-grain my temp was off by over 10F because I didn't factor in the cold tun when adding the hot water to the grain.

 

[oogaboogachiefwalkingdeer]

You can brew 5 gallon batchs in a 7 1/2 gallon pot. You just have to watch it. I do it quite often.

 

[TexasDroughtBrewery]

I have a few tips/mistakes

1. Be organized before you start. You don't want to be rumbling around looking for that hops packet you bought a week ago. Or go in and out of the house every five mins looking for something else. Get a cheap fold up work table and lay out all your stuff.

2. Don't start putting mash temps in the calc while your strike water is already heating. Do all of your research ahead of time and bring a notepad to write them down don't try to remember it especially if your drinking.

3. Good Music

4. I know many people have said this before, but seriously don't start drinking until the final boil. It can be a 4-5 hour process thats a lot of drinking and you can really mess something up. Trust me...lol.

5. Don't worry if everything dosen't work perfect the first time, if you are shooting for a Mash of 153 and its at 157 it will be ok for now.

6. Prob the most important do a dry run with your equipment to make sure you have everything before you start. I did this thankfully to realize I didn't have enough quick disconnects for my plate chiller to run though my pump. It set my first Brew day back about 2 hours running to the store getting everything.

Cheers.