Epic Mistakes in Brewing. Please share your biggest screw up. User error...

[Willy]

I have many to choose from but my favorite epic screw up...

Is emptying the Brewzilla, gorgeous wort from a completed boil ... Clean and clear!!! into a fermenter bucket on the back deck.

I didn't realize the the fermenter bucket had an open spigot at the bottom, shooting my batch between the floor boards. Buh bye.

I ended up with 2 1/2 gal. Batch from a 5.5 gal. Ouch. Perhaps even more painful... The batch was spectacular.

 

[Agent]

I BIAB in a Keggle with water heater element screwed into a silver soldered nut.

I was doing a big batch with 30+lbs of grain, and I was having a tough time getting the ratchet pulley to lift my grains out after the mash. A couple big heaves later and it moved - because it pulled the element enough to break the solder joint.

Needless to say, that batch was lost as was my second Brew Bag.

 

[fluketamer]

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/dont-do-that.527228/

 

[Willy]

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/dont-do-that.527228/

I BIAB in a Keggle with water heater element screwed into a silver soldered nut.

I was doing a big batch with 30+lbs of grain, and I was having a tough time getting the ratchet pulley to lift my grains out after the mash. A couple big heaves later and it moved - because it pulled the element enough to break the solder joint.

Needless to say, that batch was lost as was my second Brew Bag.

I BIAB in a Keggle with water heater element screwed into a silver soldered nut.

I was doing a big batch with 30+lbs of grain, and I was having a tough time getting the ratchet pulley to lift my grains out after the mash. A couple big heaves later and it moved - because it pulled the element enough to break the solder joint.

Needless to say, that batch was lost as was my second Brew Bag.

Yikes. We have Splash down Houston.

 

[Bullhog]

It was my first time brewing; I was racking my wort to the fermenter with a siphon hose. I rinsed my mouth out with gin before I did it just to be safe. Once the wort hit my mouth, it surprised me so much that I spit it out into the fermenter bucket. I didn’t even realize my error until I was halfway done. It still fermented, and everyone still thought it tasted great. I kept my secret.

 

[Willy]

It was my first time brewing; I was racking my wort to the fermenter with a siphon hose. I rinsed my mouth out with gin before I did it just to be safe. Once the wort hit my mouth, it surprised me so much that I spit it out into the fermenter bucket. I didn’t even realize my error until I was halfway done. It still fermented, and everyone still thought it tasted great. I kept my secret.

A Spitzen Dunkel!

 

[FloppyKnockers]

My biggest blunder has to be when I said "Yeah, I'll try homebrewing. How much money, time, equipment, and space could it possibly take up?"

 

[FloppyKnockers]

I BIAB in a Keggle with water heater element screwed into a silver soldered nut.

I was doing a big batch with 30+lbs of grain, and I was having a tough time getting the ratchet pulley to lift my grains out after the mash. A couple big heaves later and it moved - because it pulled the element enough to break the solder joint.

Needless to say, that batch was lost as was my second Brew Bag.

Ooooh. That's a tough one to go through and a bullet I dodged once. Now when I go to pull the bag, I put a little pressure on the pully and then rotate the bag in the kettle. If it's stuck on an element, you'll know - or it'll simply come off.

 

[gaviga]

I was fermenting in my "new" used 14 gallon Ferminator for the first time. After a few days, I thought I would pull off some of the trub. I wanted to add a sight glass below the main valve so I loosened what I thought was the tri-clamp below the valve. Turns out it was the tri-clamp valve's tri-clamp, so the beer started pouring out. Complete disaster!

 

[Hi im dave]

First time using my cip ball and pump to clean my fermenter. I took the hose off the cip ball for some reason, forgot to put it back on and plugged in the pump. Obviously this led to spraying hot PBW water all over my basement

 

[cfrazier77]

I could say dumping 5 gallons of wort into a fermenter with the front valve open and getting wet legs, but I have one more stupid. I was mid boil and while stirring I knocked the hop spider off and into the boil. And yes, I without thinking reached my hand into the boiling wort to grab it. Big mistake. That hurt...

 

[sibelman]

open spigot

This. Back in 1984 I made my first barley wine. Fermenting bucket was already in its insulating down sleeping bag but the spigot was open as I transferred. I did something to supplement the loss - don't remember what. It was a truly great beer. Saved some for when my newborn son reached 21 - but he doesn't drink.

 

[Willy]

This. Back in 1984 I made my first barley wine. Fermenting bucket was already in its insulating down sleeping bag but the spigot was open as I transferred. I did something to supplement the loss - don't remember what. It was a truly great beer. Saved some for when my newborn son reached 21 - but he doesn't drink.

Orwellian disaster!

 

[kylewag]

I made a Honey Kolsch type beer that I had been planning for over a year. I got it kegged and served a couple beers from it. It was one of the best beers I have made. I was using a new picnic tap that I got from Amazon. I had used it once before without problems. I poured a Honey Kolsch one day, drank it and went to pour a second one only to find that a clamp had failed on the tap line and beer had poured out into the bottom of my keezer. I had just cleaned the keezer so I decided to try to save the beer. So I scooped it out with a cup and poured it back into the keg. I was worried about oxidation so I drank the whole keg in about two weeks, no problems.

 

[Ruprecht]

Who has time to cool your wort?

 

[Yesfan]

Who has time to cool your wort?
View attachment 853411

Winner................

 

[Agent]

Who has time to cool your wort?

Right up there with:
Failed chiller
-> hot wort into glass carboy
-> carboy into snow to cool
-> bottomless carboy sitting on malt snow

Luckily not me, but I predicted the story as soon as I heard points 1 and 2.