First BIB didn't go so well...

[djonesax]

I just completed my first BIB and didn't go well.. lol. I have been a member here and brewing for 15 years on a 3 vessel system 10 gallons at a time. I recently bought a 20 Gal pot because I do 90 min boils and it maxes out the space in a 15 gallon kettle. I also have a grain bag for doing cold brew coffee so I decided to give BIB a try since its supposed to be easier and still makes great beer.

First off I missed my mash temp by +4 degrees so I guess we'll call this Kolsch a Pilsner instead.

Then, I had to improvise some contraption to hold the grain bag to drain.

Then, I dropped my thermometer into the boil kettle and it took 15 min to fish it out.

Then, I had the craziest foam issues and had to stir for the entire boil.

Then I forgot to scrub the fermenter before filling it with starsan.

Then, I forgot to run the pump for 10-15 min during the boil to sanitize it and had to boil an extra a few min.

Then, I was short 2 gallons of wort and the gravity was so high I had to add 2 gallons worth of bottled water.

Then, to top it all off, the next morning I realized I forgot to set the temperature on the fermentation chamber!

Of course non of this had anything todo with the BIB process other than it's just different than I have been programmed. It was a forgetful day. Im not used to brewing with the kids playing in the yard. Whatever happens, it will still be beer.


During the brew day I did feel like I was breaking a couple rules with BIB though. I usually recirculate during the mash and do a slow fly sparge to get nice filtered wort and rinse as much sugar as I can. I have been programmed to shoot for clear wort in the boil kettle which doesn't seem possible at least with the straining bag I have and I feel like my foam issues were much worse because of less filtered wort.

I have a batch of Yooper's Oatmeal Stout already milled for BIB, read for when my fermenter is empty. Hopefully the next go around will go smoother.

 

[wilserbrewer]

Maybe BIAB is too simple and uncomplicated for you....
I can’t imagine how many errors you typically made using your 3v ? Lol jk

A “contraption”...your words, to hold the grain bag to drain is of big benefit...figuring that out on the fly could be tricky.
Ratchet pulley works very well...a double acting pulley even better

 

[JONNYROTTEN]

Literally not one of those issues will affect the beer....except for possibly the mercury released into the brew from the thermometer that caused the foaming

I've never had an entire boil foam issue...weird

 

[HB2 HughBHomeBrew]

Whatever happens, it will still be beer.

Well said!

 

[Mic Carp]

I just completed my first BIB and didn't go well.. lol. I have been a member here and brewing for 15 years on a 3 vessel system 10 gallons at a time. I recently bought a 20 Gal pot because I do 90 min boils and it maxes out the space in a 15 gallon kettle. I also have a grain bag for doing cold brew coffee so I decided to give BIB a try since its supposed to be easier and still makes great beer.

First off I missed my mash temp by +4 degrees so I guess we'll call this Kolsch a Pilsner instead.

Then, I had to improvise some contraption to hold the grain bag to drain.

Then, I dropped my thermometer into the boil kettle and it took 15 min to fish it out.

Then, I had the craziest foam issues and had to stir for the entire boil.

Then I forgot to scrub the fermenter before filling it with starsan.

Then, I forgot to run the pump for 10-15 min during the boil to sanitize it and had to boil an extra a few min.

Then, I was short 2 gallons of wort and the gravity was so high I had to add 2 gallons worth of bottled water.

Then, to top it all off, the next morning I realized I forgot to set the temperature on the fermentation chamber!

Of course non of this had anything todo with the BIB process other than it's just different than I have been programmed. It was a forgetful day. Im not used to brewing with the kids playing in the yard. Whatever happens, it will still be beer.


During the brew day I did feel like I was breaking a couple rules with BIB though. I usually recirculate during the mash and do a slow fly sparge to get nice filtered wort and rinse as much sugar as I can. I have been programmed to shoot for clear wort in the boil kettle which doesn't seem possible at least with the straining bag I have and I feel like my foam issues were much worse because of less filtered wort.

I have a batch of Yooper's Oatmeal Stout already milled for BIB, read for when my fermenter is empty. Hopefully the next go around will go smoother.

Haha
Sounds like a typical brew day for me. OK, maybe a combination of a few brew days, but rarely do i go mistake free.
I usually have a huge head of foam at the beginning of the boil. I usually flame out at that point, throw in hops and light it back up and it settles down once i get the flame adjusted right.

As you said, it’s gonna be beer nonetheless

Enjoy your Pilsner
Cheers

 

[djonesax]

Maybe BIAB is too simple and uncomplicated for you....
I can’t imagine how many errors you typically made using your 3v ? Lol jk

Maybe so... lol. The setup is so much simpler, I found myself standing around a lot thinking, "Well normally right now I'd be washing or setting up other equipment". I won't say my brew days are usually perfect but this one was straight out of hell...

A “contraption”...your words, to hold the grain bag to drain is of big benefit...figuring that out on the fly could be tricky.
Ratchet pulley works very well...a double acting pulley even better

I had planned on a pulley system but ran out of time and improvised with a ceiling hook and very long piece of doubled up nylon masonry line. It worked but was a bit sketchy.

 

[djonesax]

Literally not one of those issues will affect the beer....except for possibly the mercury released into the brew from the thermometer that caused the foaming

That was the basis of my concern, I assume there is no mercury in a turkey fryer thermometer but wanted it out nonetheless, just in case.

I've never had an entire boil foam issue...weird

Yeah it was crazy, constant foam, I couldn't walk away since it would just keep rising slowly. I had a few boil overs. I'll dial down the flame next time, it's a new larger pot and I was looking forward to trying a more vigorous boil since having more space. Maybe I just had the flame up too high because I also boiled off way more than usual.

 

[bleme]

When I first started brewing, I made a detailed check-list. It might be worth making one just as a refresher.

Old brewers always want a vigorous boil. New research shows that a gentle boil actually has many benefits. I've also found that if I scoop off the foam at the beginning of a boil, it foams less later on.

 

[djonesax]

Good suggestion. I usually just use my beer smith print out as a list and take notes on it as I go. I had way too many distractions this brew day. 8 crazy kids and two maniac dogs in the back yard with me, worked out to be more distraction than I could obviously handle... lol

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

8 kids? No way I'd attempt to brew with 8 kids running around. I took a 22 year hiatus from brewing while raising my kids. It was way too much hassle when they were young and I was too busy coaching sports, attending school events etc to brew when they got older.

Now they come out and have a beer with me while I'm brewing....

 

[rmajor55]

Now they come out and have a beer with me while I'm brewing....

Well it seems you raised them right!!

 

[HB2 HughBHomeBrew]

8 kids? No way I'd attempt to brew with 8 kids running around. I took a 22 year hiatus from brewing while raising my kids. It was way too much hassle when they were young and I was too busy coaching sports, attending school events etc to brew when they got older.

Now they come out and have a beer with me while I'm brewing....

That's funny. I took 20 years off and got back into brewing a few months ago. My last brew day prior to the hiatus was the day my wife found out she was pregnant with the now 20 year old. Youngest just graduated from high school. Not much to do these days except make beer LOL.

 

[djonesax]

8 kids? No way I'd attempt to brew with 8 kids running around. I took a 22 year hiatus from brewing while raising my kids. It was way too much hassle when they were young and I was too busy coaching sports, attending school events etc to brew when they got older.

Now they come out and have a beer with me while I'm brewing....

Well.... We had some friends over with kids and my wife last minute decided to blow up a pool in the back yard and even took my darn water hose. Then all the kids came out and also the neighbors kids. I was screwed.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

Well.... We had some friends over with kids and my wife last minute decided to blow up a pool in the back yard and even took my darn water hose. Then all the kids came out and also the neighbors kids. I was screwed.

Indeed. Ouch.

 

[Jayjay1976]

I made a mistake while brewing once... I thought I had read the hydrometer wrong but then realized I hadn't and all my numbers added up just fine.
That was a close one.

 

[lslbrew]

1. Use your mash vessel to hold the grain bag. It is still technically 3 vessel but you won’t have a stuck spare.
2. If your gravity was that high does that mean BIAB was that much more efficient or was something else different?

 

[djonesax]

2. If your gravity was that high does that mean BIAB was that much more efficient or was something else different?

It was high because I was 2 gallons short from over boiling. It was a new larger pot that I had not used before and had not tested the boil off rate with it. With my old pot I had the opposite problem where I couldn't boil vigorously enough and had to boil longer to hit my gravities sometimes.

I'm going to do a Yooper's Oatmeal Stout BIB tomorrow. I think I may set some water aside and use it to either rinse the grain or dunk the grain bag. This last BIB, there were a lot of sugars left in the grain and it was sweet tasting. I'm going to collect a lot more data too so I can dial the BIB system in better.

 

[cefiro355]

Then, I had to improvise some contraption to hold the grain bag to drain.

Here's something I didn't realize/do for years. I take my bag out and move it right into bottling bucket w/ spigot. I put this on a chair elevated just above kettle (on floor). You can now sparge a gallon @ 170f right over this, open the spigot and let it drain down. Increased my efficiency and makes life easier for me and you technically don't need any more equipment (assuming you have a bottling bucket). This is a tip I wish I knew at the beginning and never hear many/if any people talk about it.

 

[LittleRiver]

I normally don't sparge, but when I do I've found this to be the best way:

• mash with 50% of the total water, drain the wort into a bucket, leaving the grains and bag in place
• add the remainder of the water to the grains, stir
• raise the bag and tie it off, fire the heat for the boil, let the bag drain into the kettle during the entire boil
• pour the bucket of wort into the kettle

There's never a need to handle a hot drippy bag.

 

[djonesax]

My second BIAB went much better. The only hiccup was my oxygen regulator fell apart and didn't work properly when reassembled and leaked out of the relief valve.

I vowed not to squeeze the bag and just let it drip above the pot but it was down to a trickle and I was still short a 3/4 a gallon or so. I did end up squeezing it to get my pre-boil volume of 14 gallons, plus I read the exBeeriment on squeezing the bag and it seems that it doesn't lead to astringency anyway but rather just less clarity. This was a stout so I don't care about clarity but that said, my pilsner cleared up fine and I squeezed that bag. I also set aside a stock pot of hot water, and used that to pour over the bag to further rinse the grain. This time the grain did taste bland and I think I got a much better extraction than last time.

Something else I noticed with the larger pot and volume of water, the temperature at the top and bottom of the vessel varied a lot. When I hit my mash water temp of 164 I stirred up the water and I was in the 170's. Next time I'll recirculate while heating the water so I don't over shoot and have to wait on it to cool. That's probably why I over shot my mash by 4 degrees on the first BIAB, since on my other system the volume of water would be much less and the thermometer is mounted in the kettle closer to the middle of the water level.

I also, didn't mash-out this time since I suppose its not necessary and its easy to overshoot and extract tannins from the grain. Which I accidentally did last time when I got distracted.

The wort was much clearer too because I recalculated the mash onto the top of the bag for a bit before pulling the bag out. I had no foam issues at all and kept the boil much lower. I still boiled off too much but kept good notes every 10 minutes of how much I had boiled off so far. I was supposed to have 11.46 gallons post-boil but I ended up with 10.75 or so. Next time I'll dial it back even more and remember to update beer smith to use a 60 minute boil versus 90 for a stout an save some time and boil off. I didn't bother adding water back since for the style a little higher gravity would be fine.

Anyway much better experience, now I'll have to wait and see how it tastes.


David

 

[RM-MN]

I read the exBeeriment on squeezing the bag and it seems that it doesn't lead to astringency anyway but rather just less clarity. This was a stout so I don't care about clarity but that said, my pilsner cleared up fine and I squeezed that bag. I also set aside a stock pot of hot water, and used that to pour over the bag to further rinse the grain. This time the grain did taste bland and I think I got a much better extraction than last time.

Sqeezing does get you less wort clarity but wort clarity and beer clarity are not really related. You can start with wort that is very hazy and still end up with clear beer.

You can use the hot water for sparging but there isn't any real difference in the sugar extraction over using cool water. I prefer to lift cool water instead of hot if I am going to pour it over the bag.

I also, didn't mash-out this time since I suppose its not necessary and its easy to overshoot and extract tannins from the grain. Which I accidentally did last time when I got distracted.

The high temperature of a mash out does not necessarily extract tannins. It takes a pH that is above 6.0 along with the high temps to extract the tannins. In any case, with BIAB you don't need to do a mash out. Mash out is to stop conversion and if your grains are milled properly for BIAB all the starches will already be fully converted.

 

[djonesax]

Sqeezing does get you less wort clarity but wort clarity and beer clarity are not really related. You can start with wort that is very hazy and still end up with clear beer.

Yeah agreed, I was referring to the exBeeriment where the squeezed bag resulted in a slightly less clear finished beer but the taste was the same.

You can use the hot water for sparging but there isn't any real difference in the sugar extraction over using cool water. I prefer to lift cool water instead of hot if I am going to pour it over the bag.

I learned this today too which is awesome...

The high temperature of a mash out does not necessarily extract tannins. It takes a pH that is above 6.0 along with the high temps to extract the tannins. In any case, with BIAB you don't need to do a mash out. Mash out is to stop conversion and if your grains are milled properly for BIAB all the starches will already be fully converted.

I have been racking my brain on why my first BIAB came about a tiny bit tart and had a slick mouth feel, and I was thinking it was because I over shot my mash-out and or the 4 degree higher mash temp than expected. But exBeeriments I have reading today all seem to debunk those theories. I am starting to think maybe I just took it out of the fermemter before the yeast finished cleaning up.

 

[D-Rox]

I use an "over the sink" kitchen strainer to drain and squeeze my bag on. It fits perfectly on the top of my 10 gallon "Gas One" brew kettle. It does take some dexterity and strength to get it under the bag. Kind of like that scene in Raiders of the lost Ark when Indie is replacing the idol on the pedestal. lol

 

[djonesax]

Third BIAB went pretty smooth, and at times I was sitting around like shouldn't I be washing a pot or something... I like not having to deal with all the extra equipment for sure. Although I'm still working on calibrating the kettles boil off rate and mash efficiency. Im still boiling off slightly too much with the new pot which is fine because the mash efficiencies have been lower than on my fly sparge system and seems to even out. The LHBS added a ton of rice hulls to my order with out me asking, which was cool because I wanted them anyway but forgot to ask. I have never used them before but it appeared that the bag drained a lot easier and I didn't have to squeeze it much at all this time. I hung it over the kettle while heating the boil for maybe 10-15 minutes and a gentle squeezing was all that was need. It did make the bag larger and heavier but worth it. This was the same recipe as the first BIAB I did, when I made all those mistakes, notably missing my mash temp by 4 degrees and heating the mash-out too high (180 degrees). I am very interested to compare these beers because the first beer, came out with a slight bit of tartness and maybe something that seemed a little tannic like tea. Everybody that has tried it says its good and we've already gone though 5 gallons, but I know its not supposed to be there

 

[djonesax]

OK so I just packaged this third BIAB beer at just over 3 weeks sitting at 62 degrees. This was the exact recipe as the my first BIAB with the exception of the addition of rice hulls. This beer come out perfect and exactly how I expected it to with none of the off flavors the first beer had. So Im going to assume that I probably just packaged the first beer too early and didn't give the yeast long enough to clean up. I say that because the second 5 gallon keg tasted better than the first, and the last beer I poured tasted best of all. I'm not quite ready to sell all my equipment yet but I will definitely be doing more BIAB moving forward. Way less work and the last two BIAB beers have come out just as good as with my 3 vessel system.