First eBIAB brew day - a couple hiccups, but so far - so good.

[rkhanso]

I'm brewing my first eBIAB brew today. I'm making the Cream of Three Crops Cream Ale.

I'm going for a 10 gallon batch, but didn't change the 11gal recipe any. This is a first-run on the new system, so I'm not 100% sure on all the losses.

I started with just 12 gallons of strike water, but I think I should have started with 13 or a little more. At the end of the mash, my little brown pump died. That sucks....since I need it to pump through the CFC. Maybe I can use gravity, but not sure about that. When the pump quit working, my temp probe outside the kettle quit reading accurately, so I'm sure the temp went up a bit too high. No worries though.

I forgot to start the boil timer right away, so I may be off on the total boil time, but the hops will have been in for the full 60 min.

I'm splitting the wort into 2 fermenters and using 2 different yeasts: Kolsch and Nottingham.

My pre-boil gravity was 1.040. I'll report back after getting further into the brew day.

 

[rkhanso]

Gravity into the fermenter was 1.047.
I got about 10 gallons into the fermenters.
I've not made any beer this light before. It does still smell good.

Since my pump quit working, I used gravity to get the wort to flow through the CFC. It worked perfect. Nice and cool coming out of the CFC. I did forget to get a temp reading, but it was lukewarm, bordering on cool.

 

[FloppyKnockers]

New systems are always tough...hell, if I brew at a time of day I'm not used to it will throw me off a bit. Let us know how it turns out!

 

[wepeeler]

Good luck man. At least you got it into the fermenter! I was worried when I saw the pump broke.

 

[brewbama]

I recently adding some new steps due to new equipment. It took three brews before I was back to a relaxing brew day. Knowing what to do to get the wort in the fermenter = good on ya.

 

[rkhanso]

I forgot to mention it was also my first use of the corona Mill. I took some pictures and i'll post them when I get back home. The Mill Worked really good. I was impressed.

 

[rkhanso]

I forgot to mention...it's also my first time using RO water and adding stuff to the water to get a good profile.
My scale doesn't measure tenths of grams, so I guessed a bit...
2.6g of Gypsum
5.2g of CaCl
.9 tsp of Lactic Acid

I'm already getting activity in the airlocks!

Here's a picture of the grind out of the Corona Mill

 

[RM-MN]

You overshot the projected OG which means you got better efficiency than the recipe was planned for. Tighten up the mill and your efficiency will go up even more. If you do, you will have to start adjusting recipes to account for this but you will be using less grains.

With no late addition hops, fast cooling isn't necessary. I'm glad to hear that your CFC worked well with gravity feed but this could have been a "no chill batch" with good results too.

 

[rkhanso]

Thanks fellow Minnesotan.

Though, I'm not sure my efficiency was better. I made a 10 gallon batch instead of 11, like the recipe directed. I didn't change the recipe though - kept the grain bill the same. I knew the gravity would be higher, just not how much higher (I don't know how to do the calculations).

This whole brew day was an experiment, being my first BIAB all-grain brewing, coming from extracts.

I did find out why my pump quit working though. It wasn't the pump that died. I blew the fuse to the pump. I had a glass 1A fuse protecting the controller - but using an in-line fuse holder inside the controller. This is inconvenient, so I bought a panel mount auto-type blade fuse holder that I'm going to install so I can replace the fuses w/o taking the cover of the brew panel off.

On eBay, the pump said it was rated for .7A. I just used a glass 1A fuse since it was the closest I could find. I'm not sure if I had a slow-blow or a fast-blow installed. But with the ATC type, I have not seen anything other than Medium (normal) blow or fast-blow for the ATC blade type fuses. I haven't seen any ATC fuses in fractions of an Amp ratings. I can only find 1A, 2A, 5A fuses. Can I safely bump it up to a 2A? Or stick with a 1A?

I'm going to take my first of a few gravity readings in a couple days to see if fermenting is completed. Is there any reason why I should't bottle as soon as there's no change in gravity? Or, would it be better to let it sit another couple weeks? I didn't plan on doing a secondary fermentation. However, I could if the beer would be a lot clearer because of waiting and/or doing a secondary. I have no way of "cold crashing" that I'm aware of.

 

[RM-MN]

When fermentation is just complete the will be a lot of suspended yeast and other trub. Allowing time before bottling leaves much of this in the fermenter instead of the bottom of your bottle. This plus the time it takes for beer to mature is a good reason to leave the beer sit in the fermenter for a longer time. This is especially true for a darker beer that will take time to mature anyway so it really doesn't help to bottle early unless you really need the fermenter for the next batch and don't care if you only get to pour 10 ounces instead of 12 because of all the trub in the bottle.

 

[Genuine]

I've been using Brewers Friend for brewing software and it's been great. Really helps you dial in your system. I usually keg a couple days after fermentation (or a week, depends on how busy life gets) to let the yeast clean up after themselves. Then it's either burst carbonated or I use the set it and forget it method for 1-2 weeks. I made a beer about 6 months ago that is finally starting to meld and become slightly better than what it was super fresh. Admittedly that brew day didn't go as well as expected so...

 

[rkhanso]

I bottled today. Just did a primary fermentation on the split-batch (one batch in a carboy, the other in a bucket - each with different yeast) for 3 weeks.
I forgot to get a final gravity on the Nottingham yeast. The Kolsch was 1.010 for a 4.86% ABV. I think they'll taste OK - but not sure if it'll be better than I can buy in the store.

I'm going to bottle condition in the same place I did fermentation - my softener room that's around a constant 65-67F. Is that too low temp for bottle conditioning?

I got 46 bottles of the Nottingham (4.3 gal) and 36 bottles of the Kolsch (3.4 gal) for a total of 7.7 gallons bottled. That's from what I hoped was a 10 gallon batch of beer.

Brewersfriend says:
Conversion Efficiency Add Log
Pre-Boil: 75% 28.5 ppg
Ending Kettle: 80% 30.4 ppg
Brew House: 73% 27.6 ppg

Can I share my brew day on Brewersfriend with a free account? I'm not sure I'm using it correctly.

I'll try a bottle in a week and see how it is.

 

[Genuine]

Whats your name on Brewers friend?

 

[rkhanso]

Whats your name on Brewers friend?

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