Full boil extract brews?

[SW Brewer]

I finally bought a turkey fryer the other day and am itching to use it. I am still extract brewing until I get my cooler MLT built, but I would like to try full boils of extract brews. Can someone (patiently) walk me through the necessary steps of moving from a partial boil to a full boil?

 

[Barley-Davidson]

It's basically the same thing. The differences are:

Hop utilization - The lower SG of a full boil means better hops utilization (more bitterness). Use a brew calculator to see what adjustments to make.

Cooling - It's harder to cool the larger volume of wort. If you don't already have some sort of chiller you should look into it.

Aeration - When you do partial boils, usually the water you use to top off with contains oxygen, so even if you don't do a very good job aerating the wort it's still OK. When you do a full boil the oxygen boils out of the wort, so you really need to make sure you do something to add it back in.

If your partial boils have been successful so will your full boils with some small adjustments. Enjoy

 

[Thalon]

I've been doing full boils with extract kits for 6 months, which means I started in the dead of winter here in Minnesota. I tried cooling my 7.5gal stockpot with a full boil in it in the snowbank, moving it around to a new spot in the snowbank as often as it needed to keep contact with the sides (the snow tends to melt away from the sides causing airspace and greatly reduced cooling capacity - air transfers a lot less heat than direct contact). It still took me about 45 min to cool down the full boil to pitching temp. I was in a hurry too! Because of that experience I went and got an immersion chiller. Now it cools from boiling to pitching temp in about 12-15 min.

All that to say I wouldn't recommend doing full boils until you already have a cooling solution in place.

Same with aeration. I didn't know about it until after about 6 batches of full boils, and my beers got worse and worse. Now they are back to very good. One method is to shake the carboy vigorously for several minutes, but with glass carboys I never wanted to bother. A simple aquarium-style air pump and air stone (sanitized!) works fine for me.

 

[kingjam]

Do you still steep your grains in 2 1\2 gal of water then add the rest of the 5 gal. before you start your boil?

 

[Got Trub?]

Do you still steep your grains in 2 1\2 gal of water then add the rest of the 5 gal. before you start your boil?

You can steep in the full volume you plan to boil.

 

[kingjam]

Why have I always heard that you have to steep in so much water per pounds of grain? Do you ever have to do that.

 

[SW Brewer]

I will take a look at that calculator and give it a shot on my next batch. I figured I would need a chiller, can you guys recommend one to me? I looked at copper tubing at Lowes, but man that stuff is expensive!

Greg

 

[kingjam]

morebeer.com $49 for one and then pick up $10 more of supplies and get free shipping

 

[Beerrific]

I will take a look at that calculator and give it a shot on my next batch. I figured I would need a chiller, can you guys recommend one to me? I looked at copper tubing at Lowes, but man that stuff is expensive!

Greg

Yeah, soft copper is expensive. Unless you are going to be buy a lot (50-100 ft.), it is practically the same price to buy one that has already been made. I have a 25' of 3/8'', this cools my 5 gallon in a reasonable time but I am still working out the details of the best way to use it.

I bought from Alternative Beverage. It is $42.99 and shipping was reasonable and got to me in one day (primary reason I bought from them).

MoreBeer sells the same size for $48.95 but they have free shipping if over $59.

 

[vtchuck]

If you do am eBay search for user brew-4-less, he has a 25' half-inch tubing chiller for $39 plus about $10 for shipping. I'm pleased with mine & the 1/2" tubing reduces the cooling time.

Just my $0.02

 

[SW Brewer]

OK. I will look into the chillers, thanks for the leads fellas. One more quick question.....how much total water do you boil? Is it a 5 gallon boil for a 5 gallon batch, or something a bit more than that to ensure that you end up with 5 gallons at the end?

 

[Wolf]

I would start with 5.5 gallons on your first one and see how much boil off you have.

 

[New2HomeBrew]

I would recomend closer to 6 gallons to begin.

 

[Ol' Grog]

Yeah, I'd start off with 6 gallons. Your going to lose a lot of water. When steeping, I don't even bother measuring the amount of water. I grab my stock pot, put about 2 gallons or so of water in it, get it up to about 160-ish on the stove, and then dump the grains in. My wife found a really good s.s. strainer that I use to dump the water with grains through. I then pour all that into the keggle, fill the rest with hot tap water up to 6 gallons, and then flame on! Not really worried about clean water at this point as it is going to be boiled for an hour any way. I still use splash aeration. I have a hose coming off the keggle and place the fermenting bucket a couple of feet below it and let it fill up that way. Makes nice bubbles when transfering.

 

[SW Brewer]

Thanks for all the help fellas. I hope to do this brew this weekend. I need to get a propane tank and hopefully get my hops from Northern Brewer. My LBS didnt have either Northern Brewer nor Cascade hops. Whats up with that!?!?!??!

 

[GK@BCB]

When doing a full boil and using enough to account for boil off (approx 6.5 gallons), do I need to make any adjustments to the recipe to account for the added volume? Added DME?

 

[Thalon]

Nope, the added volume of water is there only to account for what will evaporate during an hour long boil. The idea is to end up with exactly 5 gallons at the end, which is what the recipe is already formulated for.

 

[SW Brewer]

Alright fellas. I think I am going to do this recipe this weekend (family out of town).

http://www.basicbrewing.com/databas...unction=details&where_field=id&where_value=23

What changes do I need to make to this recipe to make it a full boil? Sorry for the "Brewing for Dummies", but I could really use some more confidence in this brew and you guys all have lots of knowledge to share. Share away!!!

Greg