I'm mashing!

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Cool! Getting a late start on it all aren't ya? I just started my mash as well (early here 7a)
 
I was going to ask the same on mash in temp. Also. how did your rectangular cooler temp hold?

Finally used my Northern Industrial grain mill for the 1st time. Worked well for the 2# I had roasting in the oven. (smelled wonderful in the early morning). Yep, LWPA! No adjust on your recipe either.
 
i am pre-heating mlt, and getting ready to transfer my stout to seconardy. Was planning on listening to the race but it's raining now they might not get it in...
 
I'm getting ready to dough in . . . gonna get my mash started before church . . . then sparge when we get home.

Brewing on Sunday . . . :rockin:

What are ya'll brewing? I'm putting together a Cranberry Wheat.
 
I'm chattered! Just started boil. Sparge went okay. Don't ask me about efficiencies...I was too phased out to care. Looks and smells nice though.
 
I went in with 30lbs of grain and was not sure I was going to get it all in. I made my mash tun from a 50 liter keg thinking it would be plenty big enough, WRONG, now I am going to have to cut up one of my 1/2 bl kegs and start over that 2 in of headspace will make a difference. But, what the hell thats what makes this so much fun, you learn something evertime you brew. Plus my partner isn't here try to dough 30 lbs by yourself.... Now I can't get my mash temp down and no room to add cool water I am 160 hope that's not to high!!!!
 
I am not sure if I input everything right, but if Promash is correct my eff on this batch is 83%, that's with 13.5 gal in the kettle....
 
Come on guys, how do you calculate efficiency?

BTW, I'm totally and utterly sh%gged out! I haven't eaten, SWMBO wants my head on a platter for taking up the kitchen all day. This beer better be worth it!
 
BlightyBrewer said:
Come on guys, how do you calculate efficiency?

BTW, I'm totally and utterly sh%gged out! I haven't eaten, SWMBO wants my head on a platter for taking up the kitchen all day. This beer better be worth it!
Click to expand...

I know what you mean, I'm done for the day, everything is clean and most of it put away. Fortunately, I brew up in the BREWshed so I don't have to worry about the SWMBO, but man am I beat. Now I have about 20 gal in Primary and secondary... Will be at it again next weekend trying to get the drinking stock up to a maintainable level.
 
Hi BB,

I brewed 2 batches yesterday. One kind of London Pride inspired clone type of thing (yes I know what Fullers have done to Gales and yes I live in Hampshire) and one wheat beer.

Started mashing the first batch about 11 and the second about 15:30. All done in time for dinner at 8.

I think my wife was just pleased I was out of the house all day (I brew in the garage). Although she wasn't happy about the smell of hops lingerring in the house all evening. I reckon it's the hops boilinmg away that makes me feel so tired each time I brew.

Let us know how your beer turns out.

All the best,
/Phil.
 
How on earth did you manage two brews in one day! You must either have a lot of equipment, or be a glutten for punishment! ;)

You must have planned that one really well.

I found the clearing up afterwards to be the hardest job (I hate it).
 
Blighty,

What kit have you got for your all grain brewery and where did you get it from ?

I'm mulling over making the move from extract brewing up to all grain and probably from a standard 5g batch up to a 10g batch.

I guess I need an HLT / Boiler, a mash tun and a big fermenter - although it would be good to be able to have the hot liquor tank and the Boiler as separate vessels.

There's too many options and I'm not sure of the best route at the moment :drunk:
 
BlightyBrewer said:
Come on guys, how do you calculate efficiency?
Click to expand...
Seriously, I just use Promash...if it says 83%, then good job! I take a reading from the kettle before I start boiling...make sure you mark in Promash that the reading was taken from the kettle and not from the fermentor, and note that the volume reading is fairly important in terms of an accurate eff. reading.

As far as cleaning up, I do it as I go. Mashtun gets dumped and rinsed while I'm boiling. Various equipment gets cleaned in the hot water from my immersion chiller while I'm chilling. I keep all my various gadgets and such in a brewbasket which just gets put back in place, and by the time I've siphoned I've really only got the kettle to scrub.

But yeah, it sucks compared to actually brewing.
 
80/-

I have a homemade cool box mash tun with a copper manifold

manifoldfinal2qf.jpg


A Brupaks Electric Boiler (which I also use as a HLT) and a homemade counterflow chiller:-

setup9kl.jpg


I agree that it would be easier if I had a separate HLT as I have to sparge into a separate vessel (shown behind chair) before transferring to the boiler once sparging is complete. I also use a watering can rose attached to a length of poly tubing to sparge.
 
Thats a tidy looking cool box mash tun !

Did you use soldered joins on the copper piping ? I'm toying with the idea of using the push fit fittings - mostly because I'm not trusted around the cobination of beer and naked flame :D

80/-
 
The two side arms are soldered (with lead-free solder) as I didn't want to have too many bits, but the rest is push fit for ease of cleaning. Works very well.
 
BlightyBrewer said:
How on earth did you manage two brews in one day! You must either have a lot of equipment, or be a glutten for punishment! ;)
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm a glutton for punishment but also I have managed to cut a few corners and optimise my process.

I use a boiler to heat the mash liquor. While that's heating I clean everything else. I mash for an hour then fly sparge for about 45 minutes with sparge liquor that I have been heating in the boiller during the mash. A big time saver is to run the sparge liquor into an insulated bin then sparge straight into the boiler so that I can have the wort almost at boiling point by the time the sparge finishes.

Another big time saver is the immersion chiller. I can take a 25 litre batch from boiling point to pitching temperature in 20 minutes. Once I pitch the yeast in the first batch I get going again. It's a very long day but worth it.

Using the above method I have cut my process down from the 8 hours I used to take, when I started brewing, to about 4 hours per batch. Which means there's more time for drinking......which, in turn, means I need to brew more beer:drunk:

All the best,
/Phil.
 
Blightly, I dig that copper manifold. Mine is similar, just smaller. My kitchen used to look like that too, until I got the turkey fryer. Now everyone is happy. I get to do all-grain at full volume, and the kitchen stays clean, although I miss the smell that would fill the house.
 
BlightyBrewer said:
I found the clearing up afterwards to be the hardest job (I hate it).
Click to expand...

Right at the very moment my SWMBO seems to not have a TERRIBLE problem with my clean up in stages. With my heart I still get tired pretty quickly. It looks like the effort I make to initially clean up holds me on good grounds.
 
Just racked my first AG to secondary. It's a bit thin (over-sparged?), very light, and has a grapefruit taste about it. Hmmm, not sure whether this one is drain bound or not?
 
BlightyBrewer said:
Just racked my first AG to secondary. It's a bit thin (over-sparged?), very light, and has a grapefruit taste about it. Hmmm, not sure whether this one is drain bound or not?
Click to expand...

What was the mash temp? Might be your thermometer too. A thin beer means you didn't mash high enough to compensate for some body. My first couple were like that and I found out (through Sam75) to check my thermometer. Sure enough.

Oversparged would have an astringency to it.
 

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