My adventure of opening a brewery in Chicago

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Thanks for the answer. I think I need to get my hands on one of these line chillers and see how the temperature control would hook into it. I think a brewery here in Indy uses these to control the temp, but I'm pretty sure he controls it at the chiller itself.

Would love to check out your setup sometime. You ever allow visitors?
 
So you decided to NOT go the brewpub route. I was under the impression you make more if you sell beer directly by the glass. But then you have the extra work and licensing (in PA) of operating a brewery + restaurant!

Are you considering bottling? (maybe THEN I will find your brews on the East Coast!)

:mug:
 
You make a ton more money selling by the glass. We still may do a taproom eventually. Right now our priorities are adding more fermenters to increase capacity and we'll start canning next month, finally.
 
Demon said:
You make a ton more money selling by the glass. We still may do a taproom eventually. Right now our priorities are adding more fermenters to increase capacity and we'll start canning next month, finally.
Click to expand...

Glad to hear it will be canned soon, some damn good beers! I loved McLaughlin’s RedEye at the Summer Solstice beer fest! Keep em coming!
 
As everyone has said before thanks for sharing all of this information. There is so much out there that it's easy to get sucked into the I need a million dollars to open a brewery. I'm a big fan of starting small and letting organic growth grow your business. I do have two questions

1. Did you guys just do an LLC or did you do a S Corp?
2. Did you guys have your physical location before you got TTB approved?
 
BrewCityBeerBuffs said:
As everyone has said before thanks for sharing all of this information. There is so much out there that it's easy to get sucked into the I need a million dollars to open a brewery. I'm a big fan of starting small and letting organic growth grow your business. I do have two questions

1. Did you guys just do an LLC or did you do a S Corp?
2. Did you guys have your physical location before you got TTB approved?
Click to expand...

We are an LLC.

We had our building before applying with TTB. TTB requires a copy of the lease in your application and it has to specifically state the building will be used for a brewery/brewpub/etc. If the lease isn't there they will send the packet back.

That is one of the more stressful parts of the process. Paying rent on a building that you can't use. The day you get the lease, apply. Do the buildout while licensing is pending.
 
jaydog2314 said:
Glad to hear it will be canned soon, some damn good beers! I loved McLaughlin’s RedEye at the Summer Solstice beer fest! Keep em coming!
Click to expand...

Thanks. We did 15bbl of that beer for Chicago Craft Beer Week as something unique to have at all the events. People loved it, so it replaced our regular porter in the lineup.
 
Time for some not so uplifting news. We had the circuits controlling the glycol system blow over the weekend for an unknown reason. Actively fermenting beer went up to 82*. Result? 1,120 gallons of beer heading down the drain tomorrow.

I need a beer.
 
Bummer. Hopefully it eon't be too much of a hit for you guys?

Did you taste test or is it just not worth the time/risk to try to salvage?
 
Mojzis said:
Bummer. Hopefully it eon't be too much of a hit for you guys?

Did you taste test or is it just not worth the time/risk to try to salvage?
Click to expand...

It's a substantial hit. Tasted it and it's not even close to what it should be. Not worth tying up the tank space trying to save it. I'd rather dump it, take the loss and re brew than put out potentially bad beer.
 
Demon said:
It's a substantial hit. Tasted it and it's not even close to what it should be. Not worth tying up the tank space trying to save it. I'd rather dump it, take the loss and re brew than put out potentially bad beer.
Click to expand...

Do you guys have an emergency fund for such an event or is this an out of pocket type deal?
 
If it's not too late, why not dump the bottom of the fermenter, re-pitch with fresh yeast and say you did it on purpose! It might turn tasty, just different than what you were planning on.

Demon said:
Time for some not so uplifting news. We had the circuits controlling the glycol system blow over the weekend for an unknown reason. Actively fermenting beer went up to 82*. Result? 1,120 gallons of beer heading down the drain tomorrow.

I need a beer.
Click to expand...
 
SliverXZennon said:
Do you guys have an emergency fund for such an event or is this an out of pocket type deal?
Click to expand...

Not necessarily an emergency fund, just take the hit and keep rollin. Material cost was around $1000, plus pushed the production schedule back one week. Not the end of the world.
 
WissahickonBrew said:
If it's not too late, why not dump the bottom of the fermenter, re-pitch with fresh yeast and say you did it on purpose! It might turn tasty, just different than what you were planning on.
Click to expand...

The problem with doing that is keeping the tank filled with potentially bad beer, resulting in lost production, when I could dump it and have great beer. Also, the beer is one of our top sellers, need to keep up with sales.
 
What does the VFD in the pump get you? Do you have a separate pump for transfer and cleaning? What is your transfer process?

Appreciate all the info you've provided in the thread.
 
bsandman66 said:
What does the VFD in the pump get you? Do you have a separate pump for transfer and cleaning? What is your transfer process?

Appreciate all the info you've provided in the thread.
Click to expand...

The VFD adjusts the speed of the pump. We use the same pump for CIP cycles on the tanks and transferring to fermenters. Transferring from mash to boil we actually use a simple chugger pump, and that's fast enough for the speed of our sparge.

Transfer from boil to fermenter goes like this...
Kettle
Pump
Heat Exchanger
O2 stone
Sight glass
Fermenter

Depending on the ground water temp I adjust the VFD speed and that will dictate what temp the wort gets chilled to. Throughout the transfer increase the speed on the VFD slightly every 5-10 min. The more beer in the tank, the faster the pump moves to keep wort flowing at the same rate.
 
Thanks for sharing your experiences with us. Hopefully you don't mind but I'll probably have lots of questions going forward.

In regards to your electric heating elements, how did you wire them? In other words, what controller are you using? Custom made?

It's probably pretty safe to assume this is running on 220V, did only 1 breaker handle it? How much amperage?

How did this effect your electricity bill? At some point in size going electric will be too expensive/prohibitive so I'm curious about the short vs long term advantages of electric on a system of this size.
 
CO2 to transfer between tanks. The only time I use a pump once beer is in the tank is if we need to rouse yeast, which is super rare. In that scenario we've only done it twice and I hooked the pump up from the bottom outlet, to the racking arm above it and circulated everything.
 
Roundhouse said:
Thanks for sharing your experiences with us. Hopefully you don't mind but I'll probably have lots of questions going forward.

In regards to your electric heating elements, how did you wire them? In other words, what controller are you using? Custom made?

It's probably pretty safe to assume this is running on 220V, did only 1 breaker handle it? How much amperage?

How did this effect your electricity bill? At some point in size going electric will be too expensive/prohibitive so I'm curious about the short vs long term advantages of electric on a system of this size.
Click to expand...

There are three 15kw elements. Each is wired directly to a 60amp safety switch. It's the definition of manual control. No float switches, no panel, nothing.

They are 208v 3 phase elements each on their own 50amp breaker. They each draw around 42amps if I'm remembering correctly, and don't run for more than two hours so the load is fine.

I don't have a baseline for electricity since we have always had an electric system, but it's not terribly prohibitive. I wouldn't want to do electric for anything larger than this though. Our next system will be a 20 or 30bbl steam system.
 
So I guess it's just flip the switches on to boil and off when done. Do you always run all 3 or do you ever use just 1 or 2?
 
Roundhouse said:
So I guess it's just flip the switches on to boil and off when done. Do you always run all 3 or do you ever use just 1 or 2?
Click to expand...

As soon as the wort transferring in is above each element, it gets flipped on. Very soon after the full volume is in we're boiling. Depending on the gravity of the particular beer we'll use either 2 or 3 elements to maintain a hard boil.
 
Yes, they are staggered. To give you an idea of the size, these things are 31" long.

10308749_542544342534592_2983693625805889822_n.jpg
 
Just found out the Mrs. is planning a fall trip to Chicago with another couple- where can I try your beers?
 
Check our website before you come out. We are going to start updating it once a week with accounts we are in. It's something I put together a few months ago and forgot about. I have two guys that we hired and one of their weekly tasks is updating that list. Depending on what area you are in though I can point you to the bars that always have us on.
 
Just from a label design consistency I noticed your logo height and gov warnings are different widths/lengths, look closely.
 
I have a few more questions that I'll just separate out. You may have already mentioned this and I just missed it. From the picture of the inside it looks like there is just one outlet on the perimeter at the bottom. I assume you just whirlpool by hand and allow it to settle. Has this worked out well for you?

Do you still need some form of a screen?

Any issues with debris buildup in the wort chiller?

Is there another inlet elsewhere on the kettle?

In regards to your mash tun, why did you choose to use a square tank as opposed to another vessel like the brew kettle? The mash tun link is dead btw. I guess they don't offer it anymore.
 
nextgenxx said:
Just from a label design consistency I noticed your logo height and gov warnings are different widths/lengths, look closely.
Click to expand...

That's from the way I cropped them after the designer sent them. He sent them with the full can specs and measurements around it, I trimmed it quickly on my iPhone. Also on 1926, the white logo, circle and 1926 look blurry because it is only there as a hold. The actual graphic is clear in those sections, so the aluminum shows instead of white.
 
Roundhouse said:
I have a few more questions that I'll just separate out. You may have already mentioned this and I just missed it. From the picture of the inside it looks like there is just one outlet on the perimeter at the bottom. I assume you just whirlpool by hand and allow it to settle. Has this worked out well for you?

Do you still need some form of a screen?

Any issues with debris buildup in the wort chiller?

Is there another inlet elsewhere on the kettle?

In regards to your mash tun, why did you choose to use a square tank as opposed to another vessel like the brew kettle? The mash tun link is dead btw. I guess they don't offer it anymore.
Click to expand...

I whirlpool manually with a big paddle for about 2 minutes. It's the most physically exhausting 2 minutes of the day.

Une Annee Brewing uses this same setup and he has a diverter welded near the outlet to block trub/hops. I'll be adding the same.

No buildup in the chiller.

No other inlet/outlet. Fill and empty from the main 2" valve.

GW Kent no longer offers the square tank. The reason for that particular selection was due to height. This tank is shorter and wider than cylindrical of the same volume. I wanted a thinner grain bed.
 
Was the reasoning for the thinner grain bed ease in lautering/less risk of getting stuck or was it due to being easier to manually stir and clean out?
 
Mark_tries_brewing said:
Could you describe the diverter? Thanks for such an informative thread.
Click to expand...


It's a 3" tall "dam" that is six inches from the kettle wall and follows the same curvature.

Essentially blocks the hop cone from the outlet after is starts to collapse when the liquid is low.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 

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