Hi, I've been gleaning a lot from these forums along with other books and internet resources, so I thought it would be a good time to share my experiences. I recently started brewing at Christmas time, what started out as a harmless inquest has reared its head instead into a fearsome and beautiful monster.
Tonight, I am planning on taking pictures of the equipment that we modified along our journey.
1st Brew - I enjoy a low IBU brown ale like Newcastle, so we tried our hand at a nut brown ale. This is shortly after buying a Brewer's best beer kit with a 6 gallon glass carboy.
(Tonight I will include recipes after looking back at my more extensive notes).
For our first brewing experience, the local homebrew store manager offered to brew it with us at his store, in order to kick-start us into brewing. An offer we gladly took him up on, (though to be fair he had no idea how particularly annoying and inquisitive I was yet). We ended up doing a partial mash recipe of his craft using DME (Dried Malt Extract) and just a few pounds of grain. For our first experience we steeped the grains for 60 minutes at 158 degrees, this time we were actually using grain socks, so as we pulled the sock out of the wort, we gently held the bottom with the paddle and let it drain naturally in order to avoid excessive squeezing and the release of tannins from the grain husks. After which we ended up bringing to a 60 minute rolling boil, and adding hops and the DME, then we cooled down with his wort chiller and put into primary fermentation for 7 days, after 7 days we racked to secondary, then 7 days later again we bottled and let them condition for a minimum of 2 weeks. They tasted quite good.
At this point our equipment was:
(Initial investment $120 (including tax)
6 gallon glass carboy
5 gallon brewing kettle (SS) (Electric stove for heat)
6.5 gallon Primary fermentation bucket with lid and airlock
6.5 gallon Bottling bucket with tap
Some sanitizer powder
Bottlecap Press
Siphon
Thermometer
Hydrometer
Now we were excited about our second which was to be a milk stout, we followed pretty much the same procedure, but ended up adding a lb of lactose in order to have that residual sweetness from the non-fermentable sugars. After bottling the trouble started, I was convinced that partial mash was not good enough nor enjoyable enough of a task. Not to mention I figured since we were already partially mashing we might as well do an All Grain batch. Rushing into it fine, but might as well.
Now we run through our equipment pick up phase. Some friends from a restaraunt gave us a 10 gallon kettle, and my roommate found another 6 gallon glass carboy in a shed they were cleaning out to demolish. We cleaned it thoroughly and sanitized it thoroughly and now we have another fermenter, yay. My roommates boss, happened to have an extra older refrigerator, and gave it to him for finding a job. We soon learned this fridge would actually easily go down to and maintain 34-36 degrees, so we bought an inline voltage thermostat to turn it into a lagering fridge. Now my mind is spinning about All grain brewing, so we made an extract brew to take my mind off of it, an oktoberfest that we could go ahead and use the lagering fridge for.
Added Equipment:
Lagering Fridge ($0)
In-Line Voltage Thermostat ($45)
6 gallon glass carboy ($0)
Now I need a mash and lauter tun, it seemed to me the easiest way to do this was going to be by using a drink cooler (this was made more obvious to me by the fact that I already had a 5 gallon drink cooler from Home Depot, that just sits in the basement collecting dust). So we took this cooler, removed the spigot from it, measured the size of the hole and I went to home Depot. Shortly thereafter we returned with some copper pipe, ball valves, fittings and tubing. We used a quick disconnect shark-bite ball valve and pulled out the plastic ring (put there for PEX connection), this would be our flow control lever to maintain, reduce or increase the flow of sweet wort from the tun to the boiling kettle. The quick disconnects are nice too, because they are easy to take off and clean thoroughly, it was also only 30 cents more. The copper pipe then goes into the bottom of the water cooler where we made a manifold for it using short copper pieces, t's and elbows. We soldered on some of the copper, so that we could take the manifold apart easily in 5 pieces and clean it. We made the cuts on the top of the pipes about 1/4 inch apart with a hacksaw. (Didn't have a fine grinding blade for my angle grinder). I think took some softer 3/8 copper and bent it around for a wort chiller.
Equipment added: (investment $60)
5 gallon Water Cooler with Manifold (serves as Mash Tun/Lauter Tun) (previously owned vessel, spent about 30 dollars on the manifold)
Wort Chiller (we had learned that the ice-baths were taking way too long, (45 minutes, with a high flow rate of water, we managed to cut this down to about 25 minutes with 2 gallons more of wort, we built the Wort chiller for under 30 dollars)
Now we tried our first all grain brew, it was an Abbey Ale that I was intending to be about 6.8% ABV, 28 IBU, 14 SRM
This recipe I came up with myself after looking at some close examples. Everything went fantastic, the lauter tun worked beautifully, no problems with stuck sparges using the manifold, now we had 6.5 gallons of wort to bring to a boil, then the problem started. The nice $1400 dollar SS stove with an electric flat glass top that I had and dual burners everywhere would not get the wort to a decent rolling boil easily. We ended up using a softer boil at about 100 minutes (It took about 45-50 minutes to get it to that), thankfully we did wait to add the hops and candi sugar, rather than trying to at the beggining of the soft boil. This was a problem that would have to be rectified.
My roommate once again looked around at their shop and his boss had an old Propane Turkey Fryer sitting out back of the shop, it had been there for two years, one question later it was ours for free. It was a bit rusted, and there was a ring to hold a smaller pot. There were going to have to be some modifications, we knew a friend that had a welder so we went over there and cut the welds, lowered the ring to accomodate a larger pot, sandblasted it, and painted it to hopefully help protect it from rust. The regulator was in good condition and we replaced the propane hose. Now we have a heat source for boiling.
Added Equipment:
Propane Burner ($0)
Now we tried something this past weekend finally with all of the equipment we would need. My roommate is an IPA fan so we crafted a beer in the style of an Imperial Pale Ale (94 IBU, 9.5% ABV, 4 SRM, 1.086 OG). We used a variety of hops, Perle, Chinook, Columbus, Mt Hood, Citra (Dry, full flower). This time our AG brew went well. The Mash/Lauter Tun worked beautifully, we had plenty of sparge water (we had shorted ourselves the first time and since learned better to have more than not enough), and our heat source was now adequate (it brought 7 gallons of wort to a boil in 20-25 minutes). Of course as we were brewing, I remarked that we needed another long thermometer, because we were going to break the one we had, it wasn't a question of would we, but more when. (the when was about 45 minutes later), but other than that a mishap free AG brewing session and now our equipment a couple months later is:
2 6 gallon glass Carboys
1 6.5 gallon Fermenting bucket
1 6.5 gallon Bottling bucket
1 5 gallon Kettle (40)
1 10 gallon Kettle
1 5 Gal (really holds 6) Mash/Lauter Tun with manifold (30)
1 Wort Chiller (30)
1 Lagering Fridge with inline voltage thermostat (45)
1 Propane Burner
1 Hydrometer
0 Thermometer (well I have a few cooking ones that work but aren't long enough this shall soon be remedied)
Upcoming equipment purchases:
Thermometer (2)
Grain Mill
That will do it until I go to a 15 gal RIMS system or something of the sort.
I thought I would post this to just give my experiences as a newbie coming into brewing and to show you can find a lot of things around the house sometimes, and even if not they can be constructed rather cheap. I will post pictures of the construction of our elements, should it be desired.
Tonight, I am planning on taking pictures of the equipment that we modified along our journey.
1st Brew - I enjoy a low IBU brown ale like Newcastle, so we tried our hand at a nut brown ale. This is shortly after buying a Brewer's best beer kit with a 6 gallon glass carboy.
(Tonight I will include recipes after looking back at my more extensive notes).
For our first brewing experience, the local homebrew store manager offered to brew it with us at his store, in order to kick-start us into brewing. An offer we gladly took him up on, (though to be fair he had no idea how particularly annoying and inquisitive I was yet). We ended up doing a partial mash recipe of his craft using DME (Dried Malt Extract) and just a few pounds of grain. For our first experience we steeped the grains for 60 minutes at 158 degrees, this time we were actually using grain socks, so as we pulled the sock out of the wort, we gently held the bottom with the paddle and let it drain naturally in order to avoid excessive squeezing and the release of tannins from the grain husks. After which we ended up bringing to a 60 minute rolling boil, and adding hops and the DME, then we cooled down with his wort chiller and put into primary fermentation for 7 days, after 7 days we racked to secondary, then 7 days later again we bottled and let them condition for a minimum of 2 weeks. They tasted quite good.
At this point our equipment was:
(Initial investment $120 (including tax)
6 gallon glass carboy
5 gallon brewing kettle (SS) (Electric stove for heat)
6.5 gallon Primary fermentation bucket with lid and airlock
6.5 gallon Bottling bucket with tap
Some sanitizer powder
Bottlecap Press
Siphon
Thermometer
Hydrometer
Now we were excited about our second which was to be a milk stout, we followed pretty much the same procedure, but ended up adding a lb of lactose in order to have that residual sweetness from the non-fermentable sugars. After bottling the trouble started, I was convinced that partial mash was not good enough nor enjoyable enough of a task. Not to mention I figured since we were already partially mashing we might as well do an All Grain batch. Rushing into it fine, but might as well.
Now we run through our equipment pick up phase. Some friends from a restaraunt gave us a 10 gallon kettle, and my roommate found another 6 gallon glass carboy in a shed they were cleaning out to demolish. We cleaned it thoroughly and sanitized it thoroughly and now we have another fermenter, yay. My roommates boss, happened to have an extra older refrigerator, and gave it to him for finding a job. We soon learned this fridge would actually easily go down to and maintain 34-36 degrees, so we bought an inline voltage thermostat to turn it into a lagering fridge. Now my mind is spinning about All grain brewing, so we made an extract brew to take my mind off of it, an oktoberfest that we could go ahead and use the lagering fridge for.
Added Equipment:
Lagering Fridge ($0)
In-Line Voltage Thermostat ($45)
6 gallon glass carboy ($0)
Now I need a mash and lauter tun, it seemed to me the easiest way to do this was going to be by using a drink cooler (this was made more obvious to me by the fact that I already had a 5 gallon drink cooler from Home Depot, that just sits in the basement collecting dust). So we took this cooler, removed the spigot from it, measured the size of the hole and I went to home Depot. Shortly thereafter we returned with some copper pipe, ball valves, fittings and tubing. We used a quick disconnect shark-bite ball valve and pulled out the plastic ring (put there for PEX connection), this would be our flow control lever to maintain, reduce or increase the flow of sweet wort from the tun to the boiling kettle. The quick disconnects are nice too, because they are easy to take off and clean thoroughly, it was also only 30 cents more. The copper pipe then goes into the bottom of the water cooler where we made a manifold for it using short copper pieces, t's and elbows. We soldered on some of the copper, so that we could take the manifold apart easily in 5 pieces and clean it. We made the cuts on the top of the pipes about 1/4 inch apart with a hacksaw. (Didn't have a fine grinding blade for my angle grinder). I think took some softer 3/8 copper and bent it around for a wort chiller.
Equipment added: (investment $60)
5 gallon Water Cooler with Manifold (serves as Mash Tun/Lauter Tun) (previously owned vessel, spent about 30 dollars on the manifold)
Wort Chiller (we had learned that the ice-baths were taking way too long, (45 minutes, with a high flow rate of water, we managed to cut this down to about 25 minutes with 2 gallons more of wort, we built the Wort chiller for under 30 dollars)
Now we tried our first all grain brew, it was an Abbey Ale that I was intending to be about 6.8% ABV, 28 IBU, 14 SRM
This recipe I came up with myself after looking at some close examples. Everything went fantastic, the lauter tun worked beautifully, no problems with stuck sparges using the manifold, now we had 6.5 gallons of wort to bring to a boil, then the problem started. The nice $1400 dollar SS stove with an electric flat glass top that I had and dual burners everywhere would not get the wort to a decent rolling boil easily. We ended up using a softer boil at about 100 minutes (It took about 45-50 minutes to get it to that), thankfully we did wait to add the hops and candi sugar, rather than trying to at the beggining of the soft boil. This was a problem that would have to be rectified.
My roommate once again looked around at their shop and his boss had an old Propane Turkey Fryer sitting out back of the shop, it had been there for two years, one question later it was ours for free. It was a bit rusted, and there was a ring to hold a smaller pot. There were going to have to be some modifications, we knew a friend that had a welder so we went over there and cut the welds, lowered the ring to accomodate a larger pot, sandblasted it, and painted it to hopefully help protect it from rust. The regulator was in good condition and we replaced the propane hose. Now we have a heat source for boiling.
Added Equipment:
Propane Burner ($0)
Now we tried something this past weekend finally with all of the equipment we would need. My roommate is an IPA fan so we crafted a beer in the style of an Imperial Pale Ale (94 IBU, 9.5% ABV, 4 SRM, 1.086 OG). We used a variety of hops, Perle, Chinook, Columbus, Mt Hood, Citra (Dry, full flower). This time our AG brew went well. The Mash/Lauter Tun worked beautifully, we had plenty of sparge water (we had shorted ourselves the first time and since learned better to have more than not enough), and our heat source was now adequate (it brought 7 gallons of wort to a boil in 20-25 minutes). Of course as we were brewing, I remarked that we needed another long thermometer, because we were going to break the one we had, it wasn't a question of would we, but more when. (the when was about 45 minutes later), but other than that a mishap free AG brewing session and now our equipment a couple months later is:
2 6 gallon glass Carboys
1 6.5 gallon Fermenting bucket
1 6.5 gallon Bottling bucket
1 5 gallon Kettle (40)
1 10 gallon Kettle
1 5 Gal (really holds 6) Mash/Lauter Tun with manifold (30)
1 Wort Chiller (30)
1 Lagering Fridge with inline voltage thermostat (45)
1 Propane Burner
1 Hydrometer
0 Thermometer (well I have a few cooking ones that work but aren't long enough this shall soon be remedied)
Upcoming equipment purchases:
Thermometer (2)
Grain Mill
That will do it until I go to a 15 gal RIMS system or something of the sort.
I thought I would post this to just give my experiences as a newbie coming into brewing and to show you can find a lot of things around the house sometimes, and even if not they can be constructed rather cheap. I will post pictures of the construction of our elements, should it be desired.
