Newbie Scheduling Question

[johnsonpvb17]

Does anyone have any tips/methods on scheduling a continuous brew pipe line of mixed fresh and decently aged ales with constraints like one fermenter, a set number of kegs, cooling and drinking capacity? Using a color coded spreadsheet calendar by keg status is where I'm at.

 

[CascadesBrewer]

If you are a new brewer, I am not sure a "continuous brew pipe line" should be your first priority, but...

I also use a color coded spreadsheet.

• My fermentation chamber (a 5 cu. ft. freezer) is one of my big bottlenecks, but I can play with that by either moving beers out after the the initial fermentation, or working in Kveik or Belgians that I can manage at ambient or with a heating pad.
• My keg freezer will hold four 5-gallon kegs and has four CO2 lines. At times, that is another bottleneck for me, especially if I want to keep something like Hop Water on tap.
• Consumption can also be a bottleneck for me. I have started to expand my equipment to support taking along either a 1 gallon mini-keg, or a 2.5 gallon keg to an event...or just taking a partial 5 gallon keg in a bucket of ice.
• I would like to have better integration with events and milestone planning. I might want to brew a beer (or several) for an event or a holiday, and I often want to have beers ready for competitions. The single column on the right does not work as well as I would like. I can see below that I added a note for two beers that I wanted to enter into the Bluegrass Cup competition.
• I don't do a good job of forecasting my future brews. Toward the bottom, I might have a list of ideas, but it seems I often switch it up at the last minute. Sometimes kegs kick a lot sooner than expected and sometimes a keg will linger for months.

 

[OakIslandBrewery]

Spreadsheets with lots of columns and lines with pretty colors are fun but there's other simpler ways to keep track of your brewed beer.

I tag my kegs before putting them into the beer cooler. Each tag has the beer style, when I brewed it and when it was kegged. Granted I have six kegs in my cooler, three on tap, but if you have more inventory then a list might be needed.

Unless you're into heavy beer production I don't see much value in making it too complicated. I figure when a keg is about empty and I put the second keg on tap it's time to figure what to brew next. At the beginning of each year I write down a list of what I want to brew.

 

[homebeerbrewer]

When I was starting out, I would brew the next batch as soon as the fermenter was empty. Consumption was my bottleneck fairly quickly. I kept buying kegs to keep up with production.

Nowadays, I brew when my non-brewing schedule allows.

 

[johnsonpvb17]

When I was starting out, I would brew the next batch as soon as the fermenter was empty. Consumption was my bottleneck fairly quickly. I kept buying kegs to keep up with production.

Nowadays, I brew when my non-brewing schedule allows.

Thanks. I'm long retired, so my bottle neck is surely consumption, which I am looking very much forward to.

Spreadsheets with lots of columns and lines with pretty colors are fun but there's other simpler ways to keep track of your brewed beer.

I tag my kegs before putting them into the beer cooler. Each tag has the beer style, when I brewed it and when it was kegged. Granted I have six kegs in my cooler, three on tap, but if you have more inventory then a list might be needed.

Unless you're into heavy beer production I don't see much value in making it too complicated. I figure when a keg is about empty and I put the second keg on tap it's time to figure what to brew next. At the beginning of each year I write down a list of what I want to brew.

Thanks. Very good points. The Kanban system is hard to beat, but a year is a little beyond my normal planning horizon.

 

[OakIslandBrewery]

Thanks. I'm long retired, so my bottle neck is surely consumption, which I am looking very much forward to.

Thanks. Very good points. The Kanban system is hard to beat, but a year is a little beyond my normal planning horizon.

My list for the year isn't gospel and I do stray from it or add new styles. I try to group some recipes so I can bulk purchase grains to save some bucks.