Thoughts/input for a newbie getting into the hobby

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AlbertaBeer

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Hey guys, total newbie here for the home brewing. Been doing a bunch of reading and watching videos and all that fun stuff and there’s just so many different ways to do it that it’s hard to decide!

We farm in northern Alberta and I’d like to start brewing with the cereals we grow. Typically on any given year we crop 2 different varieties of malt barley and 1-2 varieties of wheat (I’ve had some wheat beer before and wasn’t really a fan of it, but I’ll try some anyways) so I will have some different ingredients to play with. I haven’t looked much into growing hops in our climate but if they will produce I would definitely grow some hops just to say they came from the property too!

Anyways I’m still up in the air over what kind of equipment I’m going to go with. I’m definitely one of those guys that wants to spend the money up front and do it ‘right’ so it’s not going to be Home Depot buckets, but I also don’t want to throw money away on something unnecessary.

I’ve been thinking about going with a 10.5 foundry as electric brewing is definitely the way I want to go, it sounds like a decent unit and is relatively cheap. I’m thinking about going with a unitank (probably blichmann g4), mostly because I like the idea of being able to ferment, carbonate and then bottle from one unit.

Im pretty well decided on bottling rather than keg, it’s a bit of a pain I’m sure but simpler and more sanitary imo than a dozen dirty and sweaty guys fiddling with a tap lol

Any thoughts, suggestions, input?
 
Why not just start of with some all grain kits first? Then after you've gotten the beer making process down decently, then malt the grains you grow. They don't grow already malted. That's a process that only a few members here do. I'm certainly not one of them.

Some might tell you have to do extract beer first. But I don't fully agree with that, though extract will reduce the number of things that can go awry so you can get skilled with that subset before moving on to slightly more complication.

I learned with one gallon all grain kits and I did them as BIAB right from the start. One gallon kits are difficult to find. But you could scale the contents of a 5 gallon all grain kit to let you have a more manageable quantity of grain that you don't have to lift with a hoist or have to have a high power burner to boil outside since few stoves will boil more than 3 gallons of water well at all.

I'd also just use equipment you already have or can buy for cheap. A gallon jug, a thermometer, hydrometer and a large stock pot were all I started with. None costing anything much. Except my thermometer was a nice instant read thermometer from that I used for cooking too. And if you do five gallons instead of one gallon, that can be fermented in a plastic bucket. But unless you get a six gallon bucket that most only find at a brew supply shop, then the 5 gallon buckets won't hold 5 gallons of wort to ferment into beer.

But maybe in Canada your plastic buckets from the big box stores are already a larger volume than ours here in the USA.

Once you have gotten some skills established you probably will have a better idea of which way you want to go with brewing equipment that will cost you much more and if on a short budget might pigeon hole you into some poor decisions. Or worse, finding out you don't care to brew that way.
 
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I'm in favor of starting all-grain if you're up to it, so that's great! I'd probably do some smaller batches on the stovetop first, but grabbing an entry-level all-in-one makes sense.

A conical for your first fermenter may be a bit overboard, especially as the killer app for a conical is yeast harvesting, and you probably want to wait a while before worrying about that.

There's a lot to be said for bottle conditioning. Carbonating first and bottling second is going to require both a counter-pressure filler and (probably) a CO2 tank.

If you want to stay with fermenting and carbonating in the same vessel, something to think about would be to ferment in a keg, and get yourself a floating dip tube and a spunding valve. It's going to be a third of the price of a unitank, and if you later decide you want some other type of fermenter, you've still got a keg.
 
I probably will start with a couple batches of all grain kits just to get the hang of it.

Malting the grain isn’t too terrible of a process for us as I think we can make due with a lot of existing infrastructure. especially given the right year/crop conditions we may end up with some chitted barley that cannot be sold as malt grade anyways. (That wouldn’t be ideal as the grain isn’t uniformally sprouted but it’s an optio) Ideally I’ll use good malt grade and do a more controlled malting. Drying/kilning should be easy, we have capacity to pull close to 15% moisture out of barley at a throughput of 1200 bushel an hour (at low temp holding malt grade germination for sale) and our roller mill can process a little better than 10ton an hour. Everything is rediculously oversized for what a guy needs, but it’s there and it’s paid for so why not use it if we can.

I’ll have to experiment with a few processes I’ve seen for the malting. The more “backyard” methods are going to be more practical throughout most of the year for sure.
 
I'm in favor of starting all-grain if you're up to it, so that's great! I'd probably do some smaller batches on the stovetop first, but grabbing an entry-level all-in-one makes sense.

A conical for your first fermenter may be a bit overboard, especially as the killer app for a conical is yeast harvesting, and you probably want to wait a while before worrying about that.

There's a lot to be said for bottle conditioning. Carbonating first and bottling second is going to require both a counter-pressure filler and (probably) a CO2 tank.

If you want to stay with fermenting and carbonating in the same vessel, something to think about would be to ferment in a keg, and get yourself a floating dip tube and a spunding valve. It's going to be a third of the price of a unitank, and if you later decide you want some other type of fermenter, you've still got a keg.

Yes, I definitely want to start with small batches, they do have that insert for the foundry for doing smaller batches which I think I’ll get. There’s going to be some learning and experimentation necessary for sure as I haven’t found any recipes yet that use the types of barley we grow

I’ve already got a big bottle of beverage grade co2 I use for other things so that’s another reason I wanted to just go straight to carbonating in a unitank and yes counter-pressure bottle filling.

I realize the unitank idea is definitely overkill for just getting started but that’s where my mentality of buy it once and be done comes in. I definitely won’t be harvesting yeast anytime soon but the option is there to start playing with once I get to that stage.

And when the dust settles and I fail miserably at this I can still set the conical up in the office hooked to a chiller and fill it with beer from someone that knows how to make it haha

I had originally looked into going the keg route and at the end of the day it wasn’t an overly cheap option either by the time a guy bought a couple used kegs and some trinkets to do the job it was going to be about half the price of just getting a unitank. Our preference around here is a lager, so I figured it just simplified things more if I can lager in the uni. Again all things that won’t be happening right away, but are the end goal
 
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I realize the unitank idea is definitely overkill for just getting started but that’s where my mentality of buy it once and be done comes in.
I'd start with fermenting in a bucket or other (cheap) plastic fermenters. As others said, first get the various processes down, and find out whether brewing is for you.

Once you have kegs, bottling is for the birds... and high alcohol beers, sours, and other beers that require 1, 2, or more years of aging. For all the others, drink it, share it, or dump it. Most everyday beer is not worth bottling.

Malting is not that difficult but making good malt can be. It takes practice and mastering more processes.
 
Yea the malting thing is definitely going to be a whole adventure on its own. That’s not even on the radar yet, just future goals

Also I whole heartedly have no intention on making some kind of fancy aged beer. We’ve got cheap taste around here, as long as it’s refreshing at the end of the day that’s all I’m looking for, and better yet if we can use our own grain.

We’re cheap lager drinkers (typical canuks lol), but we go through ALOT of beer (hey it’s usually a 10+ man crew throwing back a few pops at the end of the day!). Kegs definitely are appealing for the volume we would go through, but a kegerator in the office isn’t really the look we’re going for either. The fridge loaded up with beer is at least not out in open view!
 
a kegerator in the office isn’t really the look we’re going for
Depends on what it looks like perhaps? There are some awesome builds documented around these forums.
A converted freezer (keezer) with a collar (to mount the faucets through) can look very good, and if you pick a larger size, you can easily host 6-12 kegs, all with different beers.

Or put that keezer in the the crew bar. ;)
Guess where everyone is going to hang out?

A homebrew friend of mine has 12 taps in his basement bar, coming through the wall. On the other side, totally out of sight, are full size refrigerators, holding 6 kegs each.

You can do small scale malting, even as small as 20-50 pounds at a time.
@bracconiere rarely buys malt, he malts his own.

If Lagers keep people happy, brew/ferment Lagers too, even Light Lagers. They will arguably taste better than macro-brewed ones.
IMO, Lagers are best, freshly poured from a keg, with 2.5-2.8 volumes of carbonation.

But, uh, before you get ahead of yourself, let's start with your first beer, first.
 
You can make really good easy-drinking beer -- blondes, kolsches, cream ale, and lagers -- without shelling out $1000 on a fermenter. Since you've got the CO2 already, I would ferment in a plastic fermenter with a spigot (like a BMB or Fermonster), transfer to a keg to force carb, and then bottle with a counter-pressure filler from the keg if you want. Simple, likely to give good results, and easy to scale up, all without breaking the bank. If you decide to upgrade to something else at some point, it's always handy to have an extra plastic jug and keg around.

If you want to spend more money, get a chest freezer that fits your fermenter and a temperature controller. Then you can control the fermentation temperature, and then cool down your keg while carbonating and transferring.

Just remember to keep beer away from light when you're fermenting in clear plastic.
 
The quick and easy way to start using your own grains is to use the diastatic power of malted grains that you purchase and mix in unmalted grains. You can get to nearly one half of the grains unmalted and still get conversion. Once you have made a few batches that way you can look into your own malting system.
 
Thanks guys, all valid points.

Unfortunately the keg idea in the shop office I just don’t see working. Yes a guy can build something fancy so it doesn’t stand out too bad when the high profile visitors show up, but space is also a concern. Bottles like we’re already doing is just handier even though they’re a pain in the rear the rest of the time 😂

Definitely not dead set on the conical, just thought why not simplify things a bit if we can do it all in one unit, and it’ll take up less room in my toy garage to boot. I’ll do a little more looking into it, but I really don’t see a big savings there as beat up old 5gal corny kegs sell for over $100 around here and I almost choked on my tongue when I saw what a new keg is worth lol
 
The quick and easy way to start using your own grains is to use the diastatic power of malted grains that you purchase and mix in unmalted grains. You can get to nearly one half of the grains unmalted and still get conversion. Once you have made a few batches that way you can look into your own malting system.

Thanks, again that’ll be something for waayyyy down the road, once I can figure out how to make something that doesn’t make us puke lol

Very likely that I will still have to outsource some malted grain anyways. Seems like a lot of recipes I look at are using several types and none of which are a variety we grow. So maybe our varieties just aren’t going to make something we like who knows!
 
Thanks, again that’ll be something for waayyyy down the road, once I can figure out how to make something that doesn’t make us puke lol
Start with a kit. Actually, start with an extract kit as someone else who has a ton of experience in making wort will have done it right. Much of what you learn by making a kit beer will follow you through making all grain. Make a few extract kits, then go on to all grain as you take what you learned and apply it to the new.

The only way that you end up puking from the beer you make with a decent extract kit is from drinking too much of it, same as with beer you buy.
 
One cheaper fermenter option to consider is the fermzilla all-rounder. You can ferment, carb, and serve from it. I use all-rounders and think they are a great all around option (only downside is you cannot hot-fill them, must cool the wort down first).

I agree with others that I wouldn't spend a lot of money until you've brewed a enough times to know you like it (and the beer) enough to keep doing it. And you have a better sense of where to spend the money after you have brewed a few times.

Though I mostly keg, I am not as anti-bottling as many. Sometimes it just fits the situation better. That being said, if you can make room in the work fridge, you can rig kegs and smaller keg-like vessels (even the all-rounder) to small CO2 cannisters and taps all inside the fridge (but that may not work for your situation either). (Search for @Beermeister32's posts, he's posted photos of his in-fridge tap setups before).

And just general advice - it will be hard to recreate that cheap lager taste at first. Those companies make it cheap but have also mastered how to make that specific beer. You will probably be able to make "better" beer pretty quickly, but your cheap-lager swilling co-workers may not appreciate it. (And one of my favorite pieces of advice is don't share your homebrew with people who do not appreciate it).

Also, bottling carbed beer can be a major pain. Even with a counterpressure bottle filler, it can foam like crazy and take forever to bottle. I wouldn't recommend starting out that way suggest bottle carbing (at least at first). There are a lot of steps/parts to brewing. When you first start out, it helps to keep the parts as simple as possible while you learn the basics.

Also, this is a GREAT website for advice and discussions. These threads go back almost 20 years, and almost every type of question (and mistake) is well documented and discussed.

Good luck.
 
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We’re cheap lager drinkers (typical canuks lol), but we go through ALOT of beer (hey it’s usually a 10+ man crew throwing back a few pops at the end of the day!). Kegs definitely are appealing for the volume we would go through, but a kegerator in the office isn’t really the look we’re going for either. The fridge loaded up with beer is at least not out in open view!
If you go through a lot of beer then you'll wan to skip the fancy "brewing" gear and put the money into kegs and a chest freezer. Bottling is enough of a chore but storing and cleaning all the bottles you'll need will get old pretty fast. Do you want to rinse each bottle used every day after the boys have chugged a case? If you want to keep the kegs out of sight, just use a picnic tap with 5' of hose. Nobody needs to know that your chest freezer in the back is hiding corny kegs full of beer.
Keep your brewing gear simple at first. A pot on a burner and a couple of BIAB bags and you're good to go for making wort.
 
Is that on an audiobook somewhere? I honestly have way too much adhd to sit and read a 600 page book 🤣

You don't need to read it all. The book is an excellent desk reference for (most) all things brewing. Certain sections will help you decide which direction to go with equipment and methods. You don't want to dive into this head-first, spend $1000s and end up wishing you did things a little differently.

You mentioned audiobooks. If you learn better that way, there are countless podcasts and YouTube channels with helpful content. TheApartmentBrewer on YT has some good instructional videos. BeerSmith and Brew Strong are just a couple podcasts that come to mind.

Maybe start out with basic gear first, learn to brew, and work on improving your brews. Bling gear won't make you a better brewer; learning the basics and building on those basics will. There are plenty of people who brew superb beer with a few hundred bucks worth of basic gear.

Read up, ask lots of questions here (HBT people are happy to help).
 
Speed Brewing is an overlooked book for those wanting to start all-grain (and know they will hate bottling ;) ).

In just two chapters, it covers 2 gal BIAB brewing targeting 1.75 gal kegs.

It includes an equipment list and walks through a typical brew day.
 
I 2nd the thought on bottling vs drinking a lot. Bottles takes a lot of effort and if you want volume of beer made and consumed, it will become a chore imho. Do you want to be cleaning up bottles after each work day? Brewing is fun unless it is not. Give it a shot on a small scale and keep the guys drinking the macro stuff until you see the overall commitment. You could be a bit shocked at how much effort it takes to get something to the finish line that might be consumed in one sitting!
 
Thanks guys.

Definitely agree on doing kits first rather than jumping in head first with all grain, the all grain brewing is just my end goal.

I totally agree that expensive gear isn’t going to make the beer any better. That’s true for a lot of things, our $800,000 air seeders don’t make a better crop than the neighbours $1500 box drill from 1970. But it sure makes doing the job a lot More enjoyable 😂.

Like I said, I just don’t want to have to keep buying gear and upgrading stuff, surely the gear I’m looking at holds some kind of resale value if this doesn’t work out? I’ve actually looked and don’t see much for homebrew gear other than kegs and little trinkets on the local buy&sell, so maybe it would be a hard sell? 🤷‍♂️ I’m not set on that specific equipment, thats from what I’ve seen is decent quality stuff and is available at this time. The g4 is definitely way over the top, but it’s what’s in stock when I was shopping around. I didn’t intend on dropping $1500 on a fermenter but my theory is always that it should at least be worth something in the end

Kegs are definitely a lot less work, that’s without a doubt. I’m not against them, I just have to figure out how to make it practical. The office is fairly small so we don’t have room for a kegerator and the fridge we have in there now is just too small I think to put a mini keg and co2 bottle into. It’s a large mini fridge, so not a lot of room and we do like to use it for a little bit of food not just booze lol. It would be a pain but a guy could just lug a chilled keg in there every time we’re having drinks, but that’s probably not the best option if there’s any sediment in the tank. I don’t know, I’ll have to think about How we could do that
 
I stand by my previous advice to ferment in plastic carboy (Fermonster, BMB, Fermzilla), transfer to keg, and force carbonate.

Then bottle. If you get sick of bottling, you can cut the number of bottles filled by 45% by using 22-oz. bombers. Or 65% using 1-liter EZ-caps. You and your friends will just have to drink more then...

Alternately, if you decide you can fit a growler or mini-keg in your office fridge, it's not hard to fill one of those from a keg. You can then serve using a Picnic Tap 2.1.
 
Do you know anyone else that is into homebrewing? I was always interested in brewing, and finally got a kit and brewed a batch on my stove. It was a total disaster! Especially the bottling process which I really screwed up. lol. It put me off brewing.
A couple years later I met a guy at work that was into the hobby - he had his garage all set up for all-grain brewing. He invited me over for a brew day, where I was able to see every step in the process, all his equipment, etc. That changed everything for me. I was able to go home and make some good informed decisions about what I wanted for my own set up. I now LOVE brewing - have never looked back.
Oh, and IMO Jim Palmer's book is a must! Sorry! ;)
 
OK, so I read most of the replies and cannot really add much to what you have already been told. I will say the Palmer book, at first read, it way overwhelming. But, as I think of it, having it as a reference makes total sense as he touches on every aspect of every type of brew (ie extract, BIAB and full all grain). I will also add my experience, and feel free to skip if you don't think it is worth it. I am new to all of this, maybe a year or two in. I jumped in and bought a small converted mini fridge with the regulator, lines, tap and tower for less than 50 bucks (the guy was moving to Boston and did not want to take it with him. He started at 75 and I think I got him down to 45 or 50). I also bought 48 bottles from Amazon. I bought a home brew starter kit from Norther Brewer. In hindsight, I would have looked more at Craigslist as there are a lot of people who start in this hobby and get out because it is not for them and sell their used equipment really cheap. I started with Extract. It was easier and I could do it on my stove in the kitchen, much to my wife's chagrin as I left a pretty big mess to clean. LOL. I quickly decided to go with BIAB. I bought a kettle, burner and eventually a small 2 roller mill. I still use the buckets to ferment as they fit nicely into a closet that has been dubbed my beer closet. I have added a few "gadgets" to my arsenal, but nothing too big. I have toyed with the idea of getting a cool all in one setup, but for now what I am doing works.
My point is, you don't have to go all in with the fancy stuff to get good beer. Start small, and work your way up. Nothing wrong with a couple of bucket fermenters and some used bottles that have been cleaned and sanitized.

As a new brewer and a bit more of a DIY fan, I would suggest you get a couple of fermenting buckets with spigots. You can get carb drops off Amazon, drop them in the bottle when you are ready to bottle and store the filled bottles for a couple of weeks, and when you are ready you have carbed bottled beer ready. 5 gallons typically makes me about 40 to 43 bottles, so if you have two 5 gallon batches going that a nice amount to start. I enjoy kegging as well, but I can see both sides. Kegging is a pain in the butt to clean everything after the keg runs dry. Bottles, my friends who I give my beer to know that they have to rinse out the bottles after they drink them or no more beer for them. LOL. Bottles take a bit more time, but I have found that Racer 5 labels come off super easy when soaked in warm water and either PBW or non scented Oxiclean. The night before, I run 48 bottles thru the sanitizing setting on my dishwasher, box them upside down in used Racer 5 boxes and have them ready the next day. Bottling 40 to 45 bottles usually takes a few hours as my brother comes over and we usually end up BSing and drinking the past brews. LOL. I have about 3 batches of bottles cleaned and read to go so I tend to bottle a batch and then keg a batch when he keg runs dry.

Either way, the biggest piece of advice I got was relax, enjoy the hobby and don't expect commercial grade beer. I have gotten some great brews that me and my friends have enjoyed, and am still tweaking my process. Also, have patience. This is not a hobby that you can turn over beer quick. It takes time, so be patient and enjoy the process. Rock On!!!!!!!
 
Bottles like we’re already doing is just handier even though they’re a pain in the rear the rest of the time 😂
Be aware that homebrew beer conditioned in bottles has a small layer of sediment on the bottom. It is best served by pouring into a glass and stopping short just before the yeasty sediment starts to come out. Unless you like murky beer full of yeast floaties, you can’t just pop the tops and knock back bottles of beer like you’re used to with filtered commercial beers.
 
I stand by my previous advice to ferment in plastic carboy (Fermonster, BMB, Fermzilla), transfer to keg, and force carbonate.

Then bottle. If you get sick of bottling, you can cut the number of bottles filled by 45% by using 22-oz. bombers. Or 65% using 1-liter EZ-caps. You and your friends will just have to drink more then...

Alternately, if you decide you can fit a growler or mini-keg in your office fridge, it's not hard to fill one of those from a keg. You can then serve using a Picnic Tap 2.1.
The plastic fermenters definitely have a much nicer price point. The place I’m looking to order from doesn’t have a huge selection but they do have some options. They carry the fermzilla all rounder 30L that can force carb too for only $150 with the pressure kit. Basically does what I want out of the unitank with one less 0 on the price. My only concern is what I’ve read about trying to keep plastic sanitary if they get scratches from cleaning as well as how the light is going to effect it. Heck, guys bash the g4s sight glass option because they think the light introduced at the sight glass is going to ruin the beer. I’m sure that’s a little over exaggerated!


Do you know anyone else that is into homebrewing? I was always interested in brewing, and finally got a kit and brewed a batch on my stove. It was a total disaster! Especially the bottling process which I really screwed up. lol. It put me off brewing.
A couple years later I met a guy at work that was into the hobby - he had his garage all set up for all-grain brewing. He invited me over for a brew day, where I was able to see every step in the process, all his equipment, etc. That changed everything for me. I was able to go home and make some good informed decisions about what I wanted for my own set up. I now LOVE brewing - have never looked back.
Oh, and IMO Jim Palmer's book is a must! Sorry! ;)

Nobody around here that I know of that brews their own, not all grain anyways. Got a few buddy’s that do wine kits quite often and one of them has tried a couple cheap extract beer kits that were less than spectacular but still drinkable. And like mentioned above, it was bottle conditioned beer so it had the sediment in the bottom which isn’t handy for drinking on the go

I totally agree that having the right gear will make or break the experience, it’s true for nearly everything. That’s why I just wanted to dive into some decent stainless gear right out of the gate. Watching videos of these guys fiddling around with stock pots and modified Home Depot pails doesn’t look like my thing lol
 
Be aware that homebrew beer conditioned in bottles has a small layer of sediment on the bottom. It is best served by pouring into a glass and stopping short just before the yeasty sediment starts to come out. Unless you like murky beer full of yeast floaties, you can’t just pop the tops and knock back bottles of beer like you’re used to with filtered commercial beers.

Exactly why I wanted to use the unitank, hopefully be able to bottle a nice clear carbonated beer without any of the nasties. If it’s not something we can enjoy right out of the bottle It’s not what I’m looking for.
 
My only concern is what I’ve read about trying to keep plastic sanitary if they get scratches from cleaning as well as how the light is going to effect it.
There's really no need to ever clean a plastic fermenter with anything that will scratch it up. A good shake with warm PBW will almost always get all the gunk out. If it ever needs scrubbing just use something soft. I have some narrow mouth plastic carboys; if I ever need to put a brush inside one I wrap the bristles with a couple of old sweat socks.
 
I think it's imperative to give up on the idea of carbonating the beers in the fermenter and then bottling them. It IS something that people do, but it's not an easy process. The beer needs to be nearly freezing. You'll also need a CO2 tank and regulator to make it happen. Once you're at that point you might as well carb and dispense from kegs.
 
I think it's imperative to give up on the idea of carbonating the beers in the fermenter and then bottling them. It IS something that people do, but it's not an easy process. The beer needs to be nearly freezing. You'll also need a CO2 tank and regulator to make it happen. Once you're at that point you might as well carb and dispense from kegs.
Like I’ve said, I already have co2 and regulator onhand, so it’s no extra expense to use co2 (already pay rental on the bottle and the gas is super cheap). Again probably not something I’ll get into right away but why not use it if I’ve got it?
 
Like I’ve said, I already have co2 and regulator onhand, so it’s no extra expense to use co2 (already pay rental on the bottle and the gas is super cheap). Again probably not something I’ll get into right away but why not use it if I’ve got it?
Sorry I missed that. I didn't read every post in the thread. I stand by my recommendation unless you plan to have a way to get the fermenter extremely cold prior to bottling.
 
We’re cheap lager drinkers (typical canuks lol), but we go through ALOT of beer (hey it’s usually a 10+ man crew throwing back a few pops at the end of the day!)
Like a lot of hobbies, I wouldn't say brewing my own beer is cheaper than just buying it in a store.

However making your own malt from the grain you grow already might give you a slight advantage when you get to that point.
 
Sorry I missed that. I didn't read every post in the thread. I stand by my recommendation unless you plan to have a way to get the fermenter extremely cold prior to bottling.

I’d have to do some figuring but I don’t see it requiring a huge amount of btu to drop a 5-10gal batch down cold enough to bottle it. Not to mention we don’t have a super hot climate so generally I’d only be looking at a 20°c temp drop. Even on warmer days my toy shop stays pretty cool.

Definitely something I can deal with fairly easily, I have a fairly decent stockpile of a/c components (compressors/condensers/evaporators/ect), I could put together a chiller system for nothing but a little time and parts off the shelf. I’m pretty sure it would be completely overkill as most of these components are 30,000+btu capable.

But again, not something I’d do right out of the gate, maybe later down the road. Not really a hurdle I’m too worried about
 
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Like a lot of hobbies, I wouldn't say brewing my own beer is cheaper than just buying it in a store.

However making your own malt from the grain you grow already might give you a slight advantage when you get to that point.

Yea it probably isn’t any cheaper for the most part especially if a guy drops 3k+ on equipment. But if we were able to eventually use nearly all of our own ingredients it would definitely lower cost. Also the 14% increase on liquor tax they’re putting in this week helps the argument 😂
 
Yea it probably isn’t any cheaper for the most part especially if a guy drops 3k+ on equipment.
When I started kegging we were drinking "$30 homebrew pints" for awhile too. And they were well worth it! ;)

But with time it has come down mostly to the cost of ingredients, and some electricity. Buying grain by the sack and hops in 8-16 oz packages keeps that cost down.

When we suggest a new brewer starting with brewing a few kits, we do not necessarily mean extract kits. All-grain kits are offered too by many vendors or piecemeal a few together at a local homebrew store (LHBS).

Many processes in extract brewing are the same as in all-grain brewing, except for steeping certain malts and dissolving malt extract (syrup or powder) vs. producing wort from malt and other grains.

Most ready-to-go kits, both extract and all-grain, come with instructions, alas, usually very basic or even poorly written. All in an effort to make it (look) simple...

My suggestion for reading John Palmer's How to Brew, 4th Ed. before brewing or buying anything was not meant as a deterrent to start homebrewing, or force you to read it. Just keep in mind, it's a wonderful resource and reference for homebrewing.

Aside from it being a long, mostly abstract read, many chapters and topics won't make much sense until you've a brewed a few times, or want to know more of the nitty gritty details of how and what, most of it is all there. You may skip or skim as you see fit.

For a quick overview, there's a free online version of the (fairly old and dated) 1st Edition on the web at: howtobrew.com.

As others have mentioned, if reading isn't your path to quick learning, there are very good and valuable online alternatives. Our forums is among one of those.

Apology note:
I meant to write this last night if it weren't for the electricity in our larger neighborhood to go out. We also had a snapped power line lying in our yard, not sure what exactly caused that. :D
It all came back on a couple hours ago, and the line is back up.
 
Hey guys, total newbie here for the home brewing. Been doing a bunch of reading and watching videos and all that fun stuff and there’s just so many different ways to do it that it’s hard to decide!

We farm in northern Alberta and I’d like to start brewing with the cereals we grow. Typically on any given year we crop 2 different varieties of malt barley and 1-2 varieties of wheat (I’ve had some wheat beer before and wasn’t really a fan of it, but I’ll try some anyways) so I will have some different ingredients to play with. I haven’t looked much into growing hops in our climate but if they will produce I would definitely grow some hops just to say they came from the property too!

Anyways I’m still up in the air over what kind of equipment I’m going to go with. I’m definitely one of those guys that wants to spend the money up front and do it ‘right’ so it’s not going to be Home Depot buckets, but I also don’t want to throw money away on something unnecessary.

I’ve been thinking about going with a 10.5 foundry as electric brewing is definitely the way I want to go, it sounds like a decent unit and is relatively cheap. I’m thinking about going with a unitank (probably blichmann g4), mostly because I like the idea of being able to ferment, carbonate and then bottle from one unit.

Im pretty well decided on bottling rather than keg, it’s a bit of a pain I’m sure but simpler and more sanitary imo than a dozen dirty and sweaty guys fiddling with a tap lol

Any thoughts, suggestions, input?
I have the smaller Anvil Foundry, the 6.5. I primarily brew 3 gallon batches. I didn’t see anybody mention it, but one consideration for the 10.5 is you probably want a 220v outlet. The 6.5 runs pretty well on regular house current but I’m making a smaller batch.

Most of the recipes out there are based on a 5 gallon batch. You get about 10 bottles per gallon, so a 5 gallon batch will be about 50 bottles. 12 oz bottles. My 3 gallons ends up being right about a case plus a 6 pack each time, which is plenty for me.

I scaled down because I don’t drink it quick enough and I like variety. By the time you brew (4) 5 gallon batches you’ve made 200 bottles of beer. Thats over 8 cases of 4 different beers. Who goes to the store and buys 2 cases of the same beer?

Its also a consideration that you’ll be cleaning, sanitizing, filling, and capping 50 bottles each time. Many of us keg using soda kegs. One keg to clean, sanitize and fill is much easier.

Each of us does something a little different, whether you want to fill bottles, make a freezer conversion for dispense , or buy a kegerator and set it up for homebrew kegs which is very simple to do.

My advice is to figure out how much beer you will go through and how quickly. Will it be mostly you drinking it, how many family and friends do you think you might be supplying, how often do you have people over and/or have parties, etc.

Yeah we’d all love to have a barrel sized brewery, but what good does that do if you have no outlet for the beer and it goes off before you can drink it?

Also what kind of beer do you like and would you like to brew? Temperature control is important and much more so if you want to make lagers. Making lagers is an entirely different process from making ales.

Brewing is also not really a way to save money on beer. Quite the opposite by the time you buy and learn everything its quite an investment of time and money.

Just my thoughts and where I’m at.
 
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To clean the fermzilla all-rounders, I rinse with warm (not hot) water and wipe the inside with fragrant free dish soap and paper towels. If you use paper towels (or something soft) you won't scratch it.
 
When I started kegging we were drinking "$30 homebrew pints" for awhile too. And they were well worth it! ;)

But with time it has come down mostly to the cost of ingredients, and some electricity. Buying grain by the sack and hops in 8-16 oz packages keeps that cost down.

When we suggest a new brewer starting with brewing a few kits, we do not necessarily mean extract kits. All-grain kits are offered too by many vendors or piecemeal a few together at a local homebrew store (LHBS).

Many processes in extract brewing are the same as in all-grain brewing, except for steeping certain malts and dissolving malt extract (syrup or powder) vs. producing wort from malt and other grains.

Most ready-to-go kits, both extract and all-grain, come with instructions, alas, usually very basic or even poorly written. All in an effort to make it (look) simple...

My suggestion for reading John Palmer's How to Brew, 4th Ed. before brewing or buying anything was not meant as a deterrent to start homebrewing, or force you to read it. Just keep in mind, it's a wonderful resource and reference for homebrewing.

Aside from it being a long, mostly abstract read, many chapters and topics won't make much sense until you've a brewed a few times, or want to know more of the nitty gritty details of how and what, most of it is all there. You may skip or skim as you see fit.

For a quick overview, there's a free online version of the (fairly old and dated) 1st Edition on the web at: HowtoBrew.com.

As others have mentioned, if reading isn't your path to quick learning, there are very good and valuable online alternatives. Our forums is among one of those.

Apology note:
I meant to write this last night if it weren't for the electricity in our larger neighborhood to go out. We also had a snapped power line lying in our yard, not sure what exactly caused that. :D
It all came back on a couple hours ago, and the line is back up.

Thanks, yea sitting and reading a book isn’t really my thing lol. Reading around forums and watching YouTube tutorials and such are definitely more my style!

Unfortunately where I am it’s a 2h drive one way to the nearest homebrew shop and they really don’t have a lot there, they cater more to the wine side. The nearest one that really has anything for beer gear is a 4h drive one way. So really nothing is close and readily accessible. I can’t just jump in the truck and run to the store and be back in an hour if I’m missing something lol

I have the smaller Anvil Foundry, the 6.5. I primarily brew 3 gallon batches. I didn’t see anybody mention it, but one consideration for the 10.5 is you probably want a 220v outlet. The 6.5 runs pretty well on regular house current but I’m making a smaller batch.

Most of the recipes out there are based on a 5 gallon batch. You get about 10 bottles per gallon, so a 5 gallon batch will be about 50 bottles. 12 oz bottles. My 3 gallons ends up being right about a case plus a 6 pack each time, which is plenty for me.

I scaled down because I don’t drink it quick enough and I like variety. By the time you brew (4) 5 gallon batches you’ve made 200 bottles of beer. Thats over 8 cases of 4 different beers. Who goes to the store and buys 2 cases of the same beer?

Its also a consideration that you’ll be cleaning, sanitizing, filling, and capping 50 bottles each time. Many of us keg using soda kegs. One keg to clean, sanitize and fill is much easier.

Each of us does something a little different, whether you want to fill bottles, make a freezer conversion for dispense , or buy a kegerator and set it up for homebrew kegs which is very simple to do.

My advice is to figure out how much beer you will go through and how quickly. Will it be mostly you drinking it, how many family and friends do you think you might be supplying, how often do you have people over and/or have parties, etc.

Yeah we’d all love to have a barrel sized brewery, but what good does that do if the beer goes off before you can drink it?

Also what kind of beer do you like and would you like to brew? Temperature control is important and much more so if you want to make lagers. Making lagers is an entirely different process from making ales.

Brewing is also not really a way to save money on beer. Quite the opposite by the time you buy everything its quite an investment of time and money.

Just my thoughts and where I’m at.

Like I’ve said, we go through quite a lot of beer around the shop. Even just between myself and a few buddy’s we can go through a lot just having a night hanging out at my house. 48 beer a night is not out of the ordinary, even when we are working full pin and the crew has only one or 2 beer each at the end of the day that’s 24 beer down the hatch. We don’t usually just go down to the liquor store and pick up a box or 2, we literally order a pallet and believe me it doesn’t sit around long enough to go bad when a dozen guys dig into it 😂 I figure a 5gal batch is maybe about right, even when we have a small crew around or on the off season it’s still not going to be sitting around for too long and a guy isn’t constantly having to brew to keep up

Now, I’m not looking to supply beer for every thirsty soul around the area. But the more the merrier if everyone likes it. I definitely dont see scaling it up to bbl sized batches or anything!

I have 100amp 240v service in my toy shop where I want to brew so no issue with power

Also like I’ve mentioned we’re all mostly lager drinkers. So that’s what I want to end up brewing in the end, but I’m thinking I’ll start with some ales before we overcomplicate things right away
 
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