What I did for beer today

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After almost 7 weeks in bottle, I have only a slight chill have and a very mellowed out flavor profile.

I feel like this beer went from sharp to cohesive over the last 3 weeks.
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Came home after a wonderful (sarcasm level 10000) day at work with the idea of putting the Irish Death on tap; took the American strong off to accommodate it. As soon as I pulled the co2 connect off that keg I got the dreaded fwoosh of offgassing; yet ANOTHER failed poppit. Fortunately @BobbyM got my order here in record time, and I have plenty of new poppits to replace it; except I apparently installed this post with my impact wrench (not really) and I can't get it loose; no worries, just grab said impact wrench and gently try to turn it. Except the battery is dead. Arrrrrgh. And the 20lb co2 tank that I got when I bought the kegerator is starting to, well, tank. I have a full 5lb as backup but I don't want to put it on if I don't have to. Oh well, at least there's still IPA and Wit....
 
Summer project is going to be a fermentation/aging chamber. Was on the fence about whether to use a mini-fridge or small window A/C unit. A neighbor was selling a barely-used window unit for basically nothing, so off the fence I jumped!

Now I just need to finish the plans and get the rest of the materials.
 
Over the weekend I kegged my wheat wine, where it will condition until the fall. Went from 1.112 to 1.022; not surprised given the yeast took off like crazy in terms of lag time and blow off. Naturally a bit hot at the moment, but other than that, pretty satisfied; expect some aging to smooth it out.
 
seatazzz said:
Gonna drink a LOT of homebrew tonight. To make a long story short, two years ago the owner of the company I work for (originally a small air/ocean freight concern with offices in Seatac, Kent, Portland, and Vancouver BC) sold us to a huge conglomerate super-corporation that hadn't (and still doesn't) any idea of how ocean freight works. I've been a container dispatcher for 13 years, and I'm pretty damn good at it. Fast forward a couple years, and we're not making the money they expected; add the coronavirus kerfluffle and about 70% of our staff was laid off, with the rest of us expected to take on more responsibilities. I'm salary; expected to work longer hours so the hourly folks can work shorter hours. I'm not the complaining sort, I gladly took on more work to save the company. The manager (former owner), has other ideas now and apparently my job is on the line, based on some issues over the last few weeks that I had little to no control over. I was told today to fast-track training of my new supervisor on how to do my job; being in the workforce as long as I have, I know what that means. Get her trained, and they can get rid of me.

I know I can find another job (have a few tentative offers on the table) but at 52 it's hard to change. So tonight, with the husband at the pub playing cards with his buddies, I'm going to let my homebrew do what it does best; get me schnockered. And since I no longer work my second job, which had the constant threat of random drug tests hovering over my head, I might also pay a visit to our neighborhood "green" store tomorrow night. Gonna be a weird weekend.
Click to expand...
This stinks, and training your replacement just adds insult to injury. I’m gonna send some good vibes your way that your next gig is even better for you.
 
seatazzz said:
Came home after a wonderful (sarcasm level 10000) day at work with the idea of putting the Irish Death on tap; took the American strong off to accommodate it. As soon as I pulled the co2 connect off that keg I got the dreaded fwoosh of offgassing; yet ANOTHER failed poppit. Fortunately @BobbyM got my order here in record time, and I have plenty of new poppits to replace it; except I apparently installed this post with my impact wrench (not really) and I can't get it loose; no worries, just grab said impact wrench and gently try to turn it. Except the battery is dead. Arrrrrgh. And the 20lb co2 tank that I got when I bought the kegerator is starting to, well, tank. I have a full 5lb as backup but I don't want to put it on if I don't have to. Oh well, at least there's still IPA and Wit....
Click to expand...

At least it is the gas side, the beer side getting stuck down can get messy.

If the poppets are getting stuck in the down position after removing the disconnect, maybe take a look at the disconnect to see if has something to do with it.

The tank going fast, maybe replace your post o-rings too or lube them up good.
 
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After life happening for the last few weeks I am coming back strong with a double brew day. A “light” lager and a mixed-ferm table saison are on the list for today.

Hopefully my Anvil Foundry will be here in a week or two and I can brew my first full batch of beer now that I have a kegging system waiting on it!
 
I brewed a kind of brown-stout ale, dark in color but not roasty at all that I will be inoculating with the air in my garden, under a kind of tent where I usually drink my beer (including some lambics) and next to my neighbor's fruit trees, so the place is promising and so is the ambient temperature today, it might rain during the night but my hopes are that the tent will have enough residents in it plus all the stuff the wind is bringing now from the surroundings, maybe if I'm lucky something will come flying from the vineyards
 
OldDogBrewing said:
I brewed a kind of brown-stout ale, dark in color but not roasty at all that I will be inoculating with the air in my garden, under a kind of tent where I usually drink my beer (including some lambics) and next to my neighbor's fruit trees, so the place is promising and so is the ambient temperature today, it might rain during the night but my hopes are that the tent will have enough residents in it plus all the stuff the wind is bringing now from the surroundings, maybe if I'm lucky something will come flying from the vineyards
Click to expand...

I have 50/50 luck with ambient bugs: the grapes from my garden gave good bugs and all of my sours use that culture, on the other hand, I received a sour culture from a pro brewery that had 300+gallons going in a foeder and after two years of waiting it still tasted like a$$. I wish you the best!
 
CaddyWampus said:
After life happening for the last few weeks I am coming back strong with a double brew day. A “light” lager and a mixed-ferm table saison are on the list for today.

Hopefully my Anvil Foundry will be here in a week or two and I can brew my first full batch of beer now that I have a kegging system waiting on it!
Click to expand...

I killed this brew day. Hit all my numbers and managed to brew two beers and end up mostly sober by the end of the second. No good pictures but the lager is at 62f in my ferm chamber and the saison is in my upstairs bath tub. Of course we are having a dang cold snap with a high of 62 tomorrow, but by the time fermentation is well under way it should be in the upper 70s up there again.
 
So apparently this is my week to learn new skills. Took the 20lb co2 tank with me to work today to get it exchanged; the other tank was just at the top of the red when I left for work, figured I had a day or two before it blew. Completely out when I get home. Oh well, let's just put the new one on. Should note here that my current regulator is a cheapie (although with good reviews) from Amazon, and has served well for over 9 months. Once the new tank was on, turn the valve, and violent leaking from the PRV on the regulator. Oh crap. Managed to get the one I got when we bought the kegerator on, although that one doesn't have a PRV (yes I know I don't need one but I like having it). One of the dials was bent on it, but fixing that was easy. So since that was on, I took the bad one apart, just for science. Turns out the gasket underneath the PRV was shot; took one off my other other regulator (yes I have three), and after using many sharp tools to get the bad one out (no I didn't stab myself, for once) and also my trusty impact wrench (carefully, and slowly), my "good" regulator is now back on, and holding pressure for the last 45 minutes. Getting up to check it every few minutes, and giving it a spray with the only foamy cleaner I have (Fabuloso, man my garage smells pretty) and it's holding so far. NOT what I intended to do with my evening.
 
ba-brewer said:
@seatazzz, Sounds like you may have found your leak. Always nice when a sneaky problem becomes easy to spot.
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Darn it, I hope so. 20lb exchange where I go is about $28, and I really don't want to have to get it exchanged again. Half tempted to turn the gas off when I go to bed tonight just in case, but I'm paranoid now. I don't like messing around with co2 (or electricity either) but sometimes needs must.
 
As long as your kegs are fully carbed nothing wrong with playing it safe by turning off the gas.

If you have an accurate scale you could monitor the weight. Might be hard to tell for a small leak or if you drinking and carbing beer.
 
JAReeves said:
I have 50/50 luck with ambient bugs: the grapes from my garden gave good bugs and all of my sours use that culture, on the other hand, I received a sour culture from a pro brewery that had 300+gallons going in a foeder and after two years of waiting it still tasted like a$$. I wish you the best!
Click to expand...

I've been able to capture yeast from plants in the garden before, which was my main fear in the past, to not capture any yeast to kick-start the fermentation and let the enterobacter ruin the batch

It has rained during the night but there has to be something in the wort, now I need to wait and see if is anything good haha if it's good I'll be throwing a piece of cherry wood to use it as a reservoir and have a base of bacteria for future fermentations
 
Put the double tap together, sanitized and purged the kegs for the 1st time ever, waiting on couple extra feet of air hose line from Almighty Amazon today(they are late😒), did a final grav on the honey Irish Red 7.6%! 😁. Thought today was the big day of 1st kegging but guess it will have to be tomorrow.
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Today...mostly due to stupid luck, I saved a keg of imperial chocolate stout from disaster.

During the week my normal "first pour" typically happens at the stroke of 5pm by intent. But today I was cleaning up after priming the east end of the house, and didn't get to the brewery until 5:13 - when I discovered the stout bubbling up through the handle end of my Micromatic stout faucet! WTH! And YIKES!
Immediately called The Spousal Unit down for emergency assistance as I observed my stout was slowly disappearing down through the drip tray drain into the 3 gallon catch keg inside the keezer. Good it wasn't all over the place - bad that I had no idea how much stout had already been lost.

First instinct was to pull the handle and let it snap back hoping it would seal up tight. A really bad move - instantly the leak rate easily tripled, now flowing at around a quarter-ounce per second. I had the wife hold a 1/2 gallon plastic bucket under the faucet while I used a shop towel to soak up enough of the stout still in the tray to lift the keezer lid just enough to reach in and pop the beer QD off the stout keg.

Flow then stopped, we mopped up the keezer top so I could open the lid fully. I pulled the catch keg and discovered there was barely a cup of stout therein! :rock: The wife had caught another cup and I mopped up nearly as much, so it looks like the loss was under a quart. An hour more cleaning, pulling the drain tubing off my drip tray and rinser and cleaning them bright again, draining and cleaning the catch keg, updating my tap list to account for the lost stout, and we were back in bidness.

I pulled the Micromatic faucet and took it apart. This diaphragm is the culprit...

1592354676513.png


Right at the seam between the bottom tapered section and the immediately adjacent reversed taper above there's a breach. Clearly fatigue failure.
It's a $5 part direct from Micromatic (and I bought two) but it'll likely take most of a week to get here. I stuck my 6th 525ss Perl in its place for the time being but will probably have to drop the nitro pressure waaaaay down to get a tame pour out of it :(

Could have been so much worse though - like, if it had happened at any other time of the day. That keg had over 4 gallons in it last night, my catch keg is only 3 gallons, and once that is full and the drip tray overflows there would be an epic mess...not to mention a tragic loss of my nitecap for a month. That would be "double-plus ungood!"

I'm now trying to remember how many years I've been running this faucet so I can hopefully PM that diaphragm well before it fails. Kinda like the timing belt on an interference engine, if it fails it's catastrophic. Pretty sure it's at least 8 or 9 years old...

Cheers!
 
day_trippr said:
Today...mostly due to stupid luck, I saved a keg of imperial chocolate stout from disaster.

During the week my normal "first pour" typically happens at the stroke of 5pm by intent. But today I was cleaning up after priming the east end of the house, and didn't get to the brewery until 5:13 - when I discovered the stout bubbling up through the handle end of my Micromatic stout faucet! WTH! And YIKES!
Immediately called The Spousal Unit down for emergency assistance as I observed my stout was slowly disappearing down through the drip tray drain into the 3 gallon catch keg inside the keezer. Good it wasn't all over the place - bad that I had no idea how much stout had already been lost.

First instinct was to pull the handle and let it snap back hoping it would seal up tight. A really bad move - instantly the leak rate easily tripled, now flowing at around a quarter-ounce per second. I had the wife hold a 1/2 gallon plastic bucket under the faucet while I used a shop towel to soak up enough of the stout still in the tray to lift the keezer lid just enough to reach in and pop the beer QD off the stout keg.

Flow then stopped, we mopped up the keezer top so I could open the lid fully. I pulled the catch keg and discovered there was barely a cup of stout therein! :rock: The wife had caught another cup and I mopped up nearly as much, so it looks like the loss was under a quart. An hour more cleaning, pulling the drain tubing off my drip tray and rinser and cleaning them bright again, draining and cleaning the catch keg, updating my tap list to account for the lost stout, and we were back in bidness.

I pulled the Micromatic faucet and took it apart. This diaphragm is the culprit...

View attachment 685324

Right at the seam between the bottom tapered section and the immediately adjacent reversed taper above there's a breach. Clearly fatigue failure.
It's a $5 part direct from Micromatic (and I bought two) but it'll likely take most of a week to get here. I stuck my 6th 525ss Perl in its place for the time being but will probably have to drop the nitro pressure waaaaay down to get a tame pour out of it :(

Could have been so much worse though - like, if it had happened at any other time of the day. That keg had over 4 gallons in it last night, my catch keg is only 3 gallons, and once that is full and the drip tray overflows there would be an epic mess...not to mention a tragic loss of my nitecap for a month. That would be "double-plus ungood!"

I'm now trying to remember how many years I've been running this faucet so I can hopefully PM that diaphragm well before it fails. Kinda like the timing belt on an interference engine, if it fails it's catastrophic. Pretty sure it's at least 8 or 9 years old...

Cheers!
Click to expand...
Gotta love a happy ending.
 
Well, mixed, but hella better than it could have been.
Gonna think about maybe switching stout faucets though. A keg of this stout costs as much to make as the faucet costs...

Cheers!
 
Kegged up the last WF lager I did; first tasting, before I turned the temp down to 48, was a LOT of sulfur, smell too. After crashing for a few days, it improved in leaps and bounds. No more sulfur, just a nice crisp lager. I was half tempted to save the yeast (Lallemand Diamond Lager, on its second generation) but I have two more fresh packets, so decided to dump this one and not take the chance. Couple more days on force carb should see this bad boy on tap, really looking forward to it.
 
Got the double tap tower set up, had to improvise, Arctic King has some weird twist lock where the tower goes, had to drill and hope and pray nothing important was running through the top! Got the beer transferred to kegs, just 30 lbs pressure and let it chill down to 45° over next 24 hours then carb up with the quick carb lids. Wooooohoooo!!!
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seanjwalker1 said:
Got the double tap tower set up, had to improvise, Arctic King has some weird twist lock where the tower goes, had to drill and hope and pray nothing important was running through the top! Got the beer transferred to kegs, just 30 lbs pressure and let it chill down to 45° over next 24 hours then carb up with the quick carb lids. Wooooohoooo!!!View attachment 685473View attachment 685474
Click to expand...
On the carpet! If my wife..... You are very brave... Cudos
 
I know I checked for leaks yesterday with soapy sudsey water...lost 1/2 of my co2 Damn it @!#%#!÷😡. Rechecked and was leaking at the regulator connect. Seems to be ok now. Holding steady at 12 pounds pressure to carb. Put up my metal beer wall art, wife is taking it hard...officially a beer cave now! 😎 🍻 🍻!!
 
last brew day, smelled something hot in the electric brew area. poked around, didn't see anything obvious, moved on with the day. was wrapping up the day and recirculating some pbw when the panel suddenly shut off. huh? flipped the main breaker, nothing. opened up the brew panel, now i really smelled something hot. looked closer and sure enough, one of the 240v terminals on the incoming power receptacle had melted:

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yikes! and of course, heat transferred through the copper receptacle stabs into the plug and melted that, couldn't even pull it apart (receptacle on bottom, plug on top):

1592575899356.png


this happened on sunday so i took the opportunity to check the other terminations in the panel. a few of them were loose. not crazy loose but loose enough to warrant cranking them down. chalked up my issue to the termination working its way loose after repeated heating/cooling cycles (56 brews on the panel). lesson here, periodically check your terminations, people!

order up a new receptacle and plug, showed up yesterday, wired it up this morning, everything looks good.
 
seanjwalker1 said:
I know I checked for leaks yesterday with soapy sudsey water...lost 1/2 of my co2 Damn it @!#%#!÷😡. Rechecked and was leaking at the regulator connect. Seems to be ok now. Holding steady at 12 pounds pressure to carb. Put up my metal beer wall art, wife is taking it hard...officially a beer cave now! 😎 🍻 🍻!!
Click to expand...

I used to get slow leaks at my regulator unless I attached it perfectly. I got one of these and I haven't had a problem since. Works way better than the cheap cardboard washer that they give me when I get my tank refilled.

https://www.homebrewing.org/CO2-Lea...Vaw3yXrB3Hn_Sqw25TRiW4r3a&cshid=1592580531175
 
Crashed the spunding Red Rye yesterday, so today, put the carbonation lid on the keg to see if it's ready in a day. I hope this device works as advertised.

Also dumped out the swell water from the new barrel and poured in about 500ml of cognac to season it; I will consider it my "daily exercise" to pick it up and slosh it every hour or so ;). It's a little bit heavier than a 16oz. curl, but I'm sure I can handle it. Hoping to get the wine started this weekend for the Christmas Port.
 
Dry-hopped the DIPA the other day. Got a starter going early for the IPL to give it plenty of time; finalized my water additions. Looking to brew on Sunday...gonna be a hot one, but the brewing must go on!
 

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