What I did for beer today

[day_trippr]

Already "doing for beer" this morning, had a cup o' java then went down to check out how yesterday's batch was doing. Decent krausen happening and plenty of bubbling going on.

Then I look closer at the LCD strips and they're sitting at 62°F - and that ain't right. I check the chamber's BrewPi controller and notice it has the heater on, but the fridge was running as well and was down around 48°F. I took the controller to the shop, verified it had a stuck-on "Cool" relay, grabbed a spare dual relay module, swapped it in, and verified no more "hot Cool".

Plugged it back up to the chamber and it's doing normal stuff again.

Have to say I'm impressed my brave 1318 wee beasties were hanging in tough while their world turned chilly. I usually start them off at 66°F for 4~5 days then bump up a couple of degrees 'til it's time to soft crash. This time things went in an opposite direction but they still managed a good looking head after just 10 hours.

Onwards!

 

[seanjwalker1]

Nah, my 16 five gallon cornies have served me well over the many years. I'm just jumping the gun on my brewing schedule because the weather isn't conducive to anything outside, really, and I've run out of indoor winter home projects. And I recently found out that I'm going to need another knee surgery to fix what didn't get fixed a year ago May, and when that happens - likely in March - I'm going to be off line for probably a couple of months...

Cheers!

Been there done that my friend. My left knee replacement was the worse pain of my life and I've been putting off replacing the right for 3 years. Wouldn't wish that on anyone. Good luck

 

[day_trippr]

Ran up to one of the Last Standing LHBS's within driving distance to pick up some random stuff, then came home to do even more for beer!

Started by swapping out a pair of kicked kegs in the keezer - my Juicy Bits clone and an original recipe All Your Citra [Are Belong To Us] (packed to the rafters with Citra) both neipas...

Fired up the Mark II and cleaned both kegs...

Decided my keezer's drip tray needed some love. After 4 years of use our hard water deposits had added up to "a lot".
Attacked it with a BKF paste, a scrubby and a toothbrush...

Not bad but needs more love than I had time for today. I'll hit it again when I get a chance, clean up that west end, and remove the rinser head to really get under it...

Cleaned and polished up the tower and faucets and got everything brightened up. It'll do

Cheers!

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

I haven’t done as much as some of you have, but I did package a cider including 2 bottled for comp entrees, cleaning the fermentor now and will package the mead I’m sending tomorrow morning. Dosed a couple bottles with terpenes - Pineapple Express and Gelato. Meh,

 

[day_trippr]

Brewing my 1.107 OG chocolate stout today. Always a bit of an adventure mashing 46 pounds of grains in a 20 gallon mlt. Can barely reach the bottom with my big spoon to give the underlet dough in a good stir...

Onwards!

[edit] The lautering begins. Goes in clear, comes out black! Magic! And almost an hour to chill...

Ever onward!

[wrap up] Had to boil two extra quarts of wort pulled from under the FB as I missed my original pre-boil gravity by two points. But I had nothing better to do than spend an extra 20 minutes boiling and with that the OG came in dead nuts on at 1.107 with 11 gallons to the carboys.

Having had four back surgeries including the last one - a three unit lumbar fusion - I have to be hella careful moving this MFer!

Carboys pitched, gassed and stuck in the chamber next door to last Thursday's neipa...

Gear cleaned up and stashed away, with a celebratory pour to end the session...

Cheers!

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

This. I did this for beer today.

 

[day_trippr]

A martyr to the cause!

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

A martyr to the cause!

LOL, yeah it’s not like a bad carboy incident or serious encounter with boiling wort. Have any idea which finger is cut? Should I show you?

 

[ba-brewer]

LOL, yeah it’s not like a bad carboy incident or serious encounter with boiling wort. Have any idea which finger is cut? Should I show you?

If was me I would have already showed it to the pipe cutter

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

If was me I would have already showed it to the pipe cutter

It’s the pipe cutters fault! While I was reaming the cut end the blade folded (because it is really too big for that tube) and something got me. Probably the jagged cut end. It’s not operator error!

 

[ba-brewer]

I cut my finger pretty good on one these once trying to use the fork thing to get the tubing out of a connector. I locked it shut but somehow it opened up while messing with things. Y'all been warned.

 

[day_trippr]

Swapped out a kicked keg of my Ballantine IPA resurrection 2nd batch and plugged in one from my 3rd batch. Ran the kicked keg through the Mark II so I could then sanitize it and add it to the end of the keg purge I'm running off ~11 gallons of fermenting 1.107 OG stout. Should create plenty of gas to handle an extra keg. You can hear the bubbler at the new end of the daisy chain doing its thing...

Checked said stout fermentation. These had just under a gallon of head space, and I've been running the beastly S04 a bit cooler than usual (at 64°F) yet they still managed to puke up a couple of cups of beer each at peak krausen overnight. Took this pic to show why I always use blow-offs to start, and for the person who's been publicly thinking of fermenting a batch of beer in totally filled carboys what even a respectful fill can cause

Cheers!

 

[Dog House Brew]

Waking up some old slurry of 021 and 3864. It has been too long.

 

[Hoochin'Fool]

Brewed 2.75 gal of my 1.055 amber ale, and I didn't even have to THINK about mopping the kitchen floor!
It's got Cascade for bittering, flavor, and whirlpool, going to dry-hop with Amarillo.

 

[bwible]

Drove a couple hours to a fellow brew club buddy’s house to pick up this. I’m in PA and have been trying to get this for about 4 years. Its the end of a quest.

 

[day_trippr]

They've used more provocative labels
And highly rated on BA. But was the wait it worth it?

 

[bwible]

They've used more provocative labels
And highly rated on BA. But was the wait it worth it?

I haven’t had it yet. Took so long to get because I’m in PA and the brewery is in North Carolina. It’s a limited seasonal release thats only out for a short time every year around Valentine’s Day and its not sold within 100 miles of me. From what I’ve read it has almost a cult following and it sells out quicky. I’ve been looking for somebody with a connection down there for a long time. This one friend finally came through. I have to share it with the wife now, of course.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Put a leap year stout from 2016 in the fridge for tomorrow and I’m getting a recipe and ingredients together for a Belgian Blonde in the near future.

 

[T Murph]

I did a little something different today. I brewed a Dirty Pale Ale yesterday. I payed close attention to which post the blow off tube was connected to after loosing 7 gallons of Stout last week due to connecting the blow off to the dip tube post. Then I decided the blow off tube was too long for the Fermzilla. Grabbed a shorter line and let my helper connect it to the spunding valve for me. All seemed well until this mornings check on fermentation and nothing is happening. I panicked. So I grabbed a fresh packet of US 05 figuring my repitch of 1056 didn't survive last weeks catastrophe. Upon loosening the cap it had CO2 pressure. That's when I looked at the spunding valve and realized it was connected backwards. Removed said spunding valve connected the blow off tube direct and all is well. My 1056 survived after all. I love that yeast. IMO it makes the best ales.

 

[T Murph]

@ba-brewer I have that same tubing cutter however I haven't used the part that helps disconnect fittings. I use a unique removal tool that I found on Amazon. It cost 20 bucks but very well worth the price. It can be found in their duo tight fittings section.

 

[day_trippr]

Love the name "Platato"

 

[ba-brewer]

push to fit removal tool

edit: Pretty cool tool @T Murph, thanks for sharing. Looking at you picture it was unclear how it worked but the videos on the product make it seem easy to use.

 

[Skeeter686]

Love the name "Platato"

OK... at first I was amused, but then I actually said it out loud. For some reason, I really like saying "platato"

 

[T Murph]

OK... at first I was amused, but then I actually said it out loud. For some reason, I really like saying "platato"

I can't help but wonder how high the creater who named that thing must have been. You know they laughed their tale off.

 

[day_trippr]

I'm ok with it

 

[MaxStout]

OK... at first I was amused, but then I actually said it out loud. For some reason, I really like saying "platato"

But is it pronounced "pla-TAY-to" or "pla-TAH-to"?

/let's call the whole thing off

 

[JAReeves]

But is it pronounced "pla-TAY-to" or "pla-TAH-to"?

/let's call the whole thing off

Shouldn't there be an "e" at the end?

 

[seanjwalker1]

Ran up to one of the Last Standing LHBS's within driving distance to pick up some random stuff, then came home to do even more for beer!

Started by swapping out a pair of kicked kegs in the keezer - my Juicy Bits clone and an original recipe All Your Citra [Are Belong To Us] (packed to the rafters with Citra) both neipas...

View attachment 842321

Fired up the Mark II and cleaned both kegs...

View attachment 842323

Decided my keezer's drip tray needed some love. After 4 years of use our hard water deposits had added up to "a lot".
Attacked it with a BKF paste, a scrubby and a toothbrush...

View attachment 842319

Not bad but needs more love than I had time for today. I'll hit it again when I get a chance, clean up that west end, and remove the rinser head to really get under it...

View attachment 842320

Cleaned and polished up the tower and faucets and got everything brightened up. It'll do

View attachment 842322

Cheers!

Yeah does anyone know why so many LHBS's are biting the dust ? Seems to me more people than ever are into home brewing wether beer, wine , Kombucha ect . 10 years ago there were at least 5 or 6 in my general area, my fave closed after the owner passed away now there is 1 lhbs standing, at least in my area...crying shame.

 

[day_trippr]

We've decided the peak of home brewing beer happened around 2011-2012 and since then a large portion of people brewing back then have bailed. Massachusetts had dozens of LHBS when I started almost 20 years ago, now we're down to maybe a half dozen with only a couple of large-ish retailers left.

It is what it is - and that ain't great....

 

[Knightshade]

Brewed for the first time in..yeesh, 6 months. Pulled stuff down from the attic Thursday night, went to weigh out my grains which have been sitting vacuum sealed in kibble buckets...and...well...crap. I modified the recipe a bit to accommodate the absence of a couple of hops that I utilized last time and forgot to check the inventory of the grains so...

Went back inside, modified the malt bill a little and we'll see how that goes.

pH meter probe was dry as a bone (oops) and after calibrating it, it was consistently erratic in its readings so...the hell with it. I didn't mess up too much and am currently awaiting the wort to get down to pitching temp. Lower back is a bit stiff, per usual but pretty sure I didn't make any mistakes that won't result in beer happening.