Breaking in the new rig

[Proffs]

Thanks to Yobs super fast postage I got to test out my new rig today. I did a no chill cube hopped batch.

Recipe was:
5kg Marris Otter
1kg Vienna
250g pale crystal
170g Citra (cube hopped)

Made to 21L and no chilled. Will pitch tomorrow with US-05.

Pics to follow

 

[fletcher]

you got the crab cooker and burner too right? sexy stuff. keen for your pics. i need to install a spigot on mine and will be doing the same thing.

 

[Proffs]

Ok, so I'm almost finished the boil. Here's whats happened so far.


Mash Water


Heating mash water



Doughing in @ 66*C


Heating sparge water


Measuring hops. This seems like quite a bit. 170g Citra


Raising the mash to sparge. (Forgot to mash out; *******)

 

[Proffs]

Sparging. Measured at 1.061 before sparging. Little lower than hoped.


Sparge completed. Pre boil gravity of 1.044. :wacko: About 5 points off where I wanted to be.


And were off and boiling. Missed getting pics of the boil over.

 

[Proffs]

Wouldn't you know it, just as the boil was finishing it started bucketing down. So I didn't have any time to really whirpool or anything. It all went into the cube.


Got a final reading of 1.063! Pretty happy with that,


And the fruits of today's labor. Around 22-23 litres of sweet, sweet wort. Should be ready to pitch tomorrow. Smelled awesome when the boiling wort hit the citra. Can't wait to taste this one already. I'll keep updating this post as things happen.

 

[bum]

Lie the cube on its side so the openings and handle get some heat for a bit.

Nice job!

 

[thebigwilk]

Leave the cube up right the amount of heat coming of that wort at that temp will be just as much as laying it down IMO.

Cheers awesome photos.

 

[Proffs]

Cheers guys. I'd laid it down anyway just to be sure. It was only for a couple of minutes tho.

 

[beerdrinkingbob]

Great work mate, you will find with BIAB you score extra gravity points from a 10 minutes at mashout.

Out of interest did you just pour the sparge water straight through or dunk sparge it?

Cheers
BDB

 

[Proffs]

I just poured the sparge water straight through today but think I'll have to go back to dunk sparging in future. Cheers

 

[surly]

Good work profs, what was your evaporation rate at boil?

 

[Proffs]

Good work profs, what was your evaporation rate at boil?

On my dry (wet) run I had about 5.3L per hour. But this time I went from 27.5L to around 22.5L in the hour. I did dial the burner back just a tad tho.

 

[Proffs]

Update: I racked this into a secondary today just to get it off all that trub & hot break etc. I'm gonna end up with a bit less beer than expected but that's ok. You gotta start somewhere. I had around 22 litres of wort in the FV with about 4 litres of that ending up as trub. So still 2 cartons into bottles.

Took a reading and a tasting as well. Now this is what cheered me up. Smells awesome. Super citrusy. Like a sweet, smooth, clean, bitter fruit juice. Heaps of aroma too. Measures at 1.015 and I don't think it will go much further. That should place it around 6.8% ABV in the bottle if I'm not mistaken. I'll probably dry hop for 4-5 days with about 100g more citra. Can't wait to try this one!

 

[431neb]

Yob will be able to retire with beers like this going on.

I'm making some fizzy yellow stuff for the masses - 20 grams of Galaxy in a 20 litre batch. Sorry Yob - The other taps might chew through the hop supply a bit faster.

 

[surly]

Nice Proffs.

I just finished tidying after brewing in my crab cooker for the first time. English IPA. OG of 1.062. A little higher than anticipated, though my volume seems a bit down, so prob still hit the expected 70% mash ef.
All up it went quite well
My plans of leaving it on a gentle heat and closely watching for mashing was a bit of a dud though. Will definitely go the insulation route next time.

Already planning next time

 

[Goose]

complete newbie when it comes to BIAB... wort always cloudy before its boiled ?

 

[Proffs]

Yea, you get a lot more crap in the boil with BIAB cos your not doing a vorlauf or anything. Doesn't matter too much thought. It all comes good with good fermentation practice. Whirfloc and a decent whirpool gets rid of a lot too. I've been getting good results racking onto gelatin in secondary.



I'm gonna try a couple batches without it tho cos I think it may be robbing me of a little hop longevity??

Edit: damn iPhone always puts my photos sideways.

 

[brend0n]

where did you purchase this crab/cooker pot. looks awesome id like one

 

[Crusty]

There you go mate.

 

[MCHammo]

where did you purchase this crab/cooker pot. looks awesome id like one

Rays Outdoors and BCF. You could possibly pick up something similar at other places, too.