First Ag...

[boingk]

Hi all. This afternoon I got back from a trek around the snowys and decided that with the house empty, and nothing on the 'to do' list, that my first AG would be on the cards. Recipe is here. My setup consists of a heavy duty 80L aluminium stockpot that I scored off eBay, a 3-ring burner, and 1.5 square meters of Swiss Voille. Nothing flash, nothing crazy. But I'm making beer with it

I started by getting to strike temp - 70'C. I then added the grain for dough in and brought it up to a mash temp of 66.5'C [was aiming for 66]. The Voille is a 'No Stitch' design I made myself due to me being a bit utilitarian [read 'lazy but thoughtful']. I simply draped the Voille over the kettle so as the middle of it was in the kettle, then poured in the grain. Four simple knots in the corners to tidy things up and keep it from slipping into the kettle and its done. I covered the top of the kettle with a towel as I do not have a lid, and periodically agitated the mash.

The 'sparge' was a bit unorthodox, I used a bit of doubled string line [nice fluro pink colour ] to tie up the grain bag to an overhead beam and then counterweighted it by putting a sledgehammer in the descending loop. Worked a charm, and let me give the bag a bit of a squeeze pretty easily. After the sparge I emptied the spent grain into the veggie patch and dug it in. Tasted alright, but not sweet at all which I presume is a good sign.

Hopping was done once the boil started to roll. 60, 20 and 0min intervals. No probs. The wort was then poured through the sanitised grain bag into the fermenter, chilling overnight due to a lack of chiller. One may be botched together from some copper piping I've got - 12ft of half-inch. I just need connections for a hose and something to spiral it around.

S-04 is going in tomorrow morning, aiming for an 18'C ferment.

Cheers - boingk

PS: 3-ring burner is retardedly slow at doing almost anything to a volume of 35L. Having said that, its been only 3 and a bit hours from go to whoa...am I missing something?

 

[Pollux]

Oh this inspires me....

2 weeks to go, 2 weeks to go.........

 

[Cocko]

Well its about fickin time boingk!

Sounds to me like you covered all bases, I am not sure how immersed your make shift bag was but you may miss out on some efficiency if it was not a thin enough mash BUT you sparging may make up for it.

3 and a bit hours sounds about right to me, my biab's take me pretty much 4 neat.

Now you know how easy it can be, no excuse not to refine your kit and its AG from here on in!!

Wait till you taste it!!

 

[buttersd70]

Congrats, buddy. Sounds like it all went well. Recipe looks sound, grains look balanced. (don't know about the cluster, though :lol: ). Should turn out well.

 

[boingk]

Sounds to me like you covered all bases, I am not sure how immersed your make shift bag was but you may miss out on some efficiency if it was not a thin enough mash BUT you sparging may make up for it.

Maybe I used to wrong terminology, by 'sparging' I meant draining the bag and giving a bit of a squeeze. The way I set up the bag was drape the mesh all the way into the kettle and then dough in and tie off the corners to maintain the bag shape. I think it should have been thin enough, there wasn't a lot of resistance when mashing and the water volume was almost all available to the grain, maybe minus a few litres. The bag corners were just let to sit around the outside of the kettle, like if you put the elastic top of a sock over a bit of poly pipe and then pushed the closed end of the sock into the pipe opening. I'll have to get some pics up.

Congrats, buddy. Sounds like it all went well. Recipe looks sound, grains look balanced. (don't know about the cluster, though :lol: ). Should turn out well.

Thanks Butters, good to hear that the changes I made to the recipe weren't earth-shattering. I kinda just thought it up while I was on the john, then asked for critique in the 'What are you brewing?' thread and went from there. As for the Cluster, it would've been PoR if I had been able to get a full half-kilo from ESB

One more thing, have since noticed that the 'sledgehammer' counterweight is actually a blockbuster. Didn't notice while I was panicking around with hops and boil times and the rest. Blockbuster ESB...I like the sound of that... Oh and Pollux - get into it, it might seem daunting but its really not too bad. Short bits of action interspersed with long periods of boredom...especially where heating and hopping are concerned. Hop to it!

Cheers - boingk

 

[stm]

Sounds easy, Boingk! Did you get your 23L at 1.051?

 

[chappo1970]

Congrats Boingk! You make it sound so easy!

 

[buttersd70]

Short bits of action interspersed with long periods of boredom...

Yep...thats exactly right.

 

[boingk]

stm - Just ran off to check it then, totally forgot about it until just now. I got 1.031 at a volume of 24L. This translates into...what...48% efficiency? Seems a bit crappy, definitely have to work on that one. Either way, looks like I've still got an Ordinary Bitter on my hands so I'm happy.

Chappo - Thanks mate, wish the result reflected it though. Reckon I might have to have another shot at something tonight seeing as I've got a spare fermenter. Brother is here too, so have a hand with the kettle and so forth. I'll have a quick shot at a...something. I'll post back when I figure it out.

Cheers - boingk

 

[chappo1970]

Chappo - Thanks mate, wish the result reflected it though. Reckon I might have to have another shot at something tonight seeing as I've got a spare fermenter...

Cheers - boingk

Boingk you made an all grain beer! You should be proud of that fact alone. You did it and you did it without having to buy some goopy stuff off the shelf. So what the grav is a bit low? Pffft! Everybody learns something every time we do a brew. That's what makes this a fun past time IMO. You can and will make others that's for sure! I would be keen to hear how your second brew goes... my 2c

Cheers Chappo

 

[Ronin]

stm - Just ran off to check it then, totally forgot about it until just now. I got 1.031 at a volume of 24L. This translates into...what...48% efficiency? Seems a bit crappy, definitely have to work on that one. Either way, looks like I've still got an Ordinary Bitter on my hands so I'm happy.

Chappo - Thanks mate, wish the result reflected it though. Reckon I might have to have another shot at something tonight seeing as I've got a spare fermenter. Brother is here too, so have a hand with the kettle and so forth. I'll have a quick shot at a...something. I'll post back when I figure it out.

Cheers - boingk

Hi boingk,

the problem is a 1.031 O.G. beer mashed at 66 is going to finish pretty thin. Not sure what the attenuation is with S-04 (it's the same as Wy1099??), but it may end up thin and watery. If it doesn't all the better.

Can't help much with efficiency increases with BIAB, never done it. But congrats for taking the first step.

James

 

[brenjak]

Well done!

I am just waiting for the "knead it" to dry in the hole i made in my new rubbermaid cooler. Once dry and sanded the mashmaster weldless goes in and i am one step closer!!!

 

[buttersd70]

Shame about the crappy efficiency....
one thing I would definately reccomend is taking a preboil gravity....after the mash, as it is coming up to boil, take a sample. In a shallow bowl in the freezer for 10mins or so should bring it down to temp....that way,you can get a new target OG, and if you are more than a couple of points off the original OG, you can adjust your hopping to match the new OG.

One of the sucky things about coming in so far under projected OG is not just the lower gravity....it also means that the BUGU is now thrown off. It will actually be thrown quite a bit off, because not only do you have a lower OG, you would also have a higher than anticipated IBU (due to better utilisation due to the lower BG)....so it's a bit of a double whammy, there.

 

[raven19]

Well done on your first AG! And welcome to the dark DARK side!

Is it worth investing in a no chill cube?, otherwise more oxygen and baddies can get to your cooling work prior to pitching yeast. It shall greatly reduce any chance of infection - worked a treat for me on my AG.

Love the sledgehammer couterweight too... Pics?

2c.

 

[Ross]

Shame about the crappy efficiency....
one thing I would definately reccomend is taking a preboil gravity....after the mash, as it is coming up to boil, take a sample. In a shallow bowl in the freezer for 10mins or so should bring it down to temp....that way,you can get a new target OG, and if you are more than a couple of points off the original OG, you can adjust your hopping to match the new OG.

One of the sucky things about coming in so far under projected OG is not just the lower gravity....it also means that the BUGU is now thrown off. It will actually be thrown quite a bit off, because not only do you have a lower OG, you would also have a higher than anticipated IBU (due to better utilisation due to the lower BG)....so it's a bit of a double whammy, there.

The easiest way in my book is to always have some dried or liquid malt on hand. Very simple to add for an unexpected low gravity without having to worry about reformulating the recipe etc.
...& congrats boingk, good to see you joining the fold

 

[boingk]

Good point about the preboil gravity, butters. I was thinking that it'd be massively overhopped, but wasn't really sure how to avoid it 'next time'. Ironically, next time is this time because I've got another mash on the run right now.

Recipe is here.

Raven, pics are coming...just dug up my old digital camera. Looks like its cooperating, too...

Good idea Ross, and thanks for the congrats, was thinking plain old sugar but malt would work, to

Meanwhile, this mash won't finish itself. I'll be back - boingk

Pictures: [Beware, state of brewhaus may offend]

There we go, nice and tidy h34r:

 

[boingk]

Bump, pics loaded up now.

 

[Pollux]

Oh, I'm intended to hit it up hard in two weeks....

I will be placing orders for my urn and refract from Ross, and also supporting my local HBS by ordering ingredients from there on the 11th. I already bought 2.5m of voile, polyester thread and a poly drawstring to make the bag. Actually, can someone fire me the external specs of the Crown 40L urn? That way the missus can get to work on the bag over the next few days before she returns to work.

Fingers crossed everything arrives here by the 13th, recipes are planned, I shall be brewing for 3 nights straight.

 

[boingk]

Pollux, I've used 1.5 square meters for my 80L kettle...not sure how you're planning to use 2.5 square meters for a 40L one. The simplest way is to do something like I've done, then cut the corners off to make a big circle. This will get rid of any extra you don't need. Now you just have to stitch a draw-string around the edge of the circle and you're in business.

Cheers - boingk

 

[Pollux]

I plan on stitching one up like this

I mainly bought 2.5m as it was the last of the roll at Spotlight Birkenhead Point and I figured it would be handy to make a jumbo hop sock at the same time.