I think I paid by paypal if thats an option but you do get hit with a charge for doing that. $580 was what mine came to but that was all in after all charges. With the chiller I find it works best if you use the pump and recirculate the wort while chilling otherwise you'll get a false temp reading as the chiller is sitting on top of the temp sensor. Just get some 13mm tubing and place one end on the steel bit that goes through the lid and the other end into the wort and pump through that back into the wort so your limiting oxidization.
GUTEN
- Thread starter wide eyed and legless
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nosco
Well-Known Member
Im gonna go with paypal to save me some greif down the track. Its about $25 extra but considering the total cost i dont mind.
nosco
Well-Known Member
I just made the payment. $637 all up. A bit more than I was hoping to pay and a bit more than you can get a Robobrew for but I think it looks and sounds like a better quality unit, I hope.
If you've seen them both in the flesh I don't think there's much comparison to me, Ive seen the RB at Keg King twice, it looks a lot smaller, its more brushed ally in colour than shiny SS and actually doesn't look as solid to me, the trade off is of course you've got local support. Also not sure what its interface is like and if you can do multi step, the gutens programming is clunky but once you get the hang of it its easy enough and works well, PITA if you make a mistake though, there is no corrections is a off/on and start again jobbie.nosco said:
nosco
Well-Known Member
How long did it take to deliver?
Weal, how we looking on that helix? 3rd brew tonight, all went great till went to drain, last brew I did was dipa with heaps of hops so I used hop spider, this one was Pilsner, I used the spider for the bittering but I wanted to make sure I got all out of the 5min aroma, only 20g but disaster again, blocked the bazooka and also blocked the pump this time, ended up having to to pour the beer directly into fermentor complete with all break and hops, not great for a pilsner!! gonna have to filter to secondary now before I pitch really is the Achilles heel of this machine
Anyone else using do yourself a favour and use a hop sock or spider till we get me filter
Anyone else using do yourself a favour and use a hop sock or spider till we get me filter
nosco
Well-Known Member
Wjen she said they'd send it in 3 days i thought she meant send ot from theor end in 3 daysLeyther said:
I might give the braided hose a try first.
Are you doing any kind of whirlpooling? Does it have any affect?
nosco
Well-Known Member
I use a swiss voil hop bag. I heard some people say you dont get the best hop utilisation but i think its great as it filters really well and you can squeeze every last bit of wort out of it for hop goodness
I try Whirlpool but the chiller disturbs it and the bazooka goes into the centre also. For now the spider or sock is the way to go, was just worried about the hop utilisation on a delicate pilsner and was only 20g of hop so didn't expect to be an issue. My last brew had over 100g of hop in the spider and that worked ok
wide eyed and legless
Well-Known Member
All looking good, payment has been made and they will start to manufacture shortly. If you PM me your address I can send you a hop sock to use until they arrive.Leyther said:
No worries mate I got a couple and the spider, I'll just persevere till its ready.wide eyed and legless said:
BTW whilst cleaning tonight I thought I would finally do an experiment on those volume markings.
This is what I found on my 30L unit:
10L = 11.4L
15L = 16.5L
20L = 21.7L
25L = 27.0L
30L = 32.2L
Still need to get Beersmith dialed in better, my pilsner was supposed to be 1.049 but I ended up with 1.059 had to dilute it to get to 1.049. I think I'm losing more in the boil off than its currently setup for. Mind you by the time I racked off to second fermentor I ended up with 16.5L but I left about 3L of break and hops in the original, diluted with another 3L to get it down. Be interesting to see how it comes up with the helix.
I wonder if another issue is evaporation time during ramp up, this pilsner had the following mash times:
5 min @ 57°C, 40 min @ 61°C, 30 min @ 71°C for 75min in total and another 10m mash out, thats what went into Beersmith but as the machine doesn't start the timer until it hits those temps there is some lag time during the steps.
Just a case of more experimentation till I get it right.
I wonder if another issue is evaporation time during ramp up, this pilsner had the following mash times:
5 min @ 57°C, 40 min @ 61°C, 30 min @ 71°C for 75min in total and another 10m mash out, thats what went into Beersmith but as the machine doesn't start the timer until it hits those temps there is some lag time during the steps.
Just a case of more experimentation till I get it right.
wide eyed and legless
Well-Known Member
Was the grain basket in or out of the unit when you tested the volumes? Though I can't see the displacement throwing it out so much.Leyther said:
nosco
Well-Known Member
Are you measuring mash volume? Could you get a ruler in there or maybe measure the head space?
I was just measuring water in the machine with the mash tun out, there are measurements on the side of the boiler but they are not accurate, seem to be about 10+% out, I've no explanation why, if it was dead space you would expect the discrepancy to remain constant but it wasn't, saying that I was using a plastic 5L jug which I have not measured either so that could also be out but I think the general consensus on those measurements is that they are a little unreliable, they're an 'approximation' 
nosco
Well-Known Member
I got mine today :super: If get some time ill run some perc through it. Definitely brewing with it on the weekend. I got a little chiller with it too. Ive only ever brewed with biab and no-chill so it should be fun. Ill have to go back and learn a bit about sparging.
nosco
Well-Known Member
About 30min to heat 20lt to 67c @2500w with the pump running. Not too shabby and it didnt trip the switch like I thought it would even with a fan heater running as well. The beeper is a bit shit though.
So as a test I set the 67c to 5 min for sparge water temp and then the sac rest of 65 at 10min. Is that what other people have done? I measured the 20lt with a ruler via a volume calculator and it was about 10mm below the 20lt line. Good enough at 20lt but Ill see how it goes with 30+.
Set @65c for mash the temp the Guten read 64c but my Thermapen said 64.7c. Pretty happy with that!
So as a test I set the 67c to 5 min for sparge water temp and then the sac rest of 65 at 10min. Is that what other people have done? I measured the 20lt with a ruler via a volume calculator and it was about 10mm below the 20lt line. Good enough at 20lt but Ill see how it goes with 30+.
Set @65c for mash the temp the Guten read 64c but my Thermapen said 64.7c. Pretty happy with that!
