making a brew bag

[fletcher]

i've read plenty of posts about people making their own voile brew bags, or not making a bag at all and buying a huge sheet, and i want in. all the bags i've seen are made of the flimsiest material that is lucky to survive one brew. i picked one up the other day, it caught on a tiny corner of my finger nail and literally tore a hole right through it. terrible material.

does anyone have a pictorial guide on stitching one? or the basics of just using a voile sheet as is? i don't work well with textual cues as much as i'd like to; i'm a visual learner.

any links or guides or ideas would be great if anyone has any.

 

[sp0rk]

get yourself a pillowcase (the kind that is just sewn up one side and at the bottom) flip it inside out and check the stitching
That is how mine is sewn
the top is hemmed over as well
it's a tad longer than my keggle and about the same circumference

Though guys like bribie say cut yourself a big circle, hem the edges and away you go!
seems to work well for them

 

[fletcher]

get yourself a pillowcase (the kind that is just sewn up one side and at the bottom) flip it inside out and check the stitching
That is how mine is sewn
the top is hemmed over as well
it's a tad longer than my keggle and about the same circumference

Though guys like bribie say cut yourself a big circle, hem the edges and away you go!
seems to work well for them

with the stitching - what is it stitched with? what material?

and for the circle, i'm guessing the hem is around the entire circle so it can sit around the top of the kettle? so it would hang down in an upside down dome shape into the kettle with the grain?

 

[Blind Dog]

Why would you bother hemming a circle? Swiss voile melts - cut the circle out and hold the edge taut over a flame (I use the gas stove top) and just keep the edge moving round until you've sealed the edges. Way less work than hemming. Made 3 biab bags that way, and numerous hop bags

 

[fletcher]

Why would you bother hemming a circle? Swiss voile melts - cut the circle out and hold the edge taut over a flame (I use the gas stove top) and just keep the edge moving round until you've sealed the edges. Way less work than hemming. Made 3 biab bags that way, and numerous hop bags

sounds winner mate. circular shape? care to show me a pic of your bag so i get a better idea?

 

[wombil]

This is the general idea.
Mine is just a 2.5 meter square of polly voille.
Cost about $4.

 

[sp0rk]

Why would you bother hemming a circle? Swiss voile melts - cut the circle out and hold the edge taut over a flame (I use the gas stove top) and just keep the edge moving round until you've sealed the edges. Way less work than hemming. Made 3 biab bags that way, and numerous hop bags

Because for me, giving it to my seamstress mother in law to hem up is easier

with the stitching - what is it stitched with? what material?

and for the circle, i'm guessing the hem is around the entire circle so it can sit around the top of the kettle? so it would hang down in an upside down dome shape into the kettle with the grain?

Mine is overlocked with fairly thick cotton thread, again the MIL did this for me
I sewed up a hop sock by hand once, never again...

 

[JDW81]

Because for me, giving it to my seamstress mother in law to hem up is easier

That is a lie, involving the mother-in-law is never easier h34r:

 

[DJ_L3ThAL]

I just got a piece of Swiss and couldn't believe how much stronger it is than the brew bags you get at LHBS.

The local sewing place wanted $36 to sew the hem in the circle, no thanks. BlindDog can you please post a pic of your melted edge? Wouldn't mind trying it if it is similar to what I am thinking.

 

[TimT]

Often my brews are so small I don't need a bag, just a cloth and a large sieve to sit over a pot.... but I have bought a brew bag for the larger brews, and just last week I was doing a sizeable mash. Got out the brew bag, put it down for a second and turned around to do something else, turned back and - ****! - the bloody stove had melted the bag, with some parts fused together in the heat, and a whacking great hole that all the grain would leak out of.

Cue a minute or so of cursing in as many languages as possible.

Thankfully we had a whole crapload of cheesecloth in the cupboard, which we'd bought for uses in various household endeavours - brewing, cheesemaking. We'd been cutting squares off it over the past year when we thought we needed some new cloth for something. Anyway, there was still a lot of it left in the cupboard, and folded over itself, too, meaning we could make a double strength bag fairly easily out of it.

I was all for just bunching the whole thing up and tying it loosely with a rope in the right place, but the Baron kindly offered to quickly stitch up the sides on the sewing machine. Of course I agreed; it worked a treat. I've now got an ace brew bag with all the sides made out of two layers of cloth, so it should stand up fairly well to the large weights involved. And I didn't really have to pause in the brew either. Nice!

 

[QldKev]

I used a large circle of Swiss Viole (from Spotlight) with a hem around the edge for at least 100 brews. All I did was

Get the length to match the width (1.8m from memory)
Fold the sheet into 4 (top to bottom then left to right)
Cut the outer corner of the circle through all 4 sheets, hence making a full circle once opened.
Run a hem around the outside edge allowing enough material to create a pocket within the hem. (no measuring near enough is ok)
Drag some elastic through the hem, and sew then ends off.
The elastic comes in really handing when putting it on your pot. It snaps back and holds the edge to the outside of the pot out the way.

The back is still good, I just moved to using a Big W pot for the bag.

I picked up an old sewing machine about 4 or 5 years ago from ebay for $50. Bloody handy for this and hop bags etc. Was pretty funny me walking into Spotlight to ask for the small metal round thing that holds cotton in the machine, and the lady looks at me and say what a bobbin expecting everyone knew what they were.

 

[Kingy]

I brought 2 meters worth and layed it in my pot and pushed it against the walls on the inside then draped it over the pot. Then trimmed around the pot with some scissors about 200mm down from the top of the pot. Was gunna hem it but that was about 20 double batch brews ago. So I probly won't hem it now. My cuts where rough as lol. Still works the same but so fark it.

 

[Forever Wort]

I am still using the original BIAB bag that I bought from Grain & Grape.

The first time I used it the fool thing split open but after a quick sewing job it has survived for a good few months now.

 

[crowmanz]

I haven't bothered to stich mine into a bag yet....I just chuck the metre or 2 I got in the pot, then gather the edges to tie off when I go to lift it out.