My New Ag Gear

[wraith]

Hi, Ive just upgraded my equipment and thought I'd share what I done and get some opinions, I just moved, before that I was doing my brews in the kitchen, in this new house I got myself organised to brew outside and increase my capacity, first brew in this house and on this equipment, next weekend

My new Mash Tun :





bought a 36L round cooler, and a 10" false bottom, my father in law plumber helped me with the pipe and taps, I had some problem with it not being water tight, what done the job for me was selleys kneadit aqua, its foodsafe, will handle the temp and stuck to the plastic fine.

My new Kettle (and for now HLT as well):




Thanks to Aaron for selling it to me

My New Burner:



hopefully powerful enough to get me through for years to come, wont know the power till I try it.

My Father in law helped me set up a filter outside to draw my brewing water from and I decided to put a hose length in a plastic container with ice in it before going to the chiller to increase its cooling efficiency, then from chiller to regular hose fitting to water garden (after its cool) or whatever to not waste water.



I few little things to nut out but I think I've done ok, the proof will be on brew day next weekend.

Wraith

 

[Keifer]

Nice one, what do you plan on a first brew, got a recipe figured out yet?

 

[wraith]

Thanks Keifer

Yeah, Ive got my next 2 brews sorted, none to style as no style fitted what I wanted to brew, my next brew is my first go at nelson sauvin hops, this is what Ive come up with:

JWM Pils 56.5%
JWM Vienna 38.5%
JWM Wheat 5.0%

60min, Magnum 5g
30min, Nelson S 20g
30min, Czech Saaz 20g
20min, Nelson S 10g
10min, Nelson S 10g
Steep, Nelson S 20g
Steep, Czech Saaz 30g
Dry, Nelson S 30g

Wyeast 1056

OG 1.049
FG 1.010
39.05 IBU
5.13%

I think something not to guidelines is better also because I dont have to stress about hitting targets on the first time I use my equipment.

Thanks to Aaron for the Vienna!

Wraith

 

[Keifer]

Yep dont worry about targets on your first run

That recipe is pretty much exactly what i am doing next, double batch tho. I got some crystal 55l to add something to it as i thought it would be too light coloured.
Also your using 2 hops i never have

Hope all goes well.

 

[Wortgames]

Hi Wraith, what size batches are you planning?

You've obviously got everything you need to brew, but I think you might find yourself upgrading the chiller and the burner at some point.

There's not an awful lot of copper in that chiller, and obviously you'll want to save the prechiller (ice bath) until the end of the chill, to get it down those last few degrees - you might be waiting a while depending on the temp of your ground water is all.

Also a 3 ring burner is adequate but it may be a bit on the slow side, especially if you are planning on doing double batches of 40L or so. Maybe you could add some baffles to help keep the breeze off it and concentrate the heat around the kettle.

Obviously only time will tell, and you can certainly brew with the gear you've got, they would just be my tips if I had to bet on what you get frustrated with.

:beer:

 

[Hutch]

Hi Wraith,

Ahhhhh, brewer's p0rn!
You'll be happy with the Keep Cold as a Mash Tun - I've managed over 10kg grain in mine, great for doing a double batch.

Just out of interest, how do you plan to clean grain trapped under/in the SS False bottom? It looks like its all rather permanent! I used a short length of silicon hose to make it easy to remove the FB for cleaning, but rigid enough not to be dislodged when stirring the mash.

Hutch.

 

[warrenlw63]

what done the job for me was selleys kneadit aqua, its foodsafe, will handle the temp and stuck to the plastic fine.

:blink: Might be foodsafe and will handle the temp. How will it fare over time though?

As Hutch has stated too. You're going to need a reliable means to dismantle the false bottom from the tun after each brew otherwise grain will remain trapped and go "very" mouldy between brews. You should be able to construct a reasonable bulkhead-fitting type setup with your pipe thread. All you need is 2 x brass or SS hex nuts, 2 x S/S washers and 2 x red fibre tap washers. Just tighten the whole bulkhead fitting up "carefully" with 2 spanners. As the tun fills with warm liquid the whole thing forms a reasonably liquid-tight seal.

If it was me I would have cut your pipe thread short to within an inch on the inside of the tun and plumbed the FB to it. Mine is done in this fashion and makes removal around a 30 second process. See attached pic.

Other than that your gear looks ready to rock. Not trying to rain on your parade. Sometimes it's just less frustrating if your equipment is set up correctly from the start. You'll know what I mean with subsequent brews.

Enjoy the process, you'll love it.

Warren -

 

[PistolPatch]

Great stuff Wraith!

Just one quick thing. Your 3 ring burner will be fine for a 23 litre batch. It'll take about 15 minutes to bring your mash water to mash temp and if you batch-sparge, the burner will keep up with the flow into the kettle. So all is good!

If you find though that on your second brew, the burner's performance drops then you will need to clean the holes out as the new paint gets stuck in them. (Screwtop gave me this invaluable advice). It's either a 1mm or 1.5mm bit you'll need.

Best of luck,
Pat

 

[BlueJ]

Hi Wraith

Good stuff. We have an identical KeepCold which also leaks a little. We are using the original soft rubber washers which distort under the clamping pressure and allow some water to get underneath. It is not enough to worry us but we will do as warrenlw63 suggests and get some stiffer fiber washers.

We did our first AG on Saturday and the KeepCold was great.

We have a similar chiller too. Just a thought, I doubt that the pre-chiller ice bath will have much effect on the water flowing through the plastic garden hose. The plastic is a reasonable insulator. I think you would need a second copper coil in the ice bath to cool down the water. I'd be tempted to save the cost of the ice and buy more grain for the second AG.

We cooled our wort from ~100C to ~23C in about 30 minutes using a trickle flow direct from the tap. We adjusted the flow so that the outlet water was noticeably warmer than the inlet water. We would have used less than 50 litres of water to cool the wort, and of course that water did go on the garden.

 

[kook]

My keepcold developed a very slight leak during my previous brew (Flanders Red). I simply took the bulkhead apart, put a load more thread tape on everything and put it back together. Worked fine yesterday, no leaks or drips.

I'm using silicone washers purchased from a hydraulic supply shop though.

 

[DarkFaerytale]

If you find though that on your second brew, the burner's performance drops then you will need to clean the holes out as the new paint gets stuck in them. (Screwtop gave me this invaluable advice). It's either a 1mm or 1.5mm bit you'll need.

Best of luck,
Pat

Great Tip PistolPatch and Screwtop! i know what i'll be doing tonight

-Phill

 

[BlueJ]

If you find though that on your second brew, the burner's performance drops then you will need to clean the holes out as the new paint gets stuck in them.

LOL the silver paint on our NASA burner lasted all of 10 minutes before it burnt and blocked the holes. The paint started bubbling after about 30 seconds! Sounds like the ring burners have real high temperature paint if it can get through one brew day.

 

[wraith]

Thanks everyone for the excellent advice, I didnt even think about taking the ff out to clean it, I feel like an idiot! its permanent now, so I'll most likely have to pull it apart and start again, I'll do one brew and see how it go's, the ff isnt sitting flush all the way around either, in some areas its raised 1 mm or 2, I wont know how bad that'll be until I do one, is that small amount going to be critical?
Straight after I mash I'll get the hose in there with high pressure and see if thats enough to clean it all out, if not, I'll have to pull it apart and try something else.

Thanks Again
Wraith

 

[DJR]

The grain weight will push the FB down and fix up those last 1-2mm, so i wouldn't worry. You will need to take the thing out and clean it though - backnuts and hot water washers are good for this!

Congrats on making the move to AG, you won't look back!

Those 3 ring burners are good, if you get sick of it, before you get a NASA, try using a HP adjustable regulator. Haven't yet tried it but i've heard they work fine on the 3 rings. NASA's are too loud - was doing a batch at my place on the weekend with the 3ring and everyone forgot we were brewing, they all have NASA's the poor deafened chaps!

 

[domonsura]

LOL the silver paint on our NASA burner lasted all of 10 minutes before it burnt and blocked the holes. The paint started bubbling after about 30 seconds! Sounds like the ring burners have real high temperature paint if it can get through one brew day.

I'm not sure any paint would stand up to the heat generated by a nasa, especially not mine with the high flow reg on it........ So, much so that I don't call the guards on the brewery so much 'wind guards, more blast guards.....and there are 2 sets of them... :blink:
Your dead right about the noise tho DJR....we're right in the low altitude flight path for Adelaide airport and my nasa competes in it's own right with the jumbos as they fly over......was really funny this last weekend, did my first brew in our new house and the neighbour from across the road came over to see if everything was OK! Also had the ones on either side stick their heads over the fence.....one thought I was running a forge in the yard.....(can't wait to see what he says when I actually do fire up my fan forced gas forge....it literally does sound like a turbine jet......

 

[oldbugman]

T was doing a batch at my place on the weekend with the 3ring and everyone forgot we were brewing, they all have NASA's the poor deafened chaps!

Maybe we forgot because it took so long to heat things up, let alone get a boil going.

 

[DJR]

Maybe we forgot because it took so long to heat things up, let alone get a boil going.

:angry:

It took so long because nobody was watching it - too much drinking beer!

Anyway, NASA, 3 ring, 4 ring, LPG blowtorch, it all works

 

[blackbock]

I'm not sure any paint would stand up to the heat generated by a nasa, especially not mine with the high flow reg on it........ So, much so that I don't call the guards on the brewery so much 'wind guards, more blast guards.....and there are 2 sets of them... :blink:
Your dead right about the noise tho DJR....we're right in the low altitude flight path for Adelaide airport and my nasa competes in it's own right with the jumbos as they fly over......was really funny this last weekend, did my first brew in our new house and the neighbour from across the road came over to see if everything was OK! Also had the ones on either side stick their heads over the fence.....one thought I was running a forge in the yard.....(can't wait to see what he says when I actually do fire up my fan forced gas forge....it literally does sound like a turbine jet......

OK OK Stop it. you're making me want to go and light some FLAMES!!! :lol:

 

[The King of Spain]

:blink: Might be foodsafe and will handle the temp. How will it fare over time though?

Having the same thoughts doing a mash tun at this moment. Check out on the web for the MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet). Its available for all products of this type. I just checked the silicon I am using. Have a look.

Yeah copper is expensive at the moment. Think you may need some more in that cooler. Nice setup

Cheers

 

[wraith]

Brew day went great everyone! even though I was doing up to 80-90% grain before, it feels good to make it 100% AG, extract is only to make starters with now
The only problem I had was I heated my sparge water up but it took me a lot longer to get the water from the HLT into the mash tun than I expected and it had cooled too much by that time, had to boil kettles to bring it back up, easy fixed obviously, next time I'll heat it higher to compensate.
Mash was great, totally watertight, held temp well and the FB held the grain back well, only little bits got through. The boil went excellent, definately enough power, I couldnt have the outer ring on or it would boil over, a really vigorious boil with just the 2 inner rings (with adjustable reg).
Everyone is right about the chiller, it isnt up to scratch, definately the weak link in my system, in 30mins I could only manage from boiling down to 40c, so had to pitch the next day, as I'll have to do until I can find a solution that suits me to bring it down to pitching temp on brew day, though down to 40c is better than no cooling at all, pitching the next day doesnt worry me too much though, I purge with co2 to expel the oxygen so I don't think it'll get infected, and cooling it to 40c quickly should give me some sort of an acceptable cold break. The mash tun cleaned out great too, just like new, I think I can keep it permanently fixed, though I'll do a few more brews before I decide 100%.
No hops got into the fermenter too, so im happy with that, pickup worked well.
All in all, very happy and will be doing a brew again this weekend as well, need to get stocks up because of the 2 month non-brewing period that was thrust upon me due to moving house.

Thanks everyone
Wraith