New(ish) AG BIAB Brewer - a couple of Q's

[apike]

Hi Legends,

I'm reasonably new to brewing. I have done 4 or 5 BIAB brews, each one slowly getting better and better. The last one I did was a dry stout which actually tastes awesome, but unfortunately the crown seals weren't put on as tight as they should've been. I had a friend put them on with the old hammer and hand capper... I really should've done it myself, but it seemed like he was doing it correctly!! Anyway, I think this may be the reason why my beer is lacking a carbonation. Does this sound about right? I mean, they were on reasonably tight, but I can actually pry them off with just my thumb.

Also, I brew in a 25L stock pot, using a total of about 18L of water and depending on how much grain I use, I end up with about 12L into the fermenter. I have been using a copper wort chiller attached to my garden hose to cool it down, but it takes a long time, and uses a lot of water. There's only so much I water my garden!! what benefits comes from chilling wort down as quickly as possible, apart from time saved? I'm thinking about purchasing a 40L Crown Urn, and this would then take even longer to chill down, is there any other recommendations for chilling wort down?

Cheers!! :icon_cheers:

 

[Bridges]

Do a search for no chill, plenty of good and sometimes conflicting info on here. Basically it is putting hot wort straight into a clean and sanitized plastic (HDPE) water container like you'd use when camping. Then letting it cool over time to pitching temps. Works well for me and many others. Read up before you decide if it's what you want to do.

 

[Bribie G]

For bottling I'd recommend a levered bench capper. Those hand cappers scare the shyte out of me at the best of times

re No-Chill: If you are getting a Crownie (highly recommended) then the average sized (22 - 23 litre) batch will fit nicely in a couple of these nominally 10L containers. Run the hot wort into them:



They are sturdy food grade HDPE. Nominally 10L they hold a bit more and after a few uses the sides will bow a little, so they hold a brew nicely. Pop them outside overnight and you can normally pitch the next day. The wort will stay sterile for months if necessary.

Between brews, sanitise well and keep a bit of Starsan solution in them and give them a big shake up whenever you are passing by.

I used to use a 20L cube identical to CraftBrewer's fresh wort kits but the advantage of using two 10L is that they are easier to handle and give the hot wort a much better surface to volume ratio for quicker cooling.


I have only ever No-Chilled and have a fair few gongs that I've won in competitions.

 

[apike]

Great!! thanks for that info. I've done a quick bit of research on the no-chill method and it definitely seems the way to go! I also may have found a sweet old bench capper on gumtree... nice!

For bottling I'd recommend a levered bench capper. Those hand cappers scare the shyte out of me at the best of times

re No-Chill: If you are getting a Crownie (highly recommended) then the average sized (22 - 23 litre) batch will fit nicely in a couple of these nominally 10L containers. Run the hot wort into them:

10L jerry.jpg

They are sturdy food grade HDPE. Nominally 10L they hold a bit more and after a few uses the sides will bow a little, so they hold a brew nicely. Pop them outside overnight and you can normally pitch the next day. The wort will stay sterile for months if necessary.

Between brews, sanitise well and keep a bit of Starsan solution in them and give them a big shake up whenever you are passing by.

I used to use a 20L cube identical to CraftBrewer's fresh wort kits but the advantage of using two 10L is that they are easier to handle and give the hot wort a much better surface to volume ratio for quicker cooling.


I have only ever No-Chilled and have a fair few gongs that I've won in competitions.

 

[whitewagon67]

If you have access to a water tank, you can use a pump to move tank water through your wort chiller and then back into your water tank that way there's no waste. I brew 40 litres and can cool it down to temp in about 30 minutes. Chilling it down quickly gets rid of things you don't want in your beer and doesn't allow hops to over bitter by sitting in hot wort. Good luck.