What Can Go Wrong On A Brew Day?

[seravitae]

Not so much on brew day, but years and years ago I was bottling my first stout (kit) (actually my first brew ever) and somehow managed to cause a catastrophic series of events leading to physical actions similar to having a seizure. Needless to say, i spilled a full bottle over my brand new white carpet (new house, rich parents, expensive carpet)..

Somehow the bottle managed to flip up and around in a majestic yet utterly distructive pattern which managed to evenly coat the white carpet with black, thick stout - a perfect rectangular space occupying about 1.5 meters squared.

I don't know if Murphy (from murphy's law) was merely humoring me at this point, but I had a rectangular rug in my room with the EXACT dimensions to stain..

..they still don't know.. i think that was 10 years ago?

 

[bergersau]

And I thought killing my last remaining packet of yeast by pitching it into a jug of very hot wort was annoying. (Forgot to cool the jug before pitching for the yeast starter)
I sympathize guy's.

 

[peas_and_corn]

Several times I have left the tap to my mash tun while underletting open, letting more water in. Now my good brewing assistant says "taps off?" every time an infusion is made.

 

[gjhansford]

I can't tell you how many time I've forgotten to turn the HLT supply tap off and ended up with a major overflow ... at least it was just water ... now I know why I put a drain in the floor of my brewery ... and I've lost a few litres of brew because I've also forgotten to turn the kettle outlet valve off from cleaning it for the last brew ... and I've had a few burns that even the stongest beer won't soothe ... and I've even thrown a still alight match into the rubbish bin after lighting the kettle burner ... but my brew day disasters pail into insignificance compared to the horror stories revealed by my fellow brewers. Where are the brew gods when we need them!

 

[manticle]

Schooey easily wins but I may just be able to wave at him from running behind.

My first all apple cider.

First - buy the apples.

30 odd kg worth of 5 different varieties from the local arabic fruit market which sells everything, (including apples) at approx 1/3 the price of the supermarket. Manticle doesn't drive. Manticle is on a bike.
Manticle makes two trips.

2nd trip: plastic bags, chockers full of apples, one of the bags splits as he rides around the corner. Fortunately only two apples hit the road and become rubbish. Kind lady driving past helps manticle out with a spare green type recycle bag. Issue resolved.

Manticle gets home, removes stickers from 30 odd kg of apples, quarters and deseeds every one. Meanwhile the lady's juicer that she's had for the last fifteen years has been placed in a pot of boiling water. It's a bit dirty and the brewing man doesn't like preservatives near his cider (or beer) so he's boiling it to simultaneously help remove gunk and sanitise.

Apples ready, get juicer. Except juicer is now malformed due to being old plastic that's been boiled for nigh on an hour. Juicer parts no longer fit other juicer parts. Juicer is schitfuct.

Manticle tries re-boiling and re-shaping. Juicer changes shape many times but is still retarded. After 2 hours and wondering what the **** to either tell the missus or to do with his 30 odd kg of quatered apples, he gives up on his home spun vac-forming and chucks the juicer in the bin. After swearing profusely, he rings a couple of local friends (without explaining exactly what's happened to the lady's juicer) to see if they have a juicer or food processor. 'Yes' says the second one. 'You can borrow that one, no worries'. Done deal.

Unfortunately, trying to juice apples with a food processor results in very inadequate juicing and a lot of solid pulp. I know. I tried - with every single different attachment.

Some attachments apparently don't like 30 odd kg of apples stuffed down their throat so after about 10 minutes of frustration and the smell of burning plastic, manticle stopped and realised he had also managed to grind away part of the centre pin of his mate's food processor (which actually belonged to his mate's mum). After about 4 hours, manticle had approximately half the juice he'd expected (having strained and squeezed the crap out of the pulp he had) and now had to face his lady, his mate, his mate's mum and figure out a way of actually getting something positive (read: alcoholic and tasty) out of this experience.

In the meantime he took his nice 15 litres of shared, fermented wort (big brew that was split) from his cold conditioning fridge ready for bottling. Always got to have a taste before bottling and so he did.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm band-aids. Yum. Not only did it taste funny but the fact that no-ne else involved in the share had a similar experience meant it was all due to his brewing practices.

The next day he bought around 12 litres of preservative free juice and added it to the clarifying cider

The first all apple cider became an apple/juice blend

On a positive note: best goddamn cider I ever made.

My first ever all grain experience using the wood fired weber has been detailed elsewhere but that was also long winded and fun.

 

[manticle]

Today is shaping up to my my most frustrating.

I've been upgrading my 'brewery' (if in fact you can upgrade from almost nothing).

I bought a rambo 4 jet, 4 kg gas bottle and reg, large boil pot and tap fittings for the pot (to become my HLT) and a keggle. I installed a new dial thermometer in my esky tun (been chucking in a stick thermometer and hoping it's accurate). Wow my brew days are going to be so much quicker and easier now.

Heat the strike water, preheat the tun, put in the strike water.

Then throw 3 kg crushed malt all over the garden. Quickly run to the shed to crack some more (and yes I use a hand powered cereal mill). Add the grain to the water.

Then the dial thermometer is telling me 60 degrees and falling rapidly (process and amounts were the same as usual). Desperately throw in a few litres of boiling water to up the temp, then think laterally - I know, I'll do a decoction. Stick thermometer is in so I wait 20 minutes then go to remove the decoction portion. The stick thermometer reads 75, the dial reads 58.

I need to calibrate them obviously but yesterday they read within 1 degree of each other.

Anyway I throw in cold water now - just winging it because while I'm doing this the stick thermometer falls in the mash and I can't find it anywhere. Now getting sparge water to temp without draining the tun is going to be difficult.

Meanwhile I'm trying to drill the hole for the tap in my keggle but want to avoid making it too big. With a hole that's probably slightly too small I force a brass all thread through, squeaking all the time (the thread, not me). After 20 mins of frustratingly slow progress I try and fit a nut on the finally inserted end, only to realise I've stripped the thread. Now I can't get the nut off, or screw the thread all the way through. I have another thread and I can grind the nut off but still there's pain in my balls.

Back to the mash - I drain first runnings, find the stick and it reads 64. Maybe all was not lost. I do my first iodine test and get no obvious blue. Thank god this process is so forgiving.

Anyway heating the sparge water now, I go to read the temp. Temp is 90 degrees (woops) but worse - there's no flame coming from the burner. I only bought the damn thing yesterday. I think some idiot must have left the valve turned on after turning the burner off. I wonder which idiot that might have been?

No problem - swap 'n' go is around the corner.

Only problem is that it's closed on Sundays. I find this out AFTER walking around there.

Thankfully I see my next door neighbour as I'm returning and ask him if he has a gas bottle. Bless the next door neighbour.

I still have to finish the boil, chill and bottle another brew so let's see if we can have any more interesting happenings.

 

[domonsura]

Today is shaping up to my my most frustrating.

I've been upgrading my 'brewery' (if in fact you can upgrade from almost nothing).

I bought a rambo 4 jet, 4 kg gas bottle and reg, large boil pot and tap fittings for the pot (to become my HLT) and a keggle. I installed a new dial thermometer in my esky tun (been chucking in a stick thermometer and hoping it's accurate). Wow my brew days are going to be so much quicker and easier now.

Heat the strike water, preheat the tun, put in the strike water.

Then throw 3 kg crushed malt all over the garden. Quickly run to the shed to crack some more (and yes I use a hand powered cereal mill). Add the grain to the water.

Then the dial thermometer is telling me 60 degrees and falling rapidly (process and amounts were the same as usual). Desperately throw in a few litres of boiling water to up the temp, then think laterally - I know, I'll do a decoction. Stick thermometer is in so I wait 20 minutes then go to remove the decoction portion. The stick thermometer reads 75, the dial reads 58.

I need to calibrate them obviously but yesterday they read within 1 degree of each other.

Anyway I throw in cold water now - just winging it because while I'm doing this the stick thermometer falls in the mash and I can't find it anywhere. Now getting sparge water to temp without draining the tun is going to be difficult.

Meanwhile I'm trying to drill the hole for the tap in my keggle but want to avoid making it too big. With a hole that's probably slightly too small I force a brass all thread through, squeaking all the time (the thread, not me). After 20 mins of frustratingly slow progress I try and fit a nut on the finally inserted end, only to realise I've stripped the thread. Now I can't get the nut off, or screw the thread all the way through. I have another thread and I can grind the nut off but still there's pain in my balls.

Back to the mash - I drain first runnings, find the stick and it reads 64. Maybe all was not lost. I do my first iodine test and get no obvious blue. Thank god this process is so forgiving.

Anyway heating the sparge water now, I go to read the temp. Temp is 90 degrees (woops) but worse - there's no flame coming from the burner. I only bought the damn thing yesterday. I think some idiot must have left the valve turned on after turning the burner off. I wonder which idiot that might have been?

No problem - swap 'n' go is around the corner.

Only problem is that it's closed on Sundays. I find this out AFTER walking around there.

Thankfully I see my next door neighbour as I'm returning and ask him if he has a gas bottle. Bless the next door neighbour.

I still have to finish the boil, chill and bottle another brew so let's see if we can have any more interesting happenings.

Shit you make me laugh man, you have such a way with words I can see all that happening almost like I'm watching a movie.....same with your cider making experience.
My advice to you? Stay away from roads, the edges of tall buildings and sharp objects.....pull your safest keg & a nice soft bean bag into the centre of the room away from the electrical outlets but not under the light shade and enjoy said beer until it all goes away. :lol:

***walks away thanking the gods above that it's not only him that has days like this....***

 

[Cortez The Killer]

Have a great brew session

Go to close the cube, hear a hissing, unscrew the cap, reseal, still hissing...

Realise the cube has split in one of the top corners...

Proceed to run around like a headless chook

Eventually rack to another cube

Cheers

 

[Steve]

manticle, why did you throw 3kg over the garden? you've lost me on that one?

 

[schooey]

Then the dial thermometer is telling me 60 degrees and falling rapidly (process and amounts were the same as usual). Desperately throw in a few litres of boiling water to up the temp, then think laterally - I know, I'll do a decoction. Stick thermometer is in so I wait 20 minutes then go to remove the decoction portion. The stick thermometer reads 75, the dial reads 58.

I need to calibrate them obviously but yesterday they read within 1 degree of each other.

Just wondering if you are using the MashMaster dial thermo? If you are, it may not have need recalibrating (especially if you had it dialled to a reliable thermo the day before), it may have just been 'stuck'... as in the mechanism was stuck and you needed to give it a bump.. just curious if you tried that?

The one I had in my mash tun was prone to it and I had to give it a tap with the mash paddle to get it to unstick and equalise..

 

[manticle]

manticle, why did you throw 3kg over the garden? you've lost me on that one?

I placed the crushed grains in a smaller esky last night. When I went to put them into my mash tun today, I stupidly lifted by the lid which came loose and I spilled most of the contents.

@Schooey: it's the cheaper of the dial thermometers available from grain and grape. After draining the tun, I used my 100 degree stick thermometer and a jug of boiling water to calibrate it. I then placed it in the fridge with my 50 degree stick thermometer to check it. They were within half a degree. I then placed all three in some tap water and got the same result. Finally I re-attached it to my mash tun and filled the tun with hot tap water then placed the two sticks inside. Same result so I'm confident it's now working as it should.

I'm pretty sure with all my shilly shallying today I've bumped it more times than I care to remember. I'll double check it the same way next time before use.

Everything ended up ok - 23 litres of 1049 ale into the fermenter, got the tap fitted to the keggle (needs a little adjustment as there's a tiny leak but otherwise ok).

The only thing that could have gone wrong after that? The beer seemed a lot darker than I expected when pouring into the fermenter.

That's right. I made the wrong recipe.

It can only get better from here.

 

[under]

LOL. What a day mate.

 

[manticle]

Should bring hope to people though - at the end of it I still made beer (assuming infections are avoided).

It's actually quite difficult to stuff this process completely up, no matter what your level of retardation (as long as you're a clean retard).

 

[bum]

I managed to give myself (and half my kitchen) a hot wort shower on my last brewday. Also managed to produce two, count them: TWO!, boil overs at once (while I was out of the room).

 

[Synthetase]

I don't have any total disaster stories, but a couple of frustrating incidents spring to mind.

Last year I was "inspired" to make a mead-like thing of craziness using golden syrup instead of honey and some other spices lying around. The ingredients went together into the pot on the stove to be pasteurised and I proceeded to sterilise a gallon jar which had been rescued from the old man's back garden where it had spent the last 10 years filling with dirt. It had taken me hours to scrub it clean after an all night soak in 5 molar sodium hydroxide. That all went ok, so I sanitised a funnel and poured the crazy mead "thing" in the jar and stood it on the bench to cool. For some reason, it seemed a great idea to put the very hot jar of liquor into the sink of cold water to cool it faster. *CRACK!* the jar split right down one side and emptied its contents into the sink.

Just the other week I was making a clone of Squire's golden ale. I had the boil going on the burner in the back yard and it was a little windy. I'd been watching the whole thing like a hawk for boil-overs and to make sure the wind didn't blow the flame out. With 15 minutes to go I put the lid of the pot partially over it to allow the steam to sanitise it before I put the whole thing in an ice bath to chill. I turned around to grab my beer and the wind blew the lid onto the pot, causing a malt fountain to erupt all over the place. I spent a lovely half hour digging dried malt out of the jets on the burner.

 

[user 10246]

I just made a K&K batch with 20L of water instead of 23L.....

Not sure how that'll end up though

 

[manticle]

I just made a K&K batch with 20L of water instead of 23L.....

Not sure how that'll end up though

A little bit stronger, a little bit fuller flavoured, possibly even a little bit better but a little bit less.

easy mistake to make and one you'll probably hardly notice.

I had a recent brewday which involved 3 single AG batches. Everything went super well but tasting the hydrometer samples today suggests 2 of them are infected.

Such things make me cry.

 

[Mantis]

Last brew I did the weekend before last I thought, I should use the hop flowers I have in the freezer.
Dunno what I was thinking but I just threw the flowers into the kettle like I do with pellets.
No hop screen on my pickup so , you guessed it, draining into the cube stopped after about half a litre.
Called myself every dickhead under the sun and wondered how I could get the wort out of the kettle.

Finally went with an emamel funnel stuck in the drain tube held in left hand with a towel for insulation frorm the hot wort, and using a jug dipped the wort out into the funnel. Got one and three quarters cubes filled.

Silly thing is , i have one of those big hop socks h34r:

Now tell me again about hot side aearation :blink:

 

[Hatchy]

I'm surprised there hasn't been a post in this thread since before I joined, I must have seen it linked in a different thread because I've had this page in my bookmarks for ages knowing that I'd have a brewday someday that would inspire me to post here.

Saturday just gone Mrs Hatchy had a wine tour on, perfect for brewing. I'll have the house to myself & she'll be boozed when she gets home so won't notice that I am as well. I filled my HLT on Friday night (being the organised brewer that I am) & turned on the burner at about 8:30 when I got home from dropping her off. At that point I had a mate drop in to return some cubes he'd borrowed when he brewed at my place. Good reason to grab a beer right? Turn off the HLT, have a beer with my mate & a bloke from AHB who came round to grab some bottles for the case swap.

Soon after, these fellas head off & I turn the HLT back on. Phone rings. Spend the next 3 hours on the phone to various people (whilst drinking more beer).

My mate who'd dropped the cubes off gets back, quick beer & we'll go get the new insulation I wanted for my tun & fill a gas bottle. Get back, have a beer, turn the HLT on (for the 3rd time) & start weighing grain.

The only thing written on the brewsheet is "mash in 4:40" so I assume I mashed in at 4:40. The assumption also has to be made that I got my target mash temperature otherwise I would've written it down right?

Kegged the amber ale that I'm planning on having on tap for the case swap, 3L left in the fermenter after filling the corny up, some quick maths suggests that if we drink 3 pints each we can top the keg up without having to waste beer or bottle.

Bloke from the next unit walks past, more beer. He left a longneck of something in the fridge, it has "dry" written on the label, it's still there.

Mashed for an unspecified amount of time. My guess is about 3 hours but I've got no way of knowing for sure.

1st runnings out of the tun into the kettle, I must've got the gravity because my refractometer was sticky last night, no idea of gravity or volume from 1st runnings, time for a beer.

Let's fly sparge, haven't done it before on my rig but it's not that hard right? Recirculate, both taps on slow, grab a beer.

Hose from HLT to tun & hose from tun to kettle both leaking, time to have a beer. Amber ale is carbed, tasty & 6.5%. Floor getting stickier & stickier by the second. Not much I can do about it, leave it, have a beer.

Get a carefully measured amount of wort into the kettle at a carefully measured gravity, again, nothing written on the brewsheet means I hit all targets right? Full flame on the spiral burner & grab a beer.

Get to a boil. I know that everyone who has bothered to read this far is expecting a boilover. I won't disappoint. I have no memory of it but I don't know how else the top & outside of the kettle could be so sticky. My guess is I was pouring beer & not paying attention.

Get a good rolling boil, grab a beer & chuck in the 60m hops, set alarms on my phone for the rest of the hop additions & grab a beer.

Sit down with beer, start feeling sleepy. Look at the time the alarms are set for. Realise that there's no way I can make it to the end of the boil, turn the gas off & go to bed planning on boiling it on Sunday.

Sleep all day Sunday.

Go outside yesterday morning trying to find keys to be able to get to work, pretend I didn't see anything apart from my keys.

Go to work (how the hell did that end up being the "fun" bit?).

Drive home thinking "I'll grab a beer & it won't take that long to tidy up".

Open keg fridge.

Mop up litres of beer from the floor of the keg fridge.

Leak was from the average "made up on brewday recipe" keg, not from the amber ale. Things are starting to go my way although I reckon I lost about half a corny.

Have a beer.

Tip out wort from kettle (I'm currently fermenting some form of an Adelaide Lambic on my lawn).

Grain left sitting for 2 days won't smell bad right? Wrong! Grain stinks!

Pour stinky grain from tun to garden.

Have a beer.

Realise that the fermenter still has 3L of amber ale in it, more lawn beer.

I think I've worked out where I went wrong. I shouldn't fill the HLT the night before I brew, I'm pretty sure that's where I went wrong.

Does anyone want to come round for a brewday this Friday? I've got the day off work so will be brewing. I already have the hops weighed out.

 

[proudscum]

As long as we can consume a dozen beers before we fill the HLT and maybe try burning something down a little first it sounds like a goer.will start the long wonder over from Melbourne now.

I'm surprised there hasn't been a post in this thread since before I joined, I must have seen it linked in a different thread because I've had this page in my bookmarks for ages knowing that I'd have a brewday someday that would inspire me to post here.

Saturday just gone Mrs Hatchy had a wine tour on, perfect for brewing. I'll have the house to myself & she'll be boozed when she gets home so won't notice that I am as well. I filled my HLT on Friday night (being the organised brewer that I am) & turned on the burner at about 8:30 when I got home from dropping her off. At that point I had a mate drop in to return some cubes he'd borrowed when he brewed at my place. Good reason to grab a beer right? Turn off the HLT, have a beer with my mate & a bloke from AHB who came round to grab some bottles for the case swap.

Soon after, these fellas head off & I turn the HLT back on. Phone rings. Spend the next 3 hours on the phone to various people (whilst drinking more beer).

My mate who'd dropped the cubes off gets back, quick beer & we'll go get the new insulation I wanted for my tun & fill a gas bottle. Get back, have a beer, turn the HLT on (for the 3rd time) & start weighing grain.

The only thing written on the brewsheet is "mash in 4:40" so I assume I mashed in at 4:40. The assumption also has to be made that I got my target mash temperature otherwise I would've written it down right?

Kegged the amber ale that I'm planning on having on tap for the case swap, 3L left in the fermenter after filling the corny up, some quick maths suggests that if we drink 3 pints each we can top the keg up without having to waste beer or bottle.

Bloke from the next unit walks past, more beer. He left a longneck of something in the fridge, it has "dry" written on the label, it's still there.

Mashed for an unspecified amount of time. My guess is about 3 hours but I've got no way of knowing for sure.

1st runnings out of the tun into the kettle, I must've got the gravity because my refractometer was sticky last night, no idea of gravity or volume from 1st runnings, time for a beer.

Let's fly sparge, haven't done it before on my rig but it's not that hard right? Recirculate, both taps on slow, grab a beer.

Hose from HLT to tun & hose from tun to kettle both leaking, time to have a beer. Amber ale is carbed, tasty & 6.5%. Floor getting stickier & stickier by the second. Not much I can do about it, leave it, have a beer.

Get a carefully measured amount of wort into the kettle at a carefully measured gravity, again, nothing written on the brewsheet means I hit all targets right? Full flame on the spiral burner & grab a beer.

Get to a boil. I know that everyone who has bothered to read this far is expecting a boilover. I won't disappoint. I have no memory of it but I don't know how else the top & outside of the kettle could be so sticky. My guess is I was pouring beer & not paying attention.

Get a good rolling boil, grab a beer & chuck in the 60m hops, set alarms on my phone for the rest of the hop additions & grab a beer.

Sit down with beer, start feeling sleepy. Look at the time the alarms are set for. Realise that there's no way I can make it to the end of the boil, turn the gas off & go to bed planning on boiling it on Sunday.

Sleep all day Sunday.

Go outside yesterday morning trying to find keys to be able to get to work, pretend I didn't see anything apart from my keys.

Go to work (how the hell did that end up being the "fun" bit?).

Drive home thinking "I'll grab a beer & it won't take that long to tidy up".

Open keg fridge.

Mop up litres of beer from the floor of the keg fridge.

Leak was from the average "made up on brewday recipe" keg, not from the amber ale. Things are starting to go my way although I reckon I lost about half a corny.

Have a beer.

Tip out wort from kettle (I'm currently fermenting some form of an Adelaide Lambic on my lawn).

Grain left sitting for 2 days won't smell bad right? Wrong! Grain stinks!

Pour stinky grain from tun to garden.

Have a beer.

Realise that the fermenter still has 3L of amber ale in it, more lawn beer.

I think I've worked out where I went wrong. I shouldn't fill the HLT the night before I brew, I'm pretty sure that's where I went wrong.

Does anyone want to come round for a brewday this Friday? I've got the day off work so will be brewing. I already have the hops weighed out.