Your Worst/Dumbest Brewday Stuff Up...

[Siborg]

I was listening to a BN/Jamil podcast a while back,and the advice was given about the willingingness to tip a bad batch is apparently a vital part of being a brewer.

It certainly would not serve you well if you dip your toe into commercial brewing, and you're too precious with your beer to tip a bad batch.
Sending a batch of bad beer for packaging/sales would sour your brewery's reputation, especially in the early days, so it would be cheaper in the long run to run it to the drain and re-brew.

Absolutely. I've tipped a few batches in my time brewing. And it's always painful.

It's like the 5 stages of grief:
1. Denial - It doesn't taste that bad. I mean, its drinkable....right? :mellow:
2. Anger - F&($NG Thing!!! WHY DID I HAVE TO FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS ON THE CAN AND FERMENT AT 27 DEGREES!!!! :angry2:
3. Bargaining - Please, God.... make that off flavour mellow out with conditioning :unsure:
4. Depression - I'm the worst brewer ever. I'm never brewing again.
5. Acceptance - All right. I'll tip it and try again.

 

[wide eyed and legless]

Did it again for the second time.

image.jpg
Used a 1 metre long s/s ruler to clear a blockage in the mill hopper while in use.
Ahh well it's now perfectly handy for measuring the length of snake next summer as it slithers across the yard.

Reminds me of our tech school turning teacher, we were supposed to clear the swarf with a rule, Mr Woods did show us how not to do it with ones finger, kept the end of his finger in a matchbox for ages. :lol:

 

[Thefatdoghead]

Try mixing some citric acid and water in it and boil it for a few minutes.

How strong you think?

 

[spog]

Reminds me of our tech school turning teacher, we were supposed to clear the swarf with a rule, Mr Woods did show us how not to do it with ones finger, kept the end of his finger in a matchbox for ages. :lol:

Ha, when I grabbed the ruler to clear the blockage I thought I should use the previously mangled ruler but decided nah it'll be alright I'll use the nice straight one.
Wrong ! The mill grabbed it and stuffed it. I thought you Cnut !
I killed the power to the mill and turned the pulley backwards by hand to get the ruler out which then pushed the hopper up and let grain flow out all over the shop.
Then I realised I was the dumb Cnut .
Must buy a new ruler so I'm prepared for next time.

 

[Rocker1986]

How strong you think?

I usually just use probably a couple of tablespoons worth in 4 or 5 litres of water. Never really measured it, I just tip it in from the bag until it looks "about enough" then dissolve and boil it. Even if it doesn't completely remove it, it should loosen it up enough that it can be scrubbed off once it cools down.

 

[droid]

wow, so many reminders of other stuff-ups i'd forgotten about, here's one that must be up there on the dickheadometer:

keggle taken off the gas, and put on a stand to whirlpool...so that's a hot steel keg onto plastic? uh huh. truly a wonder how some people get through life, luckily i smelled the melting plastic

 

[technobabble66]

... And brewing in thongs at the time, droid?

Nice melt on the crate!

 

[droid]

thanks good job ay?

the thongs have been a more recent happening, tho i brewed in wellies the other day so who can know

 

[Benn]

This afternoon I planned a simple evening of kegging one batch and getting another batch out of the cube and into the fermenter. Ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem, however I still haven't organised my garage since recently moving so everything brew related happens in the kitchen for now.
Things took a turn for the worse when I began force carbing via the "liquid out" post (pin locks). I couldn't find any clamps so I just pushed the beer line on to the barbs, cranked the reg up to 30psi and began shaking the keg on the kitchen floor. About 5 seconds in to it the hose blew off the reg and being that it was still connected to the liquid out post at 30psi, started whipping around spraying beer all over the kitchen. I quickly disconnected it and took a minute to survey the damage, there was beer all over the place. Ok, could have been worse.
Then, for some unknown reason I reconnected it! Off it went again spraying beer all over the clean dishes, the bench tops, me, all over the flyscreen on the kitchen window.
I quickly disconnected it again. Now there was beer ******* everywhere. I knew I was in for a long night so I took off my wet socks and got back to work. While all this was going on, the cube of DSGA I was aerating in the corner had been bubbling so vigorously that it was slowly spewing foamy beer out of the opening, running down the sides and forming a decent puddle at the base of the pantry.
I was getting pretty over it by this stage, all it would have taken was for Mum to ring up about something and I would have lost it. Meanwhile the wife and kids happily watched their movie. I pulled the other Co2 bottle out of the beer fridge and finished force carbing, cleaned out the fermenter and poured in the DSGA & yeast. I couldn't find the mop so I grabbed some chux wipes and began hand mopping. Just as I start cleaning up the kids come walking through it to get a drink, then the cat starts licking the beer puddle in the corner then it's attacking the chux wipes while I'm trying to mop up with them.
Faaaark, what a *******. I finished cleaning about an hour ago, all the more reason to get the garage organised so shit like this doesn't keep happening.

 

[Danscraftbeer]

That is farken hilarious. :lol:

 

[Grott]

You deserve a medal

 

[technobabble66]

Great story, Benn!
Agree w grott, you deserve a medal!
Surely there's something there that warrants a posting in the Manliness thread.

"I like to catch spinning gas-powered kegs. I like to shower in beer"

 

[Benn]

On the upside, my DSGA has a nice krausen going. Or an infection, one or the other

 

[mofox1]

On the upside, my DSGA has a nice krausen going. Or an infection, one or the other

Either way, it'll be a DSGA... Damn, Sour Golden Ale.

 

[CoxR]

Pitched yeast into a cube and forgot to back the lid off.
Result was a split cube and 20 Liters of wort on the floor inside.
After than the wife made me move my fermenting fridge out side on the downstairs deck in case of future accidents.
We were crying as we cleaned up the mess as it smelt so good.

 

[Droopy Brew]

Broke out the brew gear today for the first batch of the year. All was packed away in the shed while we were on holidays so I decided to get the urn out and get the strike water going while I set up the rest of the gear.
So I stuck the hose in the urn to fill while I went to get the water salts. Came back and started to put the salts in- hang on whats that? My 2 STC1000s that I use to measure the mash and water temps.
Luckily I pilfered the one from the brew fridge to get the brew underway. I didnt even bother looking at them- straight to the bin.

 

[malt junkie]

Measured 1/2 teaspoon Magnesium sulfate into the brew and about 200g onto the shed floor :huh:

It didn't get better I hadn't tightened the plumbing after a full strip down so all my union joints leaked all over the floor right next to 4800w of electrical, a qick tighten up and all was good though. I then had controller issues cause I'd pulled it down for some maintenance and a cooling fan so I would stop melting SSRs. I got brew day underway but it got too hot to do the boil so I'm waiting till tonight to finish off this 60L batch and christen the conical. 5 beers later and maybe a few more to come what could go wrong!!!

 

[Snow]

Here's a link to my worst stuff up h34r:
http://aussiehomebrewer.com/topic/5517-a-tragedy/?p=59480