First brew with Brewzilla G4

Twostage · Apr 10, 2024

Cheyne_brewer said:
Just adding my two penn’orth as I did my first Gen 4 brew on Monday. The mash control with PID and 100% heat was near perfect for a first effort. For the boil I just set it to 101C which resulted in very little cycling then dialled back to 100.1 which kept a rolling boil.

Right. 101 to get it there and then 100.1 so it controls it around the boil athumb..

.

For the boil I turn PID off and then In my profile I had one stage that had a target of 100 and told me to add the first hops and then the next stage the target is 110 (which it will never get to) and manually dial back the heater to 45%.

One thing to think about (with long boils anyway) is that as the wort gets more sugary the boiling point gets higher.

jambop · Apr 10, 2024

Just a quick update on my experiences with the Bz G4 35L. I have done 4 x 25L to fermenter brews now. I am getting a good mashing Eff average 84 % and really like the very small wort loss when transferring to the fermenter I am only losing 250 ml. Wort is very clear too!
I normally make 25L batches which usually means a preboil volume of about 32L or so. I thought that was to near to the brim for a comfortable vigorous boil so I bought a boiler extender. Long story short I reccomend it for those who like to get a full 25L of beer from the fermenter into the keg/bottle . It can also extend the possible beer volume to well over 30L . Of course if you make less you don't need one.
On the recirculation and temperature stabilty I use the RAPT BT and PID off but usethe following settings Hysterisis set at 0.3, allowed temp diff of 1C and power set at 25% 600W for mashing . For a 66C mash this resulted in a cycle of 65.6C up to 66.7C and back to 65.6C every 4mins 30 seconds which I thought acceptable. For bringing to a boil the allowed difference was set to 10 C and full power. After 30 mins at full power I back off to 80% which still gave a good boil, I boil for 90 mins. I am really surprised I am not finding too much to moan about

Twostage · Apr 11, 2024

jambop said:
Just a quick update on my experiences with the Bz G4 35L. I have done 4 x 25L to fermenter brews now. I am getting a good mashing Eff average 84 % and really like the very small wort loss when transferring to the fermenter I am only losing 250 ml. Wort is very clear too!
I normally make 25L batches which usually means a preboil volume of about 32L or so. I thought that was to near to the brim for a comfortable vigorous boil so I bought a boiler extender. Long story short I reccomend it for those who like to get a full 25L of beer from the fermenter into the keg/bottle . It can also extend the possible beer volume to well over 30L . Of course if you make less you don't need one.
On the recirculation and temperature stabilty I use the RAPT BT and PID off but usethe following settings Hysterisis set at 0.3, allowed temp diff of 1C and power set at 25% 600W for mashing . For a 66C mash this resulted in a cycle of 65.6C up to 66.7C and back to 65.6C every 4mins 30 seconds which I thought acceptable. For bringing to a boil the allowed difference was set to 10 C and full power. After 30 mins at full power I back off to 80% which still gave a good boil, I boil for 90 mins. I am really surprised I am not finding too much to moan about

What is your boil-off like. Mine seems to be losing a very small amount, quite a bit less than the default of 4 litres per hour.

tondy79 · Apr 11, 2024

I have mine set to 2.5l/hour

jambop · Apr 11, 2024

Twostage said:
What is your boil-off like. Mine seems to be losing a very small amount, quite a bit less than the default of 4 litres per hour.

I am at slight altitude so my boil occurs at 99C but I don't think that makes a huge difference. However I have converted an old store room into a small brewrey and there is a lot of timber in the structure so to keep things dry I use a fan to waft the steam through a small window that is handy. I think this does make a difference and find I have about 4L per hour loss. On top of that for the first 45 mins I boil vigorously before backing off to 80% power. So in answer to your question

I am at their rate 4L/hr.

Twostage · Apr 11, 2024

jambop said:
I am at slight altitude so my boil occurs at 99C but I don't think that makes a huge difference. However I have converted an old store room into a small brewrey and there is a lot of timber in the structure so to keep things dry I use a fan to waft the steam through a small window that is handy. I think this does make a difference and find I have about 4L per hour loss. On top of that for the first 45 mins I boil vigorously before backing off to 80% power. So in answer to your question I am at their rate 4L/hr.

I use a fan too. I keep considering installing an extractor hood as the BZ is next to an outside wall. Next project maybe ?

RoomWithABrew · Apr 11, 2024

Twostage said:
I use a fan too. I keep considering installing an extractor hood as the BZ is next to an outside wall. Next project maybe ?

Get a condenser or make one, quieter, more effective, save boil energy and reduce wort boil off.

Twostage · Apr 12, 2024

RoomWithABrew said:
Get a condenser or make one, quieter, more effective, save boil energy and reduce wort boil off.

Now there's a thought.

foxy · Apr 12, 2024

Twostage said:
Now there's a thought.

Before you let the thoughts get too far the boil off rate should stay the same with a condenser as it was without one.
https://www.microbrewerysystem.com/...s_Venting_Steam_into_the_Atmosphere_1898.html
Pro Brewer has some good discussions on it too.

Twostage · Apr 12, 2024

foxy said:
Before you let the thoughts get too far the boil off rate should stay the same with a condenser as it was without one.
https://www.microbrewerysystem.com/...s_Venting_Steam_into_the_Atmosphere_1898.html
Pro Brewer has some good discussions on it too.

Yes, it was the control of the vapour rather than reduction in boil off I was thinking about. If anything I find the boil off quite low (compared to the BZ default in Brewfather). I have to leave the door open and position a fan so it blows the steam out otherwise the brewshed becomes a sauna and the water condenses on the roof above the boiler and drips down. The up side of this arrangement is the welcoming aromas when I return to the brewshed for the hop additions.

I'll check how much they cost as this will have a bearing

jsmid · Apr 24, 2024

So I've done 3 brews now on my 35L Gen 4 240v system and it's been a mix of results so far. The first batch was default settings with PID and the BT Thermometer turned on, during the mash it seemed to get stuck but this was a kit heffeweizen and my suspicion is that it was milled a bit too fine and there were no rice hulls and I possibly put the top plate on too quick.

During the second batch my OG was way off because I boiled of much less water than the Brewfather indicates and I didn't lose anywhere near as much due to the chiller/trub. I think I only boiled off about 2.5L instead of the 4.5L for a 60 minute boil. I ended up with about 13L in the fermenter on what was supposed to be a 10L batch.

So before brewing the next batch I did a test to see how much water I would boil off in an hour time and using the L increments in the BZ itself. I put in 15L of water according to my measuring bucket(and weight), which the BZ indicated it was 15.5L, I then brought the water up to a boil and set a timer for 60 minutes, at which point I turned the heating element off and put the chiller in to cool it back down to get my final measurements. In the BZ I had about 13L of water left, after transferring back to my measuring bucket I had about 12.5L left (also verified weight.) So it looks like my L increments are off by .5L.

I updated my brewfather profile before the next batch but again I had more water left than I was counting on. Updating the measurements on my batch during the brew it seems to indicate I only boiled off 2.1L so I still ended up with 15.3L on a 15L batch. Also my OG was 1.042 instead of 1.046, It was a recipe for a blond using about 400G of candy syrup and I'm wondering if maybe that wasn't all absorbed and maybe burned onto the bottom a bit, I only noticed some white marks baked onto the bottom but not really anything burnt.

Twostage · Apr 24, 2024

jsmid said:
So I've done 3 brews now on my 35L Gen 4 240v system and it's been a mix of results so far. The first batch was default settings with PID and the BT Thermometer turned on, during the mash it seemed to get stuck but this was a kit heffeweizen and my suspicion is that it was milled a bit too fine and there were no rice hulls and I possibly put the top plate on too quick.

During the second batch my OG was way off because I boiled of much less water than the Brewfather indicates and I didn't lose anywhere near as much due to the chiller/trub. I think I only boiled off about 2.5L instead of the 4.5L for a 60 minute boil. I ended up with about 13L in the fermenter on what was supposed to be a 10L batch.

So before brewing the next batch I did a test to see how much water I would boil off in an hour time and using the L increments in the BZ itself. I put in 15L of water according to my measuring bucket(and weight), which the BZ indicated it was 15.5L, I then brought the water up to a boil and set a timer for 60 minutes, at which point I turned the heating element off and put the chiller in to cool it back down to get my final measurements. In the BZ I had about 13L of water left, after transferring back to my measuring bucket I had about 12.5L left (also verified weight.) So it looks like my L increments are off by .5L.

I updated my brewfather profile before the next batch but again I had more water left than I was counting on. Updating the measurements on my batch during the brew it seems to indicate I only boiled off 2.1L so I still ended up with 15.3L on a 15L batch. Also my OG was 1.042 instead of 1.046, It was a recipe for a blond using about 400G of candy syrup and I'm wondering if maybe that wasn't all absorbed and maybe burned onto the bottom a bit, I only noticed some white marks baked onto the bottom but not really anything burnt.

I reckon my boil off is around 2 - 2.5 litres per hour too. So, like you, I’ve adjusted brew father.

I think I remember someone saying something about brewfather assuming that DME and sugar are added to the grain bill and used in the absorption calculation, could be mid-remembering though.

I never add sugar to the boil these days due to getting scorches when I used the Burco. I stick it in the fermenter. I know this will impact things like hop utilisation. You can still take a gravity reading from your wort as it goes into the fermenter and add the sugar on.

(You could always construct the recipe without the sugar to fix both the grain absorption and the hop utilisation calculations. )

Gax · Sep 4, 2024

I've done two brews now in my gen 4 and I'm really enjoying the experience. I've made a couple mash profiles and messed with the pid a bit using David heaths advice in one of his videos and not had any problems really, though I got the Bluetooth thermometer with mine and that seems to help a lot keeping the brewzilla in check.
I'm really enjoying it. :)

6Trails · Sep 4, 2024

I can never work out my boil off because I can never see the post boil volume, but I always end up with a higher OG than the preboil gravity suggests in brewfather. Some day I need to measure how much volume my chiller adds.

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