AG#0 Testing Beer 'Alpha' (pictures!)

[Darcey]

Hello All! Well I decided in the middle of last week to brew this weekend so dispite my equipment not being ready I spent most of Saturday all of this morning getting it ready! Finally I was brewing again at home! wooow! It has been about 10 months since I last brewed. I had my stuff all stolen one afternoon but I am back!

This beer was designed to use up all the old grains I had in stock and there was very little planning otherwise. Something dark brown and 6-7%abv. I also used up some year old Motueka, Cascade & Centennial.

The other purpose was to acutaly test out the kit with out worrying too much about what beer I was making. I was more interested in getting it all to work than the finer points of the beer being made.

3kg LCMO
3kg Golden Promise
200g Carapils
100g High Colour Crystal 800
75g Black
75g Flaked Barley

Motueka 7% 60m -25g
Cascade 5% 60m -25g
Centennial 12.5 60m - 25g
Cascade 1m - 50g
Centennial 1m 50g

Aimed for 23l but I got 18l in the end. I think I need to recalibrate my sight glasses! I did have to stop sparging as it hit 1.009 so I think the grain has had its day!

OG 1.071
est FG 1.011-1.015 ~8-8.2%



Lots of late hoping on a darker beer but why not! It needs it I think. I am going to dry hop some something depending on what comes thru on the beer. I have some Bramling X if its stouty or Goldings or Cascade if its more of a porter.

Pitched with fresh brewery yeast bubbles after 45ms woow! I'll ferment at 24c then crash cool and keg most likely.

Pic fest!

D

Kit set up! Huge mess in the cellar as I was building as I was getting up to strike temperature.!

I have never underlet before but it worked a charm!

Spinning sparger (scavenged from a glass washer). I think I'll upgrade to something else but this will spin on a really low flow rate!

Underback in action! I dont know why I have not used one before on HB kits?!

First wort hops!

Copper up!

I have never used a plate chiller before! Brilliant! 20l of wort to 18.5c in 5 mins!

Resulting wort!

I am back!

Woow! :party: :party: :party: :party: :party:

D

 

[joe1002]

Glad to hear it D, well done :

Looks a great setup, make sure the scumbags don't get anywhere near this lot :thumb:

 

[Darcey]

Its all clean and back in the cellar brewery! Happy days! I think I over pitched the yeast its got a 5" krausen!

D

 

[pittsy]

looks really good set up Darcey , glad it's working now for you after all your troubles

 

[BarnsleyBrewer]

Great to see your brewing again... :thumb:

BB

 

[PD]

Nice ending to an upsetting story.

Welcome back to brewing BEER.

 

[Good Ed]

Welcome back Darcey, nice going :thumb:

 

[jonnymorris]

I have never used a plate chiller before! Brilliant! 20l of wort to 18.5c in 5 mins!

:shock:

 

[brewtim]

Nice one, do you know what rating the chiller is? Also have you got a solar pump connected directly to the copper ball valve, bloody good idea that :thumb: that would reduce the amount of tubing required.

 

[Darcey]

I'll have to look it up. I had the coolant water on max and the beer moving quite slowly with restriction on the outlet. I had to speed it up at the end to get to 24c pitching.

Also have you got a solar pump connected directly to the copper ball valve, bloody good idea that :thumb: that would reduce the amount of tubing required.

Yeah I decided that It would save tubing which I am low on and saved using any angled pipe fittings. I think I might do this with the HLT as well. Just be careful when walking past it!

 

[Darcey]

Well the beer has been chugging away nicely at 22c since Sunday. Bubbles appear to have slowed to 2 a min so I took a gravity and its moved 40 points which is pretty good but with 15 to go. If its not moved tonight I think I'll 3rd hop it with some Goldings T90's and give it a rouse and try and get it going again.

Its already tasting great!

D

 

[Darcey]

A good rouse and its dropped to 1.028 which is pretty good. I expect it to be down by Monday so dry hop with something with a rouse on Saturday then slowly cool down to 12c for 3 days before transferring to secondary mid next week.

As its only on 17l I may bottle this one rather than keg as I am using one use kegs but I am not sure yet!

D

 

[steve963]

glad your enjoying your cellar setup, almost same as mine.
Nearly passed out down there today though due to the steam at head height :shock:

went for a Citra SMASH

 

[steve963]

glad your enjoying your cellar setup, almost same as mine.
Nearly passed out down there today though due to the steam at head height :shock:

went for a Citra SMASH

HEY, what temp does your cellar reach, mines at 16 now, goes up to 20 on a brew day, mid summer reaches about 19

 

[Darcey]

Well I have taken another gravity and its down to 1.018 so 3-4 points of target FG so I have dry hopped and roused again dropping the temperature to 17c to give it a bit of a diacetyl rest for 2 days. It cant get much diacetyl on the flavour but I know this yeast can pick it up easy enough.

I'll prob transfer to a secondary after its on or near its FG and batch prime and bottle later in the week after 24 hours at 5c to drop some of the yeast out. The krausen fell in so its very yeasty at the moment so it needs it IMO.

HEY, what temp does your cellar reach, mines at 16 now, goes up to 20 on a brew day, mid summer reaches about 19

I had the fridge controller running in the background and the air temperature was 21c by the end of the day! Even with the extractor fan on full tilt! I think insulating the HLT and the copper may help keep the temp down abit in the cellar.


I should have some beer in 2 weeks time to drink! Woohoo! Next Sunday planning a LCMO 100% split with Brewers Gold and Admiral or Target.

D

 

[Darcey]

Well I dry hopped 7 days ago and left it be to get down afew points. It has moved 4 points in 5 days so nice and easy at 15c. Gave it a rouse and its back slowly moving. Check on Sunday then chill for 48 hours to drop some yeast out and bottle.

It already tastes great from the FV. Looking forward to trying it after a few weeks in bottle.

Question is what do a brew next weekend?

D

 

[Darcey]

Anyway to update.

I bottled this and remembered why I switched to kegs. Left it at 25c for a week then in the cellar 10-15c for 3 weeks. Truely lovely beer. Perhaps a little dry, but sertianly not as sweet as the FG would suggest. Lovely balance of malty, caramel, liquorice with a zesty orange, citrus nose and flavour finished with a lasting dry bitterness.

Lovely stuff. Seeing as this was a test for the kit I am pretty happy with it and would prob like to brew it again perhaps reducing the black malt to get a deep red rather than a deep ruby.

I am back! :drink: :thumb: