First 2016 Brew - Rye PA

[spook123_uk]

I decided to get up well before the family yesterday with a view to getting a brew done by lunchtime... Didn't do too bad and was done by 13:30

It was my first attempt at a Rye PA (from BrewUK) in a 23L batch

Grain Bill (90 min mash):

4.3kg Maris Otter
1.1kg Rye Malt
500g Pilsner Malt (leftovers from the last brew to balance out my poor efficiency in the mash)
288g Crystal Malt
28g Chocolate Malt

Hop Schedule (all leaf 70 min Boil):

35g Bravo - Start of Boil
35g Chinook - End of Boil / Steep
20g Amarillo - End of Boil / Steep
20g Columbus - End of Boil / Steep

Dry hop for 1 week with:

15g Chinook
15g Amarillo
15g Columbus
40g Citra
80g Mosaic

Targets:
O.G - 1058
F.G - 1014
ABV - 5.9%

Few mistakes (as per usual :))... As this was a recipe kit, and I'm only getting 63% ish efficiency at the minute, I decided to throw in 500g of leftover Pilsner Malt to achieve the target OG... Whilst doughing in, I realised I had forgotten to measure out the Pilsner Malt and I was adding from a leftover 1.5kg of the stuff so I wound up stopping the addition at around 1kg.

I'm getting quite good at the mash now and managed a 90 min mash with 18L of water starting at 66.5 degrees and only dropping to 65 over the 90 mins. Tested Mash for ph and it was bang on 5.2ph

The next bit is where I think my efficiency drops generally (especially in past brews)... I am batch sparging at the moment until I get the hang of things as I'm worried about temp loss etc. through the sparge arm.

I recirculated around 4L until the runnings were clear and drained the tun. This gave me around 10L of Wort that had a gravity of 1.072.
Next I added 23L of 85 degree sparge water and gave it a good stir... I don't think this was hot enough as the temp probe I had in there with it wound up showing a temp of only 73 degrees for the 20 mins I left it.

Maybe I should have not worried about adding too much water and started adding from the kettle?
I think next time, I ought to be looking at 88 - 90 degree water?

Following recirculation again and then draining the tun, I managed to get 32L of Wort as I'm sure my kettle loses at least 7 litres in the boil. I was aiming for a pre boil gravity of 1.047 at 32L and wound up with 1.045 at 33L.

Boil went normally and chilled in 30 mins although I only managed to get 20L from the Kettle at the end. Given that 33L went in and I know I have 4L Loss at the bottom of the Kettle, that's 9 litres lost on a 70 min boil. I think I'll have to start looking for a bigger boil volume.

When I got the 20L out at the end, it was a lot higher gravity than I was looking for. It wound up being around 1068 so once in the FV, I topped it up with water to 25L which seems to have now given me 1056.

WLP001 yeast pitched and it's in the brew fridge sat at 19 degrees. Still waiting for it to start properly but there's the odd bubble there at the moment. Given past experience with the WLP001, I reckon it may well get lower than the anticipated 1014 FG.

Rich

 

[clibit]

Nice write up and looks a very nice recipe. I wouldn't worry too much about raising the sparge temp myself, I don't think it's critical. 4 litres seems a big kettle loss to me. You will get more consistent with efficiency and closer to your targets.

 

[spook123_uk]

Cheers Clibit,

Hardest thing is trying to figure out what my efficiency roughly is to calculate recipes to!
It's a big pot and without tipping it right up, it'll drain down to leaving around 4 litres in the bottom.
I was most surprised at the boil off amounts.. I have two 2.5kw elements in there and one running seems to be a gentle boil so I tend to have both on until it's a vigorous boil then switch one off for 5 mins or so.

 

[clibit]

Well a good vigorous boil is a good thing. Do you not put your recipes into brewing software? This would enable to check the efficiency. And make adjustments for next time.

 

[spook123_uk]

That's what I'm now doing with beer smith. This is AG no. 4 and as of brew 2 (as no 1 screwed up so much I forgot to record anything), I'm putting in the results and getting the efficiency back out. Based on the fact that my last brew hit 64%, I put that into the recipe builder for this one to see what I needed to add to the recipe kit to make it up.

I think I was way off on the boil off volume which is what I now need to address in the equipment settings to try and get that more accurate in the recipe calcs.

I'll get there (or drunk trying!)

 

[Leon103]

That loss does seem huge. Is there anyway of getting the 4l out of the bottom?

 

[cheapbrew]

thanks for the write up n pics its good for someone like me waiting for grain for their first ag to know.

 

[spook123_uk]

The dry hops... Went in 4 days ago. It's now pretty much finished. When it has, I'll crash at 1.5 degrees for 5 days.

 

[GHW]

Nice steampunk chiller by the way.

 

[spook123_uk]

It does the job nicely!! I've just checked the SG and it is currently sat at 1.012 and showing no sign of activity. I'll give it another 24 hours to see if it's moved then chill I think. It's not looking like it's going to budge past that and I'm assuming 1.012 isn't far off for the style of a Rye PA?

 

[spook123_uk]

Today's report... Day 12 of primary.. I was expecting it to have remained at 1.012 so i can get it on a cold crash... It still seems to be going. Todays reading is 1.010. I'm going to leave another 24 hours and see if it drops again as whilst there is no sign of activity at all, it's dropped by 2 points in the last couple of days.
That's showing an apparent attenuation of 81% which seems to be pretty damn good for WLP001.

Tastes mighty fine too!

Here's a couple of pics and it is already quite clear to say I've not cold crashed yet and it's just finishing primary.

 

[RZH]

Looks great mate, that's the sort of dry hopping I like - loads! Gonna give a RYE-PA a go soon, I love the flavour that rye gives. Nice one!

 

[spook123_uk]

Just seen your location.. I'm in Kiddy too