Have a go at simple AG

[clib]

Ha! That's your first brew for you. Nothing to worry about. Relax, don't worry, have a home brew. Oh, you don't have any yet.

70 minutes and 60 minutes will make no noticeable difference.
It's ok to top up the boil. You could sparge again with that water.
Hops do soak up beer. You can too up though, cos you are over gravity.
Your efficiency is obviously higher than Greg predicted. Books can be very conservative with efficiency. That's a ridiculous difference though. Hydrometer readings can be dodgy. Don't worry, it's beer, and you're over.
Nice work.

 

[NoArt]

Ha! That's the first time I've ever been too efficient!
I'm looking forward to drinking it! And I'm slowly calming down!
Is there a way of working out efficiency? I think Brewfather gives biab (no sparge) at 67% maybe I squeezed too hard!
Is it worth bunging in another litre of tap water now? Or should I just walk away?!

 

[clib]

Ha! That's the first time I've ever been too efficient!
I'm looking forward to drinking it! And I'm slowly calming down!
Is there a way of working out efficiency? I think Brewfather gives biab (no sparge) at 67% maybe I squeezed too hard!
Is it worth bunging in another litre of tap water now? Or should I just walk away?!

I put my recipes in a recipe calculator and I get efficiency from that.
You can add tap water. Or leave it as it is. Your call.

 

[matt76]

Next thing will be some form of wort chiller 'cos this sink thing is taking an age!
Cheers

Make a wort chiller - it's relatively cheap, it's easy, it doesn't take long and it's very effective
https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/holy-heat-transfer-batman-its-a-wort-chiller.79604/
And well done you for doing your first AG brew. I started 2.5 years ago exactly the same as you following @clib 's guide and haven't looked back since

I've learned a lot on the way, and still lots more to learn, but I try very hard not to forget how daunting it is at first.

Best advice I can give is to brew again. And again and again and again. After the first few brews you'll find your feet and get the hang of what you're doing, and get a feel for how your set up behaves - in particular the efficiency you get from your system which makes it easier to adapt recipes and hit your target OG (if you care about numbers, which isn't essential!).

 

[clib]

I still don't have a chiller shock horror! I cool in the sink for a bit (you can get to around 40C pretty quickly and effortlessly) then transfer to FV and leave it in the coldest place. Pitch the yeast when it gets to pitching temp.

 

[Nottsbeer]

Hi, I stumbled across this thread in March and I've been planning to do an AG brew since. Had a kitchen to fit and kit to get sorted first tho! Think I'm nearly ready to go. Bought Marris Otter and crystal malt yesterday with Golding's hops and Cascade. I've been playing with the Brewfather app and have come up with the following recipe for a 10L brew:
1.75kg MO
150g crystal malt
30g Golding's @ 60 mins
5g cascade @ 10 mins.
OG is 1041. FG is 1009.

It seems to be good in the app. Any feedback on this would be greatly appreciated. I'm planning to do this later this week or next week. My yeast is Mango Jack's M44.

Thanks Clibit and everyone on this thread for the inspiration to try an AG brew

 

[clib]

Hi, I stumbled across this thread in March and I've been planning to do an AG brew since. Had a kitchen to fit and kit to get sorted first tho! Think I'm nearly ready to go. Bought Marris Otter and crystal malt yesterday with Golding's hops and Cascade. I've been playing with the Brewfather app and have come up with the following recipe for a 10L brew:
1.75kg MO
150g crystal malt
30g Golding's @ 60 mins
5g cascade @ 10 mins.
OG is 1041. FG is 1009.

It seems to be good in the app. Any feedback on this would be greatly appreciated. I'm planning to do this later this week or next week. My yeast is Mango Jack's M44.

Thanks Clibit and everyone on this thread for the inspiration to try an AG brew

Hi Notts. I'd increase the amount of Cascade and add them at the end of the boil, personally. Let them steep after the boil. Maybe 20/30g.

 

[Nottsbeer]

Hi Notts. I'd increase the amount of Cascade and add them at the end of the boil, personally. Let them steep after the boil. Maybe 20/30g.

Hi Clibit, thanks for your feedback. I'll give that a go. Looks like being next week as have my kids on halfterm this week, plus I need to get my brew fridge set-up. Will let you know how it goes John

 

[doccy]

This is a brilliant thread - I've been making the 10 Litre all grain batches and after a wobbly start I’ve been having great results

I was wondering if I wanted to scale up what goes into the fermenter to 20 litres but didn’t have the equipment could I add a kilo or so of dry malt pre boil so I can hit the correct ABV when I add water in the fermenter

But I'm confused by how it would change the hop schedule. Is it as simple as twice the volume of wort in the fermenter then twice the amount of hops used if aiming for 20 litres instead of 10 when following the recipe?

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

This is a brilliant thread - I've been making the 10 Litre all grain batches and after a wobbly start I’ve been having great results

Yay - well done you and as you say, the results are worth every bit of the effort.

I was wondering if I wanted to scale up what goes into the fermenter to 20 litres but didn’t have the equipment could I add a kilo or so of dry malt pre boil so I can hit the correct ABV when I add water in the fermenter

No, I wouldn't recommend that. If you really don't have the equipment, then I'd suggest to do two batches into the same FV - it'll be easier than you might imagine, because you won't need to wash everything up in between :-)

But I'm confused by how it would change the hop schedule. Is it as simple as twice the volume of wort in the fermenter then twice the amount of hops used if aiming for 20 litres instead of 10 when following the recipe?

Yep - just scale everything in the recipe by the same factor :-)

 

[doccy]

that's brilliant - two batches never crossed my mind!

 

[Pavalijo]

Well here’s my first all grain attempt.
I made mistakes (as seen in my brew day HERE ) but the end result is so good that I don’t think I will brew from a kit again.
The 3 friends who have tried it have enjoyed some of my kit beers but really loved this one.
Thanks again Clib, this is my Clibit Citra Pale Ale:

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Well here’s my first all grain attempt.
I made mistakes (as seen in my brew day HERE ) but the end result is so good that I don’t think I will brew from a kit again.
The 3 friends who have tried it have enjoyed some of my kit beers but really loved this one.
Thanks again Clib, this is my Clibit Citra Pale Ale:
View attachment 48560

Looks fantattic! No going back now

 

[Nottsbeer]

Hi Notts. I'd increase the amount of Cascade and add them at the end of the boil, personally. Let them steep after the boil. Maybe 20/30g.

I finally made my beer last-night. As per most first-timers on here things went very well, with a few hiccups to keep life interesting! My final recipe was (for a 10L batch):
1.68kg MO
144g Crystal malt
25g Goldings @ 60mins
Proflac @ 15mins
20g Cascade hops @ 0 mins - left for 20mins to stew.

O.G target was 1.041 F.G. is 1.010.

My pre-boil gravity was 1.034 (temp adjusted). The calculated gravity was 1.031 was I was very happy with my mash and sparge.

I had a boiler issue mid boil - my home-made power regulator packed up (need to investigate why) so I couldn't maintain a rolling boil, the last 30 mins ended up being a vigorous boil. Naturally this ended up with more boil-off so I finished with around 9L of wort. As it was very late I left the liquid to cool overnight. Gravity was around 1.044 this morning so i topped up to 10L (1.041) and added just over a half pack of M44 yeast.

The final liquid tasted great, can't wait to get this bottled and drunk!!

Am really happy I found this thread as I don't think i'd have tried this. Can't believe how easy it was....already planning my next brew!

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

I finally made my beer last-night. As per most first-timers on here things went very well, with a few hiccups to keep life interesting! My final recipe was (for a 10L batch):

Bravo - feels great to done it 'from scratch' doesn't it

my home-made power regulator packed up (need to investigate why)

Feel free to message me if you want any advice on that :-)

 

[Nottsbeer]

Bravo - feels great to done it 'from scratch' doesn't it


Feel free to message me if you want any advice on that :-)

Thanks for that. I'll hopefully look at my set-up over the weekend. I had made a power regulator following the guide by foxbat. I noticed that the unit was getting hot after about 25 mins (set at 40 %). Will check the fuse and see how it looks inside. I had used a larger box than foxbat to give the unit more space, guessing a fan is needed if I make a V2. Will contact you in a few days

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Yeah it's the size of the heatsink and the airflow across it that matters; and that air has to be drawn in from and expelled to outside the box, otherwise it'll just get hotter and hotter in there.

The component that actually does the switching (a Triac, usually) drops 1.5-2 Volts across it when it's switched on. That means it has to dissipate 1.5 - 2 Watts of heat energy for every Amp flowing through it.

A 3kW heater element is a 12.5 Amp load, so the Triac needs to dissipate about 20 Watts of heat energy (or, say, 8 Watts at 40%) - that's quite a bit of heat.

 

[cushyno]

I similarly built a voltage controller into my power box, as inspired by @foxbat and @AdeDunn. At time of build I incorporated a 12v adapter in the box to power a solar pump but also added a switchable 12v 80mm pc fan. I'm so pleased I added the fan to add airflow over the heat sink, it really does pump out the heat.

 

[Nottsbeer]

I similarly built a voltage controller into my power box, as inspired by @foxbat and @AdeDunn. At time of build I incorporated a 12v adapter in the box to power a solar pump but also added a switchable 12v 80mm pc fan. I'm so pleased I added the fan to add airflow over the heat sink, it really does pump out the heat.

After investigation I found that the fuse had blown in the plug...the kettle type cable used had a 5A and not a 13A fitted (should have checked when putting the kit together!). As my boiler is quite old I'm looking into maybe upgrading my kit so dispensing with the voltage controller. Out of interest, are you using a similar regulator to the one used by foxbat (i.e. from China), or did you find an alternative one?

 

[cushyno]

After investigation I found that the fuse had blown in the plug...the kettle type cable used had a 5A and not a 13A fitted (should have checked when putting the kit together!). As my boiler is quite old I'm looking into maybe upgrading my kit so dispensing with the voltage controller. Out of interest, are you using a similar regulator to the one used by foxbat (i.e. from China), or did you find an alternative one?

Yes I used the same one as foxbat. Same digital readout with a 40A SSR if I recall correctly, just to ensure a fair degree of tolerance in manufacturing quality.