hey lads I lost my AG virginity last night

[stigman]

Was up till 2am mashing away lol
Will right up how it went when I get a min!

 

[cheapbrew]

Congratulations on your first AG :thumb:

what did you brew?

 

[Covrich]

Congrats, yeah what did you brew you will have probably leanrt so much from that one brew.. first thing being probably plan more time better :lol:

 

[JapanBrew]

Congrats!!!! Away you go!!!

 

[Sonnal]

Congratulations! There's no turning back now. :thumb:

 

[GlentoranMark]

Easy peasy but as you maybe realised, it takes 4- 5 hours. You'll appreciate it in 6 weeks time :drink:

 

[MarkMayf]

My extract brewing takes 4 1/2 hours! I'd be at it all day if I go to AG!

 

[Cwrw666]

I think you're still technically an AG virgin til you drink your first bottle...:

 

[jayjt29]

Looking forward to the write up :)
Cheers
Jay

 

[Covrich]

My extract brewing takes 4 1/2 hours! I'd be at it all day if I go to AG!

It would probably add an hour on :thumb:

 

[Rocksaga]

Stigman, your now on a one way road with no way to turn back. :thumb:

I have 2 AG's bottled but still not tasted them yet. Gonna be a couple of weeks before the first has conditioned, but I've got some kit beer that I'm able to drink in the meantime which is helping with the waiting.

 

[MarkMayf]

It would probably add an hour on :thumb:

So little? Interesting. I'm only a mash tun short of going AG, so once I have a few more brews nailed I can see me giving it a go. Heat up is the longest part for me now.

 

[Covrich]

So little? Interesting. I'm only a mash tun short of going AG, so once I have a few more brews nailed I can see me giving it a go. Heat up is the longest part for me now.

Obviously it all depends on your setup. 4 half hours seems on the long side to me for an extract but if say you steep grains it is mostly an upgrade on that part.. Heating up and cooling down is pretty consistent, the difference may be that with AG you will heat up larger volumes of water but you may heat teh total volume now anyway.. What do you use to heat up now and what batch size do you look for?

With the right equipment which doesn't have to be elaborate or break the bank doing 23L AG brews in 5 hours (give or take half an hour) is pretty reasonable

 

[GlentoranMark]

So little? Interesting. I'm only a mash tun short of going AG, so once I have a few more brews nailed I can see me giving it a go. Heat up is the longest part for me now.

Mash in your boiler (or pot) and do BIAB. Just wrap towels around it and it will hold the temperatures fine.

 

[MarkMayf]

Obviously it all depends on your setup. 4 half hours seems on the long side to me for an extract but if say you steep grains it is mostly an upgrade on that part.. Heating up and cooling down is pretty consistent, the difference may be that with AG you will heat up larger volumes of water but you may heat teh total volume now anyway.. What do you use to heat up now and what batch size do you look for?

With the right equipment which doesn't have to be elaborate or break the bank doing 23L AG brews in 5 hours (give or take half an hour) is pretty reasonable

I'm doing 23 litres in one go on the hob, so not ideal. It's slow to heat up, but maintains a good boil once up to temp. It takes around an hour to heat to 60-65 degrees then I am steeping grain. Brew in a bag seems like a nice next step to take. I'll do some reading up on that.

In total I have two hours heating and 30 minutes cooling in my 4 1/2 hour brewing time.

I need a propane burner!

 

[wfr42]

Lots of people (and me now) have the below.

http://www.thehomebrewcompany.co.uk...iler-chiller-mashing-bag-mash-kit-p-2507.html

http://www.thehomebrewcompany.co.uk/hop-strainer-p-83.html

Good luck if you make the leap.

 

[stigman]

Right the Kids are in bed and the missus is busy so I'll tell you how it went. I was using the hbc biab kit that Wfr42 gives the links for above, with the double IPA kit that I got with it, I also added the hop strainer aswell which was my only real problem during the brew, it got clogged up with hops pretty much straight away when transferring to my fv, so I had to keep teasing the wort through with my spoon so pushed through loads of trub, not sure if this will be a problem, I'm Gona drill some more holes in it and some in the elbows I think.
After putting the boiler together and filling up with water I had a little leak from the element. I emptied it and had a look what was wrong, every time I tightened it up the o ring was pushing out a little so after a lot of cursing had a lightbulb moment and smeared a bit of fairy liquid on both sides, this did the trick and I soon got my water on heating up ready for the mash.
I got 26 litres in the boiler added half a campden tab and heated it up to 70degrees.
I added my grain which dropped the temp to a surprising 62, it must have been cold Sat in my car all day, so I flicked the heat on and got it back up to 67, on with a load of towels and mashed for 75 mins stirred a few times in between. I sparged with 3 litres of 80 degree water and gave the bag a good squeeze. This left me with 27 litres pre boil.
On went the heat and got her up to a boil. Oooh! Things are getting a bit scary now, The missus came down whilst I was watching the hot break and was like what are you up to! I hope you know what your bloody doing this looks dangerous. I said yeah don't worry about it I know what I'm doin whilst secretly a bit nervous of a boil over. I added the hops as per the schedule and started to cool. whilst cooling the wort I noticed a kind of oily film appear when it got to about 50 degrees no idea what this was (any ideas) I got a little worried and tried to skim it of but couldn't so I just left it. Transferred to fv and I was short on volume. Only 21litres I took a gravity reading and got 1.070 should be 1.060 but I like a strong beer so pitched the yeast at 22 and stuck it in my brew fridge set to 20. Quick clean up and of to bed. It's nearly 3am.
24 hours later it's bubbling away nicely and smelling lovely.
Sorry no pics I was to busy trying to get everything right

 

[cheapbrew]

Sounds like it went well, Topping up to 24.5 litres of water would bring it down to 1060

 

[Covrich]

Right the Kids are in bed and the missus is busy so I'll tell you how it went.

Sounds like a dirty secret :lol:

Overall sounds like a successful brew day though and you will like I say learnt so much..

I do like the bit where you say "The missus came down whilst I was watching the hot break and was like what are you up to! I hope you know what your bloody doing this looks dangerous." :lol:

 

[stigman]

I don't mind it being stronger than it should be but will the yeast be up to it? Think it was us 05 that came with the mash kit. Is an oily film normal when cooling or has something come of wort chille?r I did give it a clean on starsan before I used it.