Rauchbier aka Smokey-Dokey 25th & 26th November 08

[BrewStew]

I'm brewing on my kilderkin brewery :party:

had to finish building it (ie wiring plugs, sorting hoses) etc and test it on the fly while the liquor was warming up.

i've had a bit of a mare with pumps and john guest fittings but i'm sorted. the mash is on, but 1.5'c lower than i wanted.. so it's 66.5'c and started at 7:15pm

recirculated the liquor around the mash tun for about 15 mins to even out the temperature, cos i just couldn't get my spoon deep enough without burning my hands!

had issues with dough balls too.

oh and i ran too much liquor in the tun and had to run off about 15 litres into a fermenter... i'll recirulate it through if i can be bothered, but to be honest it had only touched the grain for about 10 mins so might not be worth risking lowering the mash temp for the sake of some lightly malted liquor.

ugh!

but it's so much fun

my grain bill is as follows:

16kg of Maris Otter
3.5kg of Rauch Malt
0.5kg of Black Malt

will decide on hops some time tomorrow

i'm worn out already! and i aint even halfway through! haha

 

[MEB]

What's a kilderkiln brewery? Or is your spelling just bad?

 

[BrewStew]

kilderkin is 2 firkins around 80 Litres

 

[Kingfisher]

You having a two's up with Wez :wha:

 

[BrewStew]

huh?

 

[Kingfisher]

Co-incidental half brewing session

 

[BrewStew]

ah gotcha

well all done... i literally *just* finished cleaning up... and i'm knackered!

the runnings took friggin AGES to clear. i was recirculating it for a good 30 mins before it was collectable. so it ended up as a 2 hour mash

collected 105 litres and the runnings were still 1.014 when i figured i may aswell stop as i shouldn't need anymore. i guessed a 75% efficiency, so its good news that i'm above that.

boil will be tomorrow night :party:


I just realised... tomorrow night i'll have six 5gal fermenters on the go in the bedroom! :shock:

 

[Wez]

Just noticed you mashed 20KG :shock:

 

[BrewStew]

yep :twisted:

 

[Wez]

Cool

Whats the plan then - start the boil at around 85L and keep topping up? What boil period are you going for?

How are you going to fill 6 FV's :wha:

I wanna fill 6 FV's :grin:

 

[A T]

Cool

Whats the plan then - start the boil at around 85L and keep topping up? What boil period are you going for?

How are you going to fill 6 FV's :wha:

I wanna fill 6 FV's :grin:

Stella :rofl:

 

[Wez]

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

 

[BrewStew]

i've already got two full... one with sake... one with TC. 4 will be from this brew.

yep.. the plan is to boil for 60-90 mins depending on my boil off rate. if i find it's dropping like a stone i'll stop at 60... if it's not boiling off fast enough then 90 but i've gotta look at my IBU's for both to see how it'll get affected.

i'll keep topping it up with the weak wort that i collected in the 4th fermenter... the 75L sat in the boiler waiting for tomorrow night consists of the first 3 fermenters full... ie the stronger wort. didn't take a reading but will do tomorrow.

i'm basically gunna wing it and go with my gut

 

[BrewStew]

oh and hopefully it'll come out slightly strong, and i can let each fermenter down by 3L each, to reach the magic 20 gallon mark

 

[Wez]

Gotcha - thought you were aiming for 6x 5G FV's from one brew :lol:

Good luck with the brewlength mate :thumb: , i've settled for 60L max now using the same size boiler to save having to top up after the boil or worrying about hop utilisation.

 

[BrewStew]

worrying about hop utilisation.

why worry?

remember earlier this year, i didn't realise i wasn't temperature correcting for my fly sparge? well every time i ended up with really strong wort, and EVERY time i watered it down to my target volume, each time always hitting my target gravity too... all those times, i never noticed an issue with bitterness.


i say give it a bash mate... Wing it!

 

[BrewStew]

i've got some pics of last night... but my camera phone is utter pants in bad light... i must get a 100W bulb for the garage, or add more light fittings cos it's not the best for seeing things like thermometers and hydrometers.

anyway, here we go:

the set up:

the set up after struggling with john guest leaks:

the mash:

the recirc through my sparge device:

the foam overflowing from recircing unattended for too long :lol: :

the sparge:

the runnings:

they were crystal clear after 30 mins of recricing after the 90 min mash. next time i'll begin recircing 30 mins toward the end of the mash as i only lost half a degree from the loss in temperature through the pump and pipes.

 

[MEB]

Looks like you had a blast BS. That washing machine is taking up valuable brewing space though-sling it out. :lol:

 

[BrewStew]

:lol: been thinking about doing that for a while... i might continue to think about it a few months more :lol:

all done... except i still need to wash the boiler out, but my back is aching so gunna take a ***/beer break for a bit.

i got 85L of 1.050 in the fermenters with no watering down at all... which comes out at a measly 71% efficiency. i reckon i didn't do a good enough job of doughing in. the time it to took recirculate clear, could have possibly meant a number of dough balls after further contemplation.

still... 4.8% ish aint bad :thumb:

pictures will follow shortly as soon as my phone has done uploading them straight to photobucket

my bedroom looks awesome with 6 fermenters bubbling away

 

[BrewStew]

here's the pics

Hops and irish moss weighed

final touches to the new upgraded chiller:

Now hooked up to the hose:

this is how steamy my garage got as the boil started:

you can just make out how close i was to the brim at the start of the boil:

here's how steamy my garage got when i took the lid off:

and here's how close to the brim i was when the chiller went in:

collecting at full speed :shock:

85 litres collected:

and into their new home for the next week