Hudson1984
Regular.
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2020
- Messages
- 247
- Reaction score
- 124
Brewday Number 1 - 19/12/20
Light Lager
Well, Brewday number one is done!
alot more work than expected, things too alot longer than I thought they would and I certainly need to organise the brew space more.
12:07, lad is in bed for his nap. Time to get started.
I'd prepped everything the night before so was pretty much ready to go, everything was clean and sanitised etc. Sadly my hose connector for the sink in the garage hadn't arrived so had to run a long hose. Luckily I had a working drain
After speaking with a local brewing club, I had made a batch of treated water - meaning I'd adjusted the alkalinity to around 140ppm, this should hopefully give a better brew! Our water is quite hard which apparently isn't well suited to Lager. I didn't want to do anything other than this on brew number 1, thought I had enough to learn without going mad, but adjusting this was easy enough so thought why not!
I hadn't preheated as I wanted to see the time it took to get through, 1900W on for the brewzilla with 9.3ltr liquor, 27ltr in the Digiboil, this was on the 500W element as I didn't want to overload my plugs in the garage - already been advised that they're ok for about 3000W. Upgrade required - Better power socket to allow for 2400W use on both at same time!
In fairness, the brewzilla was up to temp in twenty minutes (66 degrees) so, switched to 500W on the brewzilla and 1900W on the Digiboil.
so we're at about 12:30, mash in!
I'd preweighed so was easy enough to pour in and give it a good stir. Recirc pump on and all is hunky dory....for about 3 minutes.
Now, I'd used the fine filter plate in the grain pipe - this did me no favours!! It seemed to clog quite easily with the grain, and as such I got little more than a trickle of water filtering through, meaning the recirc pump was only really used for about 5 minutes in total, and even then it was on it's lowest setting possible. Note to self - don't use the fine plate next time!
So mash done, time to sparge. Digiboil was up to temp so I jugged over the 27 ltrs a few litres at a time... So the astute among you will observe that 27+9 is 36 ltrs, in a 35ltr Brewzilla......we'll get to that...
The sparge took about an hour, the aforementioned trickle hadn't gotten better, I resorted to stirring just to get some flow. Again, next time I won't use the fine plate.
During the sparge I upped the temp on the Brew to 80, turned off digi so was able to use both elements.
Got to 80 ish fairly quickly so turned up to the HH setting to get the boil going. This wasn't quick! So I took some extra steps to add some heat.
I was cycling around 93 degrees for about 10 minutes, Added the heater and we soon got there - and I was more comfortable too!
I got my rolling boil....well, rolling boil over that is! The total liquor was indeed too much, I'd assumed that the recipe was allowing for the grain to absorb the rest - clearly not! Anyway, I had to drain some 4 ltrs out which got things back on track.
Rolling boil achieved, first hops in notice my dribbled on jacket
Boil was 1 hr 15mins, added second batch of hops 5 mins before the end, protofloc in 15 mins before end too.
So, job done. All heaters off, time to cool. As some will have seen from previous threads I was looking for a plate chiller, thinking it would be easier - well the BZ came with an immersion so thought I'd try it first....No need to change that! took 15 mins to go from rolling boil to 20 degrees. That was the smoothest part of the job! As you can see - cleaning is going to be a joy!
I also used the whirlpool arm, I don't have anything to compare with to say it sped things up but 15 mins to chill was ideal I think.
20 degrees achieved I checked the SG
Not the clearest pic, but I confired on refracto and we're at 1.031, expected final is 1.011 so i'm looking at a sub 3% strength, so will be a nice session lager, bit weak but I guess that's down to a crap mash?
Time to add to the Fermenter. I'm using my 35ltr Fermentasaurus. Spunding valve set to 10psi. Plunger up, all clean and ready.
Again, the layout in my garage didn't allow for the tap so I transered using the pump. Didn't really take too long and got about 25 ltrs out, I lost alot during my overflow. As that was right at the start of the boil, and of course I lost more in steam. Upgrade required - I need extraction! having the door open was ok, but made the boil hard, having the door closed meant a damp garage. I think I'll get something through the wall and rearrange the garage to adapt to this new use.
and we're in! 12 degrees ferment. Yes I know the heater really wants to be horizontal, but the 1ft was out of stock, so had to go with a 2' which doesn't fit anywhere else. Upgrade point - 1' heater, horizontal below fermenter.
We're done! finished at 5pm. Lost lots of time in errors and inexperience, but hey if it turns out to be only good for the drain, I've learned alot and spend £15. I've got work to do in the brewshed to make things easier.
Additionally, it took me 2 hours to clean down! again, not enough room to put things away, no hose in the garage so rinsing with a jug.
Might just have to rip the garage out, put a hygene floor down and some commercial gear and have a full clean in place system haha!!
Come back in a couple of weeks and we'll see how this lager is getting on before conditioning.
Light Lager
Well, Brewday number one is done!
alot more work than expected, things too alot longer than I thought they would and I certainly need to organise the brew space more.
12:07, lad is in bed for his nap. Time to get started.
I'd prepped everything the night before so was pretty much ready to go, everything was clean and sanitised etc. Sadly my hose connector for the sink in the garage hadn't arrived so had to run a long hose. Luckily I had a working drain
After speaking with a local brewing club, I had made a batch of treated water - meaning I'd adjusted the alkalinity to around 140ppm, this should hopefully give a better brew! Our water is quite hard which apparently isn't well suited to Lager. I didn't want to do anything other than this on brew number 1, thought I had enough to learn without going mad, but adjusting this was easy enough so thought why not!
I hadn't preheated as I wanted to see the time it took to get through, 1900W on for the brewzilla with 9.3ltr liquor, 27ltr in the Digiboil, this was on the 500W element as I didn't want to overload my plugs in the garage - already been advised that they're ok for about 3000W. Upgrade required - Better power socket to allow for 2400W use on both at same time!
In fairness, the brewzilla was up to temp in twenty minutes (66 degrees) so, switched to 500W on the brewzilla and 1900W on the Digiboil.
so we're at about 12:30, mash in!
I'd preweighed so was easy enough to pour in and give it a good stir. Recirc pump on and all is hunky dory....for about 3 minutes.
Now, I'd used the fine filter plate in the grain pipe - this did me no favours!! It seemed to clog quite easily with the grain, and as such I got little more than a trickle of water filtering through, meaning the recirc pump was only really used for about 5 minutes in total, and even then it was on it's lowest setting possible. Note to self - don't use the fine plate next time!
So mash done, time to sparge. Digiboil was up to temp so I jugged over the 27 ltrs a few litres at a time... So the astute among you will observe that 27+9 is 36 ltrs, in a 35ltr Brewzilla......we'll get to that...
The sparge took about an hour, the aforementioned trickle hadn't gotten better, I resorted to stirring just to get some flow. Again, next time I won't use the fine plate.
During the sparge I upped the temp on the Brew to 80, turned off digi so was able to use both elements.
Got to 80 ish fairly quickly so turned up to the HH setting to get the boil going. This wasn't quick! So I took some extra steps to add some heat.
I was cycling around 93 degrees for about 10 minutes, Added the heater and we soon got there - and I was more comfortable too!
I got my rolling boil....well, rolling boil over that is! The total liquor was indeed too much, I'd assumed that the recipe was allowing for the grain to absorb the rest - clearly not! Anyway, I had to drain some 4 ltrs out which got things back on track.
Rolling boil achieved, first hops in notice my dribbled on jacket
Boil was 1 hr 15mins, added second batch of hops 5 mins before the end, protofloc in 15 mins before end too.
So, job done. All heaters off, time to cool. As some will have seen from previous threads I was looking for a plate chiller, thinking it would be easier - well the BZ came with an immersion so thought I'd try it first....No need to change that! took 15 mins to go from rolling boil to 20 degrees. That was the smoothest part of the job! As you can see - cleaning is going to be a joy!
I also used the whirlpool arm, I don't have anything to compare with to say it sped things up but 15 mins to chill was ideal I think.
20 degrees achieved I checked the SG
Not the clearest pic, but I confired on refracto and we're at 1.031, expected final is 1.011 so i'm looking at a sub 3% strength, so will be a nice session lager, bit weak but I guess that's down to a crap mash?
Time to add to the Fermenter. I'm using my 35ltr Fermentasaurus. Spunding valve set to 10psi. Plunger up, all clean and ready.
Again, the layout in my garage didn't allow for the tap so I transered using the pump. Didn't really take too long and got about 25 ltrs out, I lost alot during my overflow. As that was right at the start of the boil, and of course I lost more in steam. Upgrade required - I need extraction! having the door open was ok, but made the boil hard, having the door closed meant a damp garage. I think I'll get something through the wall and rearrange the garage to adapt to this new use.
and we're in! 12 degrees ferment. Yes I know the heater really wants to be horizontal, but the 1ft was out of stock, so had to go with a 2' which doesn't fit anywhere else. Upgrade point - 1' heater, horizontal below fermenter.
We're done! finished at 5pm. Lost lots of time in errors and inexperience, but hey if it turns out to be only good for the drain, I've learned alot and spend £15. I've got work to do in the brewshed to make things easier.
Additionally, it took me 2 hours to clean down! again, not enough room to put things away, no hose in the garage so rinsing with a jug.
Might just have to rip the garage out, put a hygene floor down and some commercial gear and have a full clean in place system haha!!
Come back in a couple of weeks and we'll see how this lager is getting on before conditioning.
