Stupidest Mistake You've Ever Made

[Martybhoy]

What's the most dumb-*** mistake you've made whilst home-brewing?

My worst is when mashing my BIAB in my kettle, the temp got too low. I turned boiler on to boil to increase the temp and forgot about it. Ended up with a fully boiling kettle with the bag still in it full of grains.

I've also put an FV into my brewfridge without pitching any yeast.

 

[Poochops]

Threw a duvet over a biab on the stovetop, hadn't turned off the flame. Thank Christ it was a large pot on a low light or else that would have been the end of our kitchen and my homebrewing career :-?

 

[Gunge]

Batch sparging - see the thread titled exactly that.

 

[Simonh82]

Last night I tried testing out my new corny keg for the first time. I made two stupid mistakes. The first was assuming that for the CO2 regulator to be turned off, the valve should be screwed in till tight. When I turned on the gas, I shot about 80PSI of CO2 straight into the keg. The second mistake was thinking it would be a good idea to vent the keg in my kitchen.

It turns out a keg at 80PSI holds a lot of CO2 and after feeling decidedly dizzy, I then had to run around the house and open windows (it was freezing last night) so that myself and my family, who were all asleep in nearby rooms, didn't asphyxiate.

 

[stigman]

Left the temp Probe outside of ferm chamber cooked a yeast starter to about 45 degrees.

 

[BeerCat]

Kicked 20l of wort over the garage floor. Had a mice problem after that.

 

[Dutto]

I guess scalding my right foot whilst wearing Crocs and moving boiling hot wort.

Since this ****-up I have:

o NEVER drunk anything alcoholic on a Brew Day until the wort is cooled.

o NEVER moved the boiler until the wort is cooled.

o ALWAYS worn decent footwear.

My other ****-ups (which are both numerous and varied) pale into significance beside this one!

 

[BarnBrian]

Last night I tried testing out my new corny keg for the first time. I made two stupid mistakes. The first was assuming that for the CO2 regulator to be turned off, the valve should be screwed in till tight. When I turned on the gas, I shot about 80PSI of CO2 straight into the keg. The second mistake was thinking it would be a good idea to vent the keg in my kitchen.

It turns out a keg at 80PSI holds a lot of CO2 and after feeling decidedly dizzy, I then had to run around the house and open windows (it was freezing last night) so that myself and my family, who were all asleep in nearby rooms, didn't asphyxiate.

A Cornie at 80psi would release 105 litres of CO2 when vented so not so life threatening. Still not a great thing to do though.

 

[BarnBrian]

I guess scalding my right foot whilst wearing Crocs and moving boiling hot wort.

Since this ****-up I have:

o NEVER drunk anything alcoholic on a Brew Day until the wort is cooled.

o NEVER moved the boiler until the wort is cooled.

o ALWAYS worn decent footwear.

My other ****-ups (which are both numerous and varied) pale into significance beside this one!

I know I've mentioned it before Dutto, but are you sure you used to be an HSE officer:lol::lol::lol:

 

[GerritT]

At flameout I threw the yeast in instead of the Simcoe

 

[IainM]

Messing up volumes and overfilling the fv then going on holiday. Loads of krausen spilt out into the heated water bath. By the time I returned it was rotting and buzzing with flies. My god, the stench. Amazingly, the wine survived.

 

[Drunkula]

Not waiting for John Guest pipe connectors to arrive, forcing pipes into each other and leaving a keg to force carb while I went to watch "I'm a Celebrity". Came back and the pipes had popped apart, the entire batch was a swimming pool on the floor and I'd lost almost all of a just-filled 13kg bottle of co2. The only thing that stopped it all going was that it froze the keg coupler.

 

[Covrich]

Done lots of silly mistakes.

Like racking into bottle bucket and forgetting to turn the spigot off, forgetting to sanitise the hydrometer.

Best one I did was when starting out I used clothes pegs to help keep the bag on my 15L pot I removed it but it was close to the hob and melted onto the hob and side board .. Thankfully missus was out so I managed to scrape the burnt plastic off and bleach the brown burn stain.

Some impressive ones here like throwing a blanket on but forgetting to turn the flame off :shock:

 

[BarnBrian]

Not waiting for John Guest pipe connectors to arrive, forcing pipes into each other and leaving a keg to force carb while I went to watch "I'm a Celebrity". Came back and the pipes had popped apart, the entire batch was a swimming pool on the floor and I'd lost almost all of a just-filled 13kg bottle of co2. The only thing that stopped it all going was that it froze the keg coupler.

Forcing pipes together is a daft idea but forgivable. Watching "I'm a Celebrity" on the other hand is definitely unforgivable.:nono::nono::nono:

 

[Dutto]

I know I've mentioned it before Dutto, but are you sure you used to be an HSE officer:lol::lol::lol:

I have one leg 3cm shorter than the other and the marks left by 137 stitches that prove that I know exactly what ISN'T safe! :thumb:

One of my favourites was an accident with a Stanley Knife that slipped and sliced across the palm of my hand. The cut was so quick and clean that I had time to think "I wish I hadn't done that." before the pain arrived. :whistle:

It didn't need any stitches and "Butterfly Clips" don't count in the above calculations! :lol: :lol:

 

[F00b4r]

Mashing in my Buffalo boiler without putting the BIAB bag in first.

Mashing in my Braumeister without putting the malt pipe in first.

Forgetting to turn the pump off before removing the malt pipe on the Braumeister (a few times, I swear this part should be clearer on the screen).

Leaving spigots open.

Putting corny disconnects on the wrong bits, luckily they were on adapters on a Sankey coupler so I could take it off without a beer shower (my brew buddy did this on an actual corny, I wouldn't recommend it!)

Freezing a fruited beer in a demijohn (it looked like a serial killers fridge after it exploded out).

The list could go on.....

 

[foxbat]

Leaving spigots open.

That has to be the most common one. I've got so bored of doing that and wiping water/starsan/vwp/beer off my jeans that I've coloured in the side of the white plastic tap on my FV that shows when it's open bright red so I'd have to be totally asleep to miss it.

 

[Dutto]

That has to be the most common one. I've got so bored of doing that and wiping water/starsan/vwp/beer off my jeans that I've coloured in the side of the white plastic tap on my FV that shows when it's open bright red so I'd have to be totally asleep to miss it.

Anybody going to take bets on how long it will take to "miss it"?

Murphy's First Law is "If it can happen it will happen." and like yourself I try to make everything "***** proof" ... :thumb:

... but fail miserably!

 

[BeerCat]

I am amazed so far no one has said getting married!

 

[stevey]

I regularly leave the tap open when filling my kettle, there's always that little time lag of realizing my socks are getting wet and wondering why.
My favourite though has got to be force carbing my new cornie with the black disconnect attached as well. Luckily it wasn't facing my way, but the kitchen blinds caught the lot. :-?