The Chaos that is a Buffers Brewery brew day

[Buffers brewery]

It's a bit warm today (Saturday) but I want to get a brew done before I go on holiday and check out my minor modification to my manifold. A nice session cascade pale ale is what I'm aiming for, around 4.5% ABV.
Brewery set up providing some shade from the hot sun.

Mash produced 7 gallons of wort at around 1.034 (according to my refractometer) so rather than boiling for half an hour before first hop addition I boiled down to 6 gallons then added hops.

Second hop addition after 15 minutes with half protofloc tablet then boil stopped after another 15 minutes. Cooled down to 80C and added last hop addition and left for 30 minutes before cooling down to pitching temperature.

Used my double cooler, one in a bucket of ice water the other in the boiled wort, to get the temperature down to 22C in about 30 minutes.

Transferred 5.5 gallons of wort SG 1.046 into fermentation bucket and pitched a sachet of verdant IPA yeast.

The manifold mod worked OK. Just need to create another manifold for the kettle pump so I can reverse the connections without having to physically change them. A couple of 3-way valves might do it!?

 

[Buffers brewery]

Today is the first brew day with the new Digiboil that replaced my catering boiler that kept burning my wort (see my "Burnt bottom" thread). I decided to repurpose the catering boiler into my HLT, so all my brewing water (8 gallons of tap water) goes in there where it has a crushed campden tablet and 45mls of CRS added. I then but a couple of gallons in the empty mash tun and heat it using the HERMS circuit while the remaining water is heated in the HLT. This gets everything up to temperature before I start the mash.

The now hot water is returned to the HLT and the grain added to the mash tun.
Nothing complicated today, just a cascade pale ale, 4kg Maris otter, 400grm Carapils and 140grm crystal. 30grm cascade leaf added 20 minutes and 5 minutes then the remaining 40 grm added after flame out at 80C and left to stand for 20 minutes before chilling down to 24C.
Did a bit of water "art" as well today. Used the calculater on this site. Using 3 gallons of water for the mash, I added 0.6grm gypsum. Will I notice the difference?

Then to the wort before boiling 0.8grm of gypsum and 7grm Epsom salts.

I got very confused with the volume markings on the Digiboil! The penny dropped at the end of the boil that the "gallons" are US gallons NOT Imperial gallons.

With what appeared to be almost 8 gallons of wort I panicked, not realising that was wrong cos I had only used 7 gallons for the mash! So boiled for longer than I needed resulting in only 4.5 gallons of wort in the fermenter and.....a slightly burnt bottom

Coming up to the boil....

Recirculating for the last 15 minutes with the chiller in situ...

20 litres in the fermentation bucket and Verdant IPA yeast pitched..

The resulting burnt bottom ..

I have to say it wasn't as bad as the previous boiler. This was quite soft and light brown, cleaning off easily so I'm hoping it won't taint the resulting beer. I'll have to sort out my volumes for next time and establish the boil off rate at the lower power setting. That's my homework before the next brew day.

 

[Buffers brewery]

Over 2 months since my last brew day so when I got my brewery out of the garage there was a serious day's cleaning ahead as everything had the dreaded black mould . Everything was soaked and scrubbed with VWP solution followed by a thorough rinse. Just enough time at the end of day 1 to put 8 gallons of water in the HLT and adding one crushed campden tablet and 50ml CRS.

Day 2 was a cold start so I transferred 2 gallons of water into the mash tun and heated it to 50C using HERMS circuit to get the equipment warmed up. Heated the remaining water in the HLT to 50C at the same time. While that was doing I popped to the shop to get 1kg of porridge oats that I'd forgotten about .

NEIPA today so lots of oats. Decided to change my method slightly today and, after emptying the water from the mash tun, I put all the grist in for the b-g rest, previously I did it separately. Mixed the dry grist well before adding 4 gallons of water at 50C. Mashed in and finished at 45C. Left it for 30 minutes with a good stir halfway and no circulation.

Having completed the b-g rest started circulation through HERMS and (slowly) increased the temperature to 65C with regular stirring.

The one hour mash with stirring every 15 minutes was completed without incident - no stuck/gummy mash .

At this point made another change to my method. Rather than do another couple of 30 minute mashes I went down the straight sparge route. I'd previously modded my kit layout and plumbing so the HLT could feed the HERMS and the mash tun could feed the boiler...

The blue handled tap in the middle of the recirculation line isolates the two lines when in the OFF position and allows recirculation in the ON position.

As the HERMS coil provides a bit of resistance to flow I turned the sparge water feed on full and controlled the flow out of the mash tun with the tap into the boiler, keeping a covering of water on top of the grist.

Everything surprisingly went well and 60 minute boil resulted in 20 litres of wort, SG 1.054 in the FV.

50 GM of Amarillo and Simcoe hops were added at the end of the boil and left for 30 minutes before chilling down to 20C (that wasn't a problem today!)

A sprinkling of Verdant IPA yeast over the top before the lid with 2 of my dry hop hoppers filled with 100gm citra, 50gm galaxy and 50gm Amarillo hops was fitted.

All tucked up in the brew fridge set at 20C. I aim to drop one batch of hops after 2 days and the second batch after 5 days.

 

[Buffers brewery]

SG down to 1.009 so cold crash started today, temperature set to 3C. I'll transfer to one of my King Kegs in four days time and carbonate for two weeks using a sugar priming solution.

 

[Buffers brewery]

Cold crash complete. Closed transfer from fermentation bucket to sanitised King Kegs that's filled with gas recovered from my last empty barrel. Primed with sugar solution, I'll leave it for two weeks at 20C then condition for a week or two at 10C before I have a taste

 

[Buffers brewery]

Just upgraded my second brew fridge from just a "conditioning" fridge (fridge only) to a carbonation/conditioning fridge (fridge + heater). Consequently I've moved the barrel of NEIPA that was carbonating from the fermentation fridge to my now upgraded fridge, meaning I can get on with another brew day. Everything is set up for a brew day tomorrow

Revisiting the first recipe I brewed when my kit was very much under development and my brewing "skills" were....nonexistent .

 

[Buffers brewery]

Well that was odd! Nothing went wrong and I enjoyed a very pleasant brew day . P'raps shouldn't say that....too late!
Woke up to a beautiful morning. Bright blue sky and not too much wind. First job was to transfer around 3 gallons of treated water (or is it liquor?) from the HLT to the mash tun and then start circulating it through the HERMS set at 65C while the remaining water is heated in the HLT. In the meantime have a shower, get dressed and have a cuppa.
Once everything's up to temperature the now hot water gets pumped back to the HLT so the grain (or is it grist?) can be added to the mash tun. Three gallons of strike water run slowly into the mash tun and the grain,
4kg Maris otter pale
400g carapils
400g crystal EBC100
400g terrified wheat,
is thoroughly mashed in. The wort is circulated through the HERMS set at 69C.

You can see the temperature sensor for the HERMS in the top RH corner poking out of one of wort return pipes. Mash temperature was nicely maintained at 66.7C - 67.0C.
After an hour the wort is slowly pumped to the boiler. As the wort exits the mash tun hot water from the HLT is pumped through the HERMS to sparge/lauter the grain.

The subtle difference in this shot is the liquid is clear (hot water) and the wort level is just covering the grain. Slight tweaks to the tap on the boiler to either speed up or slow down the flow to keep the level right. At 29 litres in the boiler sparging is halted. While the wort comes to the boil the mash tun and all it's paraphernalia are cleaned and put in the sunshine to dry off.
15g of East Kent Golding's pellets are added to the wort at the beginning of the 60 minute boil.

25grm cascade pellets are added with 20 minutes to go, half a crushed protofloc tablet added with 15 minutes to go together with the immersion chiller and whirlpool paddle. A further 25grm of cascade pellets are added with 2 minutes to go.

Slowly whirlpool as the wort cools to 22C when the chiller can be removed and I have another (as it turns out, failed) attempt at whirlpooling.

Leave the wort to settle for an hour then transfer to my fermentation bucket.

While the wort is transferring I prepare the FB lid with my small dry hopper. 50grm Columbus hop pellets are loaded into the hopper

The lids closed and held in position by the magnets on the top of the lid

5 gallons of wort (SG 1.052) are successfully transferred to the FB, a sachet of liberty bell M36 dried yeast sprinkled across the top and the lid and dry hopper fitted. The FB transferred to the now empty brew fridge, set at 20C, using the infamous fermicular railway and the last bit of cleaning done.
Nothing broke or went wrong! I didn't make any mistakes or forget anything! I hope this beer is drinkable in 6 weeks time! Watch this space

 

[Buffers brewery]

DISASTER! Just poured the first glass of the NEIPA I brewed last month.

Something has gone seriously wrong here. The colour was good at the end of fermentation when I measured FG. Barrel was full of CO2 from a cylinder. Barrel pressure held at 15 psi for 2 weeks during carbonation and reduced by 0.5 psi during a week of conditioning at 10C. And this is the result
Oh well back to the drawing board. I know what the next brew will be!

 

[RoomWithABrew]

Oh dear, oxidised by the look, what about the taste?

 

[Buffers brewery]

Oh dear, oxidised by the look, what about the taste?

Agree. Smells like an NEIPA. Taste is....weird....and not what I expect based on my previous brews. Something has gone seriously wrong at the time of transferring from fermentation bucket and barrel but I don't know what . I'll be doing a repeat brew in a week's time and see if I can do it right.....or **** it up again! It's an expensive brew to pour down the drain!

 

[RoomWithABrew]

Intensely irritating, I do my NEIPA all closed, with spunding and hops lowered in on magnet. I find them very stressful with all the " risks", plus purging kegs, lines, ascorbic acid and then I get indigestion from all the hops.
They've been good but I keep asking why do I bother?

 

[Buffers brewery]

This ...

Plus this

Equals

No beer in my barrelator and three empty barrels is not a good look for a home brewer .
Thought I'd do a simple cascade pale ale in an attempt to "get back on the horse" and replenish my much depleted home brew stocks.
4kg Maris otter pale and 400gm carapils mashed at 66C for an hour.

Mash was quite "milky" to start but gradually cleared as time went on.

Hope this is not an omen!
At the end of the mash, sparged to get 29 litres in the boiler.

Boiled for 60 minutes with 8gm of fuggles at the start of the boil. Then 20gm cascade at 30 minutes then 30gm cascade at flame out.
Trying out the "no chill" approach.

Boiled wort is now sitting on the patio cooling in the night air. I'll return tomorrow morning to transfer to the fermentation bucket

 

[Buffers brewery]

Nice sunny morning on the West Sussex coast and time to transfer my cooled wort to the fermentation bucket...

I had another attempt at whirlpooling last night and seems to have been a bit more of a success ..

Got 5 gallons of wort in the FB...

and pitched a sachet of Verdant IPA yeast before tucking it up in the brew fridge set at 20C. OG came in at a respectable 1.048...

Now let's see if I can ruin this one!

 

[Buffers brewery]

Last month's Cascade pale ale has finished fermentation, FG 1.010

so after a 3 day cold crash, transferred to pressure barrel to carbonate.
Time to have another go at an NEIPA after my last disastrous attempt! Decided to reduce the grain bill to produce a lower alcohol beer, 3kg pilsner malt, 0.3kg Vienna malt, 0.3kg Carapils and 0.6kg flaked oats.
As usual with this style I started with a beta-glucan rest, 30 minutes at 40C-50C. No stirring after mash in and no circulation.

Maintained a temperature 48.2C-47C

Mash temperature 66C for an hour then lautered to get 29 litres of wort in the boiler. Boiled for an hour, no hop additions. Cooled to 80C then added 50g Simcoe and 50g Amarillo hops. Left for 30 minutes then cooled down to 40C, whirlpooled and left to cool overnight.
Transferred to fermentation bucket this morning

Loaded up my dry hoppers with 100g Galaxy and 150g Citra hops

Pitched a sachet of Verdant IPA yeast and sealed the lid on

and transferred to brew fridge set at 20C. Just a little under 5 gallons of wort OG 1.046

I'll drop the dry hops in four days time and check SG in two weeks. Watch this space!

 

[Buffers brewery]

Well, confidence is being restored. Just starting on the American Pale Ale I brewed back in February after the failed NEIPA. Very drinkable, especially on an Easter weekend in the sunshine.

 

[Buffers brewery]

Refill I think

 

[Buffers brewery]

Two weeks after my NEIPA brew day the SG was down to 1.010 so turned temperature down to 3C and left for four days. Now it's time for the tricky bit where it can all go wrong .
Barrel was cleaned yesterday using VWP, not Oxy! Good rinse followed by Starsan. For CO2 priming I fill the sanitized barrel with cold water, fresh from the tap .

Then the sanitized lid with float tube is introduced into the barrel..

the float has to be pushed down to position the lid without kinking the tube.

I then fit a "breather" tube to the beer out connector to allow water to flow up the tube and out. When the lid is tightened down I can see water creeping up the tube.

Then I connect my CO2 cylinder to the gas post and drain the expelled water into the sink.

By tilting the barrel the majority of the water is displaced. Now the fun part, transferring the beer!

 

[Buffers brewery]

First I prepare the priming solution using 140gm of white sugar dissolved in 350 mls of boiling water then allowed to cool.
I use a modified stainless steel glass with a beer post fitted through the bottom. The priming solution is poured into the glass, the transfer pipe connected and bled with the solution to remove any air

The transfer pipe is then connected to the barrel and fermentation bucket in turn to bleed the float tube in the FB and then transfer the majority of the remaining solution to the barrel .

Tha barrel gas connector is connected to the FB (red pipe) to allow gas to exit the barrel and return to the FB.
Having primed the barrel it's connected to the FB to allow the beer to transfer to the barrel.

Barrel is returned to the fermentation fridge to carbonate for two weeks and FB is cleaned and the dry hoppers

ready for next brew day.
Let's hope no disasters this time

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Blimey, those NEIPAs seem like a labour of love!

 

[Buffers brewery]

Blimey, those NEIPAs seem like a labour of love!

I might have over-complicated it a bit