What's in Your Fermenter? 2018

[Fergy1987]

Just put down my Lightning Strike Summer Ale. Brew day went pretty good. First brew with my new brew pot and first brew in the fermentation fridge. Yeast got a bit mixed up lifting the fermenter into the fridge but not too concerned.

Now just need to wait and see if I need to dry hop with some EKG

[tja1980]

Always love brewing with new things  Hope it goes well Fergy

[Otto Von Blotto]

Just put my second brown ale into the fermenter. This one is pretty much the same recipe as the last one, but the water  profile I built from scratch with distilled water and mineral salts. OG is 1.0464, fermenting with 1469 on its 15th (i think) generation, 18°C. 25 litre batch made the brewhouse efficiency 73.6%. 

The below picture is why I much prefer having taps on my cubes. Unfortunately they don't really work well in my white cubes, but they've been retired now. These don't fit tightly the right way up, but they do almost upside down and stay there, in the white ones they'd pop out. I turn them right way up at filling time. I still use the 20L cubes without taps as they aren't as difficult to lift and pour, and I'm only doing 21L batches so the only trub that gets in is whatever is stirred up when lifting them. That extra 5L makes a lot of difference.

Using the tap and tube is obviously easier but it also results in less cube trub getting into the fermenter because it doesn't get stirred up by lifting it. Yes it was lifted up to the bench, but I did that about half an hour before filling the fermenter to let it settle out again.

@JoeB7 this is the tap setup I used when bottling except on the fermenter/bottling bucket rather than a cube.

Cheers

Kelsey

[joolbag]

How much trub do you leave behind in the cube Kelsey?  One of my cubes only holds 22.5L filled to the brim when hot.  I tend to just tip the entire cube into the fermenter, cold break and all. 

 

and I thought you stopped using taps on cubes because that one infected one blew all over the laundry floor

[Otto Von Blotto]

I stopped using them on those particular cubes because of that blow up one, but I never ruled out using them ever again if I found some cubes that they fit properly in. They fit much better into the Bunnings cubes like in that photo even though they have to sit with the outlet at about 2 o'clock, so I'm happy to use them in those.

At a guess I probably leave behind 1.5-2 litres of trub, maybe a bit less. Today I drained the cube until just the two upside down 'humps' in the bottom were still full of crud*, allowing a small amount into the FV but certainly not all of it. I'm not sure how much volume is in those 'humps'. I'm only making 21L batches with the 20L cubes anyway specifically for 19L kegs only, with the extra 2L there for hydro samples and 2-3 'tap area clearing' glasses on kegging day, so I don't need another litre and a half or whatever in the FV because it'll only end up down the drain. I figure it's better to tip it down the drain at the start rather than have it make the trub level too high in the fermenter. Same deal with the 25L cubes as I use them for 25L batches, maybe I'll get some 26L batches using the taps but that'd be about the maximum. I don't see too much harm in throwing in all the cold break, but there's no real benefit either.

*The cube wasn't completely filled on brew day and I had to squeeze it quite a bit to get the wort up to the brim. I was a bit worried about the tap popping out but it stayed put. Previously when the cube was about that full I'd probably have only got 23 litres or so into the FV due to all the trub being stirred up pouring it in, but I was able to get just under 25L into it today, with the rest made up of the yeast pitch. So it certainly leaves behind less after draining. A properly filled cube I could easily get 26L, maybe 26.5L. The reasons I don't use taps in the 20L cubes are the blow up one and the no need for the extra volume in the FV.

Cheers

Kelsey

[ben 10]

On 8/11/2018 at 9:06 PM, The Captain1525230099 said:

What do you reckon caused the colour transformation?

I think posting the wrong pic made it look lighter!

[The Captain!!]

Nice one Ben. That picture definitely helps

[ben 10]

Bottled it today with half the priming i usually use.

[Beerlust]

Well it's not in there anymore.

I bottled the Coopers DIY ROTM Coconut Porter earlier today. Sodium perc soaking yesterday, followed by the vinator Starsan flush today on each bottle. It's a good thing I only make roughly one dark beer batch a year. 26 longnecks & 7 stubbies. I don't miss bottling. 

The coconut aroma smelled nice during bottling. I primed half the batch with approx. 1 1/2 carb drops & the other half with just one carb drop. I'll open the higher primed bottles earlier & save the lower primed bottles until at least next Autumn/Winter.

Yum, yum ahead. 

Cheers,

Lusty.

[Otto Von Blotto]

The brown ale has a nice inch high krausen on it now. When I checked it a bit after 5am today it didn't appear to have anything on top so it's started sometime in that 6 hour period. I'll take my usual 3 day SG sample on Sunday and see where it's at, and likely raise the temp up to 21ish at that point as well.

[John304]

Just tested my gold rush summer ale, seems to have reached FG, will bring it up to 21 for a couple of days then cold crash, tastes and smells great

[Beer Baron]

I have a simple pale ale in my fermenter. 

Pale Malt - 80%

Quick Oats - 15%

Caramunich 1 - 5%

Single hop of Mosaic only as various times to bitter to 28 IBUs

Wyeast American Ale Yeast

It should come in at about 5% and will be easy to throw down once spring starts. Crystal clear going into the fermenter despite forgetting kettle finings

[Otto Von Blotto]

The brown ale is down to 1.020 after 3 days in the fermenter. I daresay it will be finished in another day or two. Temp has been raised to 21 now, but I reckon it'll be lucky to get there before it's done

[Koo wee brew]

K & B IPA cold crashing.

Heavily hopped with Cascade and Centennial. FV sample had a strange 'Fruit Tingle' taste to it. Maybe I've over hopped it? 

Transferred my rice lager to the keg. Will lager under serving pressure for 2 - 3 weeks. FV samples tasted great. Sulphur aroma/taste gone, can taste a hint of citrus due to the Citra hopping. Looking forward to this one. 

Cheers,

Dave. 

[porschemad911]

1 minute ago, Koo wee brew said:

Maybe I've over hopped it? 

Curious, how much of each did you use and when in the process to get the feeling it might have been too much? 

Cheers, 

John

[Beer Baron]

21 minutes ago, Koo wee brew said:

Maybe I've over hopped it? 

IMPOSSIBLE!!!

[Koo wee brew]

26 minutes ago, porschemad911 said:

Curious, how much of each did you use and when in the process to get the feeling it might have been too much? 

Cheers, 

John

Hi John,

Recipe;

Brew A can, 1Kg DME, 150g Dextrose. Brewed to 20L. US-05. FG 1012.

40g Cascade + 20g Centennial Hop tea

30g Cascade + 20g Centennial dry on day 7 and 10

It will probably settle in time.

Cheers

Dave  

 

 

[porschemad911]

Ah OK thanks Dave, definitely won't be over the top by the time you're drinking the beer. 

Cheers, 

John

[Otto Von Blotto]

I have a sneaky feeling this brown ale has fermented out or pretty much fermented out in 4 days since pitching it. I raised the temp controller yesterday to 21, and it got up to about 18.7 but has since dropped back to 18.4. The sample has dropped clear but it did get colder overnight than the main batch. I'll give it another couple of days and start taking FG samples. Pretty happy with a 4 day ferment, could end up CCing after 7 days and kegging a week later, then getting on with the next batch.

[James Lao]

Did these 2 brews on Friday, fermenting away now

Hop Head IPA Galaxy

Brewed 17/7/18

4.75kg pale malt 2 row 

0.23kg Munich malt

0.15kg Caramunich malt

0.3kg Crystal malt

0.3kg sugar

 

HOPS

15g each Amarillo, Chinook 45min

15g each Amarillo, Chinook 15min

60g Galaxy 2min

15g Citra 2min

IBUs 55

OG 1.058 - was meant to be 1.059

 

Will dry hop with 15g each Amarillo, Galaxy and Citra

And did this one as well

Moktoberfest

Brewed Friday 17/8/18

WY Pale malt 2.25kg

Briess brewers malt 2.25kg

WY Munich malt T1 0.45kg

WY Vienna malt 0.45kg

 WY Cara Munich T2 0.45kg

WY Carafa III 0.09kg

Cascade 15g 60mins

Willamette 10g 60mins

 Hallertau 30g 15mins

OG was meant to be 1.058 but was 1.056

IBUs 23.5

Efficiency around 70%

2 brews on the Robo took me from 8.30am till 5.30pm, chilled, pitched, cleaned up and all packed away!

Big day 9 hours of brewing fun! 

And lots of cleaning!!

Cheers

James

[joolbag]

James that Hop Head IPA Galaxy looks pretty tasty!

[The Captain!!]

+1 for that hop head ipa recipe looking good. Nice one James 

 

so I bottled my latest hoppy pale with all Amarillo today, unfortunately due to my Brut IPA still fermenting away I couldn’t cold crash it. Also the lid to my canister for dry hoppy come off at some stage.

So. Much. Hop. Matter. In the beer it was out of control. 

This beer was also the first time pitching a starter from harvesting yeast, The Kelsey Method. Tasted bloody fantastic. Looking forward to that one. 

Captain

[Otto Von Blotto]

Since we've had a few single figure nights lately and they will be continuing, which is causing the brown ale to keep slowly dropping in temp, I've decided to use the old boiling flask of water trick to keep it up for the next couple of days. It's on 19C at the moment and I'll be reboiling the flask soon, but the krausen foam has reached the lid of the fermenter, which would be a good 150-170mm above the top of the brew itself. I'm not really sure why it would explode like that when fermentation is almost finished, or even may well be finished by now. Perhaps it's just residue that I'm looking at. Either way I'll test the SG tomorrow and again on Friday and if they're the same then I'll start dropping it for a week long CC on Saturday.

[Beerlust]

The 2nd gen M44 I'm using on my current Pale Ale has taken off like a rocket, so I'm very pleased about that. It's got going somewhere around 12-16 hours after pitching as it was banging along like a congo drum when I checked it earlier this morning. 

Provided the brew ferments out to expected levels I'll likely harvest again from this batch given the M44's much faster start to begin actively fermenting the wort.

Most pleased.

Cheers,

Lusty.

[Otto Von Blotto]

Brown ale is down to about 1.014 today, I think predicted FG was 1.013 but I'll check beersmith for that. I'll check it again Friday and start dropping the temp on Saturday or Sunday. It's tasting pretty good already, and will get at least a few weeks in the keg before being tapped so it should be even better by then.