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Brew Day!! Whatcha' got?


Canadian Eh!L

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Welcome back everyone!

 

I enjoyed my first 3V brew day immensely, and I think for the first time on a new system I did quite well.

 

Some big differences to allow for that I've noticed.

 

- More temp losses while transferring water between vessels. Strike and sparge temps need to be higher to start with.

- I lost more temperature during the mash than I was expecting in an insulated cooler. About 3C over 90min [crying], so not much better than lagging a BIAB kettle.

- Way more absorption of water into grain with 3V

- Big losses to dead space in the mash tun (a bit over 1 litre for me.)

- A BIAB bag is much easier to clean than a cooler.

 

BUT

 

- FAR clearer wort into the kettle. The whole vorlauf before draining thing is pretty cool.

 

- I reckon I lost about 1.5L less to kettle trub than usual. I reckon a fair bit of flour was getting through the bag, where the grain bed filters it out with this system.

 

 

The good news in all this is that on the side of caution, I dialed back my efficiency to 65% when I was making up the recipe for the new system. I still got my OG target, but with a lot of extra wort due to the decreased trub losses. Next time I can allow for the bits I didn't think of and I reckon I'll get a fair bit higher.

 

Having said that, I don't give a flying turd what my efficiency is, as long as it's roughly the same every time. A handful of grain is not worth agonizing over to me.

 

Really happy, and will keep at it. Good first attempt I reckon. [happy]

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Good stuff Phil.

 

Do you have much headspace in the mash tun? I cover the mash with 3-4 layers of foil to help with the insulation. I lose about 1 degree over 60 minutes. I have read about others using camping mats for this too.

 

I also lose about 1 litre in the mash tun dead space but if you set it up in the software correctly then it isn't a big deal. It takes a few goes to dial it in but you should get consistency after that.

 

And what, you don't like scooping wet grain out of the cooler? It is still easier than lifting 6kg of wet grain without a skyhook.

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Welcome back to the MCG, or the SCG, or the WACA, or wherever the hell we are...

 

Anyway. I also did a brew day yesterday. This brew day took about 11 hours which I'll explain further down. This was another of my Hellesraisers, basically brewed to the same recipe as the last batch.

 

4kg Pils Malt

500g Munich II Malt

250g CaraPils

100g Carared

 

75 min boil

20g Hersbrucker FWH

7g Magnum @ 60 mins

25g Hersbrucker @ 20 mins

Half a whirlfloc @ 10 mins

 

Now comes the interesting part. [lol]

What I intended to be a 90 minute mash ended up being a 5 hour mash. That girl who was meant to be coming to visit called me and insisted that I go and see her, told me to get Dad to brew it, just leave it sit there etc.. wouldn't take no for an answer so I just left the mash there as it was. It got down to 50C in the approx. 5 hours it was there. It must have coated the element in more crap than usual because it had trouble reaching a boil and kept switching on and off until I scraped the element with the mash paddle and it worked as normal then. The only other difference I noticed was that there was more stuff floating around in the wort than normal, however it was still clear going into the cube. Started about 11am with the milling and finally finished the boil/cubing about 10pm last night.

 

I got an SG of 1038 pre boil and 1046 post boil so I'm pretty happy with that. Just hopefully next brew day doesn't get interrupted. [lol]

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Good stuff Phil.

 

Would you expect anything less? [innocent]

 

Do you have much headspace in the mash tun? I cover the mash with 3-4 layers of foil to help with the insulation. I lose about 1 degree over 60 minutes. I have read about others using camping mats for this too.

 

Yep. Was gonna cut up a camping mat next time. Hope they clean alright?

 

And what' date=' you don't like scooping wet grain out of the cooler? It is still easier than lifting 6kg of wet grain without a skyhook.[/quote']

 

Once it's wet, it's more like 11kg. [pinched]

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Good stuff Phil.

 

Do you have much headspace in the mash tun? I cover the mash with 3-4 layers of foil to help with the insulation. I lose about 1 degree over 60 minutes. I have read about others using camping mats for this too.

 

I also lose about 1 litre in the mash tun dead space but if you set it up in the software correctly then it isn't a big deal. It takes a few goes to dial it in but you should get consistency after that.

 

And what, you don't like scooping wet grain out of the cooler? It is still easier than lifting 6kg of wet grain without a skyhook.

Nice one, Phil!

 

I'm with Hairy on all points.

 

Welcome to 3V! It will take a few tweeks to dial in the volumes and measures. Try to take notes on your first few brews and apply this info to the next brew.

 

Did you take pics of your set-up?

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This is not a brew day, as in wort production, but there were brewing related activities.

 

I bottled a batch on Saturday, soaked the FV overnight and pitched another batch on Sunday. The only problem, which I didn't think about, was the temp of the cube. It was a touch nippy overnight on the weekend and the wort was about 12-13 degrees. I pitched the yeast anyway and it took about 12 hours to bring it up to 18.5 degrees. I used BRY-97 so I'm hoping the lag time isn't any longer than it usually is and that I didn't shock the yeast. The rehydrated yeast was probably at around 20 degrees by that stage. I will need to keep an eye on this one.

 

I also tried something different. I have been making hop teas on my last couple of brews, just using water. This time I boiled up a wort of water and DME (1040 gravity) and poured it into a French Press/Coffee Plunger for the hop steep.

 

This way I won't dilute the wort in the FV (even though it is only 700ml) and I was hoping to emulate a flameout addition. Plus it had some galaxy in it which can sometimes be a bit rough so I am hoping the wort steeping will soften this a little.

 

I will see how it goes.

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I'll be doing the same this evening with the cube of chocolate porter from yesterday.

 

I pitch cold fairly regularly, and raise the temp as quick as I can. As long as my starter and my wort are the same temp as each other at pitching time I'm sure there won't be any thermo-shock.

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I'll be doing the same this evening with the cube of chocolate porter from yesterday.

 

I pitch cold fairly regularly, and raise the temp as quick as I can. As long as my starter and my wort are the same temp as each other at pitching time I'm sure there won't be any thermo-shock.

So if you pitch warm yeast into cold wort, do their testicles climb back inside and they get some 'shrinkage'? If so, I have experienced thermo-shock many times before [innocent]

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