The mash went well, mashing at 68C according to my temp. gauge after last brew went to 1.006 after a 66C mash. Sparge was fairly uneventful producing 30.5 litres of wort for the boil, although still haven't got the "spinny" sparge arm to spin! SG of pre-boil wort was 1.044. On to the boil and my first disaster of the day! Brewing outside in a strong wind which seemed to be keeping the rolling boil a bit low, I put the lid partially on the boiler to shield it from the wind without completely covering it. Popped into the house for a few seconds to get something and when I came back there was no sign of the lid! I thought it had blown off, but there was no sign of it anywhere around and I realised that the only place left for it was in the boiler! Sure enough it was jammed tight at the bottom of the boiler. Couldn't get it out at any price. Eventually gave up as the wort was still boiling and started pitching hops as per schedule. Second problem was forgetting to put wort chiller in to sanitise, so extended the boil by 10 mins to achieve this.
I am currently using one "40" litre boiler for HLT and copper, but a second 30 litre boiler finally arrived two days after this brew!
Anyway, once the boil and hop steep was finished I started draining the copper to my FV and eventually got access to the lid. I was able to extricate it after much huffing and puffing, but it did disturb the hop bed at the bottom of the copper so I had to filter the remaining run off through a sanitised sieve.
Managed to get 21.5 litres in the FV at OG of 1.056. A bit short of target, but good enough.
Currently on day 7 of fermentation. Some pics below (hopefully).
Recipe:
Pale Malt (Crisp MO) 5200g
Caragold 300g
Torrefied Wheat 150g
Hop Schedule
Columbus (AA 14.5%) 20g @ 70 mins
Chinook (AA 12.5%) 30g @ 20 mins
Columbus (AA 14.5%) 30 g @ 20 mins
Chinook (AA 12.5%) 30 g @ 0 mins
Columbus (AA 14.5%) 30 g @ 0 mins
Chinook (AA 12.5%) 40g dry hop from day 4
Columbus (AA 14.5%) 20g dry hop from day 4
(Planned 90 min boil with hops at 60, 10 and 0, but extended boil by 10 mins as above so timings for hop additions changed)
Using Beer Engine I calculated an overall efficiency of 71% giving me figures of:
21.5 litres @ 1.056 est FG 1.013, 5.6% abv, EBC 10, EBU 73
Grain Bill
Mash Tun
All Wrapped up
The Sparge
First Runnings
Start of the Boil
First Hops
Boiler Run-Off
