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stocks of AG2 depeleted- It was time for affirmative action.....




and so to work. I scaled up the previous recipe using the wonderfully free beer engine (thanks GW) and armed with strike heat, water treatment,batch sparge calculators from Jims Beer Kit I embarked upon the big one - featuring my 50L stock pot and big burner of propane for the first time in anger

water in, added to the grains : much stirring and (you'll have to take my word for it) the thermometer showed 67 deg c.. a good start !



running off/batch sparge action featuring ss colander from pound shop



rolling rolling boil , this burner can handle WAY more than 5 gallon batches- need a bigger mash tun though !



left overnight to cool and then painstakingly jugged into a FV via the pound shop colander.

so...as we are all supposed to do at work... what went well etc...

+Boil- easy to get a rolling boil, fast heat up times.
-tricky to balance heat input to get a stable temp for strike. I can see MAYBE a HLT in the near future (its made but i would add 1x kettle element and thermal control )

+Hops where vac packing has remained intact and have been in freezer are still fresh after a long long time
+CRS / gypsum brought the OG in on the nose

-jugging the wort out of the copper is a bad idea. I will make a hop strainer. this also means i want the copper up higher: gravity is free.

bottling 40+ pints may be a PITA but it sure saves the hassle of gas and regs !

AG4 will be an ale ... promise.... and i'll resize those pics soon as well !

Looking good on the burner and boiler.
Do you have details on the burner?
You'll either get used to bottling 40+ bottles or get a kegging system, I normally bottle that number every 3-4 weeks and it does geta pain after a while. Maybe one day I'll stump up for a few kegs

The burner is here : (although its widely available elsewhere as well)

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/LARGE-BOILING-RIN ... 27b1280cda

note that it only requires a low pressure reg - I am running it from a bullfinch variable regulator and its wound out to its lowest setting. I like the steel frame it comes with as its nice and sturdy but not cast iron heavy.

The stock pot is good value too.good thickwalled aluminium- not as shiny as ss but a helluva lot easier to drill if you go that route ...

This was at 1.020 last night so the mahoosive starter is doing its job ok, I'll bulk prime and bottle it at the weekend , assuming it gets down to 1.010 in time- again it will have a fair whack of sugar in the boiled water as befits the lager-ish nature of this beer . Its developed a complex almost honey like sweetness which balances the hops nicely, this won't be heading for a long conditioning period. If theres time at the weekend will kick off AG4 which, as promised, will be an ale. I have promised myself I'll do my homage to Abbot from BYOBRA. The copper will be getting a hop filter and a tap as a result of my experiences with this brew, I'm holding off on the HLT for now so tonight its sanitising and making the starter up.