Home Brew Forum

Ay up! I've just popped the cherry on my new three-tier garage brewery (yesterday 23/12/07). It was a magical experience, not having to lift heavy vessels. Everything went well, the only mistake being that I forgot to put the chiller in the boiler 15 mins prior to the end of the boil - so I had a 75 min boil! Notice DaaB that I have converted to using an immersion chiller! RIP my beloved CFC.

The recipe was a "throw it together" to use up some bramling cross hops I have:-

3.75kg Marris Otter
0.5kg Crystal
50g Bramling Cross (60 mins)
10g Bramling Cross (15 min)

60 minute mash at 67C
75 minute boil
Potential OG 1054
Gervin Ale yeast.

Here are some piccies

Blighty's (New) Brewery:


HLT:


Grist:


Mash Temp (I hit 66.5C):


Mash:


First Runnings:


Sparging (spinney sparger in lid of tun):


Hot break:


Boil:


Cooling:


Collecting wort:


Aerated:


Wort colour:


All-in-all a great day. Took me five hours (including the dreaded clean-up). I got an OG of 1044 (max potential 1054) so 81% efficiency.

Sweet! Lots of insulation going on there too (loving the space-age HLT)

Nice one!

spearmint-wino wrote:Sweet! Lots of insulation going on there too (loving the space-age HLT)

That HLT has improved my brewing experience tenfold. It heats the water up to 73C in no time. Before I had to heat up the water in my boiler for mashing and sparging, and transfer the wort from another vessel to the boiler as soon as sparging was finished - a right royal PITA! Now I just fill er up and turn er on! (or is it the other way round?)

Looks great BB

Nice to see you back in the brew seat BB.

Looks great wish I had space for a setup like yours.

What the tin foil for??

Looking good

nobby wrote:
What the tin foil for??

So that I don't disturb the grain bed when pouring the first runnings back into the tun.

DaaB wrote:We used to have a member here called Blighty Brewer, I can't quite remember what happened to him, he moved to the frozen waste lands of the north I think

Aha! I am back! Been a while of nil brewing, but it's good to be back in the "hop seat". I tell you what, it is blinking cold up ere DaaB!! Wish I was back in the sultry hotbed of Hampshire that is Totton. Have you got a revitalised Rumbridge Street yet?

DaaB wrote:

BlightyBrewer wrote:

DaaB wrote:We used to have a member here called Blighty Brewer, I can't quite remember what happened to him, he moved to the frozen waste lands of the north I think

Aha! I am back! Been a while of nil brewing, but it's good to be back in the "hop seat". I tell you what, it is blinking cold up ere DaaB!! Wish I was back in the sultry hotbed of Hampshire that is Totton. Have you got a revitalised Rumbridge Street yet?

We've had a posh Chinese resteraunt open up there called Fuchi , Mike Osmands (a comedian apparently) brother has taken over the Swan and they've scattered a few cobbles in amongst the tarmac

Is "Fuchi" next to the porn shop by chance? (Ahem, not that I know about any porn shop on Rumbridge Street! )

Ah, the Swan. Isn't that the pub next to the ballet school where that guy got tasered for waiving a fake hand-gun around? (Ahem, not that I know about any ballet school on Rumbridge Street! )

BlightyBrewer wrote:

nobby wrote:
What the tin foil for??

So that I don't disturb the grain bed when pouring the first runnings back into the tun.

Thats a good idea. I am using batch sparging but something simalar would be helpful

Smart looking set up there BB, looks like it all went to plan, nice one!

Nice one BB glad you had a good brew

Well done - nice looking set up there.