Thinking of starting Extract Brewing.

[Nobby Novice]

I am thinking of starting extract brewing as the last kit I tried was disappointing. I thought I might be able to boil the brew in the garden shed as I am told the whole house will smell, well like a brewery.
Looking at this forum for the first time yesterday, I found quite a few suggestions to get me started. I could use a plastic fermenter with a heater fitted rather than splash out £130 for a boiler.
Could you guys tell me where I could buy something like a kettle element to fit to the bin ? How high in the fv does it have to be fitted? Aboeve the tap ?
I would be grateful for any help I can get, and if you have any pics of the process already on this forum, I would be most grateful.

[Swiller]

I have a boiler but you can use a large stock pot on your cooker
hob, you mention the house will smell like a brewery well give it a
try you may find you like it.
Or have a look at this post. viewtopic.php?f=6&t=37383

[potatoes]

I like the smell of boiling LME and hops. Also the smell doesnt last for days, its normally gone within 1.

[barl_fire]

Go for it. I just use a big stock pot for mine.

Put it this way, first time I supped one of my extract brews my first thought was if I can make beer that tastes this good then I'll never do another kit again, plus the beer clears and conditions quicker than any kit I've ever done. You really can taste a massive difference, no twang at all as I use DME and the designing brews for your own tastes and experimenting with hops and grains is great fun. I switched mainly because nearly every kit I tried was beginning to taste the same.

As for the smell, last night I put a brew on and admittedly it was the strongest smelling brew I've done yet (must be those Northern Brewer hops I used), but the missus reckoned when she pulled on to the drive she could smell it from the car and there was a bit lingering this morning in the house, but less than 24 hours later when I've got in from work there's no smell at all.

[Kev888]

Hi,

This type of element is what the commercial plastic boilers use. I believe you can just fit it through a hole and plug a kettle lead (e.g. from homebase) into it without having to alter it electrically. I believe some people do get a better nut for them though, like these, as the supplied plastic shroud can apparently pop off under pressure.

There are alternatives; I myself use immersion heater elements fitted with mechanical flanges, and many people use elements taken and adapted from cheap £5 jug kettles from tesco and argos and so on. I'm not so keen on the latter as I think the quality may be a bit low (see here ) but in the interests of ballance I shouls say that I may be in the minority on that one. Just take care that you know enough about what you're doing if you try anything with electrics - if uncertain then the risk is not worth the savings over a more expensive element, in my view anyway.

Some of the commercial offerings again use plastic fermenting type buckets - I'd say use sturdy polypropylene ones if you can find one, some people use (usually blue) HDPE bins which I'm less happy with (see here). If you search through the threads you should find where people have got theirs from. You can get away with boiling less than the full volume in extract brews and therefore use smaller boilers than all grain, but the time and effort to build it is as much and the cost barely less for making a bigger plastic boiler so if you have the space I'd say go for a nice big bucket and it'll make things easier and also help any future upgrade to all grain or Brew-In-A-Bag and that sort of thing.

The element should be mounted a little way above the bottom of the boiler so that it doesn't unduly heat the plastic base and can't contact it if the side is deflected a bit, but it doesn't have to be higher than the tap for any reason. Just make sure that you remember to switch it off before emptying the boiler.

Cheers
Kev

[brewjohn]

In an old book I have ,The penguin book of home brewing by W.H.T.Tayleur, he says the boiling of hops will make the house smell. If your spouse objects,change your spouse !!!! I think thats going a bit too far !!!

[Nobby Novice]

Thanks Kev888, a lot of information there. Do I have to boil the whole 23 litres in one go ? if not, that would mean 2 to 3 hours of boiling partial quantities ? I would prefer to boil the whole brew in one go in my shed. I was told by a friend to stick to kits as the whole house, sheets curtains etc would smell of beer.
Brewjohn, I changed my spouse before brewing,I have no plans of changing again.

I shall read up more on the method of extract brewing. Thanks for your help. It is nice to know you guys are so knowlegeable and helpful.

[Kev888]

No problem at all. Its best to boil all the volume if you can, and if you take that into account with your size of boiler and have a shed to work in then you should be able to do that (some extract brewers don't have the space or equipment though, which is why I mentioned the smaller size - it is possible to boil a thicker, lower volume wort and add more water afterwards to make up the full volume, although the hop utilisation tends to be lower in thicker mixtures).

EDIT: Just thought; If you want to use the shed electrics make sure they're up to the task, or possibly look at getting a chunky extension lead if they arent. Some people use two elements to speed up heating and then switch one off when it reaches the boil, but as each one more or less maxes out what a plug/socket can take you can't run them from the same lead and some house or shed electric installations aren't up to it either. Personally I prefer to just wait a little longer, though I do insulate the boiler well to help out.

I'd say that the smell is probably similar to a strong cooking smell that lasts a day or so but not for ever (like smoke can for instance) - it depends if you dislike it or not as to how bad that is, some people find the smell of hops offputtinmg whilst othere like it. More problamatic tends to be the condensation from all the steam produced - you can easily lose 10% to 15% of water (or even more in long boils) as steam, and it can strip wallpaper unless the room is very well ventelated.

Cheers
kev

[Nobby Novice]

Hi Kev,
My shed is only 10 feet away from my kitchen. It has its own power supply, a consumer unit with a RCCB which safeguards the garden pond, a seperate circuit which feeds double sockets and my freezer.
If I could only find somewhere else to put the bikes and the mower, I could have it as my own mini micro brewery.
I may not start another brew (kit) or experiment with extract until the spring, when the temperature improves, to ferment the brew.
Thanks for all your help guys, I will start looking around for a suitable boiler.
Nobby.

[Wooderson]

Have you thought of skipping extracts and going the BIAB route? This is what I plan after pricing up a few extracts brews it seems the logical choice and should result in even better beer.

[chivelegs]

The only 'problem' I had with extract brewing was once I tried my first one it made me determined to go all-grain, it was that much better than kits. It may turn out to be the most expensive brew you ever do!

[Nobby Novice]

I now have a vessel with a kettle element fitted and soon hope to get my first extract brew on the go.
i have looked at afew recipes in mr Wheelers book, however when I look online for spray malt/malt extract, there is only a limited number of malts available. e.g. light dark or wheat. I dont see any of the crystal or pale extracts as described in the recipes.

[kane]

The only malt extract you need to buy is the pale malt extract, this is where the majority of the fermentable sugars come from.
Things like the crystal and black malt need to be bought as crushed grain, this allows you to steep them in hot water to get most of their flavour/colour out (rather than fermentable sugars).

Kane

[EramusBlack]

I have been regularly boiling in the garage using a converted olive drum and the smell doesn't last overnight. There are plenty of posts on here explaining how to go about making your own boiler, the key thing is making sure the plastic FV won't melt, so many of them do, so be careful in your choice.

[Nobby Novice]

Yesterday, I made my first extract brew. It was based on a Summer Lightning/Exmoor gold recipe. I used light liquid malt extract. I think I would prefer to use the spray malt .
The boiler is made of plastic fermenter (Youngs) with a kettle element fitted. The fermenter seems quite sturdey, with 2 handles attached and a tap.
Withthe ingredients added, I had over 24 litres of liquid. It took about an hour for the liquid to start boiling and started to foam and overflow. I released some of the liquid in to a bucket to get the level down. After half an hour of switching off and on of the element, it settled down to a aggresive boil. After 90 minutes of boil I ended up with 15 litres of wort. So about 5 litres boiled away as steam to make my shed smell really nice.
The 15 litres are now in my fermenter ready for me to add the yeast. I dismissed the idea of topping up the fv with bottled water as I would have thought would weaken the final beer. However the colour of the wort bears no resemblence to the colour I was expecting.
Where have I gone wrong ? Any help would be most helpful.