Comical

[paulindevon]

Hello all. I'm a new member and I've just done my first all grain brew after slowly putting kit together over about 18 months. I've done lots of kits and have been anticipating my first 'proper' brew for yonks. Looked at all the videos on youtube and I thought I was prepared really well. How wrong could I have been? If it could have gone wrong, it has. Started about 10.30 this morning and just finished in the dark with a torch. Good job I'm not doing it for a living.
Firstly I had a stuck sparge. I'm using a stainless keg with the top cut off, and a perforated false bottom connected with a plastic tube to a ball valve, all wrapped in old duvets etc. I later discovered that the tube connecting the false bottom had expanded a bit with the heat and slipped off. In fact it comes off so easily that I can't believe it wasn't supplied with jubilee clips or something similar. Ended up with wort and grains all over the garden. By the time I had it sorted the mash was down to about 35C as its been flipping cold today, so I put some wort back in my HLT and heated it up again and sparged with that. Probably cocked my brew up completely but I wasn't giving up. I'm doing Wheelers old Speckled Hen and following the 25L recipe so was aiming for an SG of about 1050. I ended up with 23.5L prior to boil, but only 15L in my FV. Surely that can't be right? Luckily the SG was about 1060 so I just diluted it with cold water until I hit 1050, and ended up with about 18.2L. I guess the loss is due to my spectacular incompetence during the mashing. Any comments would be appreciated

[lord groan]

Hi and welcome!
Wow, you did have a lot of grief!
Don't worry though, you have still made beer. When I've made mistakes or things go wrong I found out that you still get good beer, just not as good as it could be.
I'd really recommend doing a full run through with water alone, I did this and it highlighted all the problems without wasting wort.
Impossible to tell exactly where you lost volume with a tale of woelike that, just accept it and the next batch will go so much better you won't believe it!

[paulindevon]

Good advice. I must admit that it did cross my mind, but I was so excited about doing a brew that I couldn't wait to crack on. I know its impossible to tell much as it at all went so badly, but the main question is whether such big losses (in volume) are normal during the boil, and also whether it is normal to top up the wort with water to get back to the target fermenter volume.

[BenB]

Life would be boring if things didn't go too wrong. What's the dead space in the boiler? I have 17% boil-off per hour and a 1L dead space so can easily get down to the levels you mention. If you drain the boiler and find you're short I reckon it's best to put the water in the boiler and re-drain it- at least that way you get some of the SG and flavour from the wort left in the boiler. If you add it directly to the FV you just dilute what's in the FV. I usually forget to do this though and after a long brew day just dump the water in the FV and then realise my error...

[Jocky]

Hang in there. We all have nightmare brews, and those early ones can be difficult and complicated.

It'll get better and faster.

[Jonnyconga]

My first all grain tool 10 hours and put me off all grain for about 18months!! Now only do all grain and it's much easier so don't give up!!
As someone else has said the loss in volume is most likely due to boil off. I find I boil off loads more than average so go from 28L ish to 22L ish in the fermenter after boil and hop absorption etc. I often add water (liquor back) when the beer is in the fermenter if it's a higher OG than anticipated. Didn't impact on my beer at all.
Good luck!

[paulindevon]

Thanks for the replies. I'm starting to feel a bit happier. I guess I'll get another brew under my belt before trying to analyse today's efforts. Guess I'll just chalk it down to experience and at least learnt a few basic problems with my equipment. I'm a big fan of old peculiar so that one is coming up next, ( after I've sourced some stainless jubilee clips )

[Capped]

Keep at it! My early brews of yore really were a comedy of errors which still always yielded beer. What once used to take all day is now done and dusted in 5 hours max. At least the tube coming adrift was just bad luck and not the sloppiness of leaving a tap open - we've all done that and you will too, believe me. But it's a problem you've found and rectified but alas there'll be more to discover. All part of the fun and getting to know your kit and its foibles. Sometimes I get a little jaded with this brewing lark as apart from recipe and method variations the whole process has become as second nature and as uneventful as making a cuppa - but the great beer keeps me at it. That's what 30-odd years of fiddling with mash tuns and boilers and sparging devices and trying new hops and recipes etc etc does to you, but I hope it holds your interest for that long, too. It's worth it!

[VANDEEN]

At least the tube coming adrift was just bad luck and not the sloppiness of leaving a tap open

Or turning it the wrong way when you see the trub coming through and sending even more of it into the FV & splashing it up the wall / floor into the bargain, and I was only doing extract with steeped grains

Here's my first BIAB brewday thread viewtopic.php?f=24&t=74009

Next one will be better!!! and more automated / controlled hopefully. If I'm not making mistakes I'm not learning from them

[paulindevon]

Enjoyed the fans sticking out of the window. My missus is not so tolerant, hence the garden. I came down this morning and it was bubbling like crazy. Not something I have ever experienced with kits. Blew all the water out of the airlock !

[DeadFall]

Sounds a lot like my first AG attempt which took most of a day and was a complete disaster. The beer tasted rank due to tannins, but I didn't need the keg so I left it. About 3 months later it tasted ok and was drinkable.

[alix101]

You seemed to cope well and the things you've done are right given the circumstances.
A stuck mash is a nightmare only realised by people who've done it.
Heating the wort was a good move and diluting your beer to hit gravity is common practice.
The fact you ended up with a stronger brew showed you did get good conversion.
Like above everybody has bad brew days.
Do an update when it's ready the proof is in the tasting. ..if it's good you'll wonder what the fuss was.

[critch]

I had many nightmares when I first went all grain eons ago, stick with it, youll get there. grahams books are great, I learnt to brew from them and I do it for a living now.
sterilisation of everything on the cool side is important,as is fermenting at a cool constant temp. don't worry too much on the mash as long as it was at the right temp for a an hour, or just under youll do fine. good luck

[Fil]

I wont list all the errors and calamities of my first biab brew, lets just say it got me banned for life from brewing in the house and I was gobsmacked at how well it turned out. Im sure the beer gods will smile down on your brew.

You succeeded in brewing a reasonable volume of fermentable wort, and all new brewerys need running in to evaluate the actual variables like deadspaces and evaporation rates, and now you have crucial information like you can boil off about 8litres so can plan to sparge 31l into the kettle for your next brew if your target is 23l ..

Using a keg for a tun will require a bit more preheating and may even require a slightly higher strike temp too again you have soem experience to fall back on now .

it will all fall into place soon enough.. i envy you your first sample of your first ag brew, that is a special moment i hope yours is as eyebrow raising with pleasure as mine was..

[paulindevon]

That's some really interesting info, especially about the mashing for 1 hour. I think I was a bit too hung up on sticking strictly to the procedures and not thinking enough about what was really going on. Fil you are spot on with the higher strike temperature as I reckon I was about 7 degrees under where I need to be. I'm planning on getting a digital thermometer with a long probe that I can leave in the mash as the tun seems to cool at a ridiculous fast rate if the lid is off for any time at all. I'm also thinking about something better than a duvet with a towel draped over the top to insulate my m.t. The problem is that it's a real ale cask which belly's out in the middle. Would have been much easier with a perfect cylinder.
Once again, thanks for all the comments