seanthanna
Apprentice
- Joined
- Nov 28, 2016
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Hello all,
I'm a relatively new brewer looking for some help. I've done a few batches and most have turned out pretty well but I was sticking to pretty basic instructions.
My latest batch I tried to step it up a notch and am trying new things so naturally I have some questions. I'll try to lay them out by section of the brew cycle. And by all means if anybody has any feedback on any methods I'm not already questioning myself, I'm all ears!
FWIW, I did a partial mash using a BIAB method. 6lbs of Golden Promise and 6lbs of DME. I did a partial boil (about 4-4.5 gallons).
--Mash--
My first issue is I had issues keeping my mash temp. I use a induction Cooktop (nuwave 1800w) and thought I could just keep it at the 155 settings and stir every so often to keep it at my 152 target but that was a huge flop. Not sure if it's the Nuwave, the kettle, or my instant digital pen but my readings were all over the place depending on where I stuck the pen...as much as a 10 degree difference though the temp never went above 162 and never below 145. To combat this I stirred often. Eventually (after about 45 minutes of fighting the temp) I was able to maintain a fairly consistent temp but it took about 90 total minutes since the start of the mash to pass the iodine test.
Questions:
1) Did boiling it for 90 minutes have any negative effect on the mash?
2) Any ideas why my temp would be so different depending on where I was taking the measurement?
--Boil--
While the NuWave did get the 4+ gallons of water to boil, I had to keep the lid on to keep it vigorous.
Questions:
1) Does keeping the lid on have any negative effect on the boil? I've read that you want some of those compounds to escape and I was capturing them and throwing them right back in when removing the lid.
--Hop Additions--
I just added my hop pellets at the times indicated directly in the kettle with no bag.
Questions:
1) was that a bad move? See racking to secondary below for why I think it might have been....
--Whirlpool--
I had never done this before and couldn't find good instructions for it with the equipment (or lack thereof) I had. I ended up just gently stirring the wort to try and simulate a whirlpool and then adding the hops.
Questions:
1) What is the best way to do a whirlpool (the poor man's method)?
2) Was I supposed to let the wort cool before doing this?
3) Is manually stirring it like this acceptable or am I introducing too much O2?
--Cooldown--
Used wort chiller and 1.5 gallons of drinking water to cool down to 70 in 30 min.
--Transfer to fermenter--
Aggressively dumped about 5.5-6 gallons of wort into the fermenting bucket to aerate it. Took a sample and got my OG at 1.078. Pitched my smack pack yeast that I broke and shook about 3 hours earlier and kept at 70 degrees.
Questions:
1) should I have aerated it more?
2) When taking gravity samples I've been using my wine thief and just dropping the hydrometer right in there. Is that a good method? One of the issues I've been having is there are bubbles around the readings and therefore I can't read it very clearly and since the hydrometer is in the wine thief, I can't spin it anymore other than the initial spin.
--Dry Hopping--
Last time I dry-hopped I did it all in the secondary. This particular recipe calls for double dry hopping so I decided to do my first in the primary. After 72 hours, the airlock activity had halted so I took a gravity reading and got 1.014. Took it again the next night and got the same so decide to toss in my first round of dry hops directly into the fermenter (again no bag or filter). I also put a carboy stopper underneath one side of the bucket to try and clear one side for ease of racking later. I also gently rotated the fermenter nightly to try and get the hops distributed.
Questions:
1) Does it make sense to tilt the fermenter? Seems like it would make it so the high side would be where the siphon would go.
2) Is rotating the fermenter doing more harm than good?
--Racking to secondary--
With all these hop additions I figured it would make sense to clear the beer and rack to secondary. Took another gravity reading and it was still 1.014 so figured primary was completely done. Using auto-siphon I transferred it to a 5 gallon glass carboy. the bottom 3 inches or so was pretty thick. I used a clip to keep the siphon above that line for a while and it ran clear but there was only about 4 gallons in the carboy when it started getting cloudy and then it got downright thick. I was determined to get as much beer in there as possible (and reduce the headspace) so I kept at it...I'm guessing this was probably a mistake as there were a few times it got stuck and I had to repump the siphon. At one point I even took the siphon completely out, washed and sanitized it, and started over. A couple of times during the re-priming, I heard bubbles in the carboy...ugh.
Questions:
1) Did I oxidize the s*** out of this beer? Or will racking kick up some C02 to get it out of there? Or does that only apply to headspace and the O2 I forced into the wort is in there for good.
2) Is it normal to have that much trub in the primary? I know I didn't use hop bags and didn't leave it in the primary for very long and did not cold crash so is that to be expected? Should I have done one or all of those to combat this? Or does it not matter as it will all settle now in the secondary instead of the primary?
3) Even though there was a lot of trub, there still seemed to be beer in there too...Is there anyway of getting that all out so that all you're left with is a pretty solid trub that you can be assured you're not losing beer?
I know I just used up a years worth of questions but I wanted to type them out while they were all fresh in my head.
Any and all help is much appreciated.
I'm a relatively new brewer looking for some help. I've done a few batches and most have turned out pretty well but I was sticking to pretty basic instructions.
My latest batch I tried to step it up a notch and am trying new things so naturally I have some questions. I'll try to lay them out by section of the brew cycle. And by all means if anybody has any feedback on any methods I'm not already questioning myself, I'm all ears!
FWIW, I did a partial mash using a BIAB method. 6lbs of Golden Promise and 6lbs of DME. I did a partial boil (about 4-4.5 gallons).
--Mash--
My first issue is I had issues keeping my mash temp. I use a induction Cooktop (nuwave 1800w) and thought I could just keep it at the 155 settings and stir every so often to keep it at my 152 target but that was a huge flop. Not sure if it's the Nuwave, the kettle, or my instant digital pen but my readings were all over the place depending on where I stuck the pen...as much as a 10 degree difference though the temp never went above 162 and never below 145. To combat this I stirred often. Eventually (after about 45 minutes of fighting the temp) I was able to maintain a fairly consistent temp but it took about 90 total minutes since the start of the mash to pass the iodine test.
Questions:
1) Did boiling it for 90 minutes have any negative effect on the mash?
2) Any ideas why my temp would be so different depending on where I was taking the measurement?
--Boil--
While the NuWave did get the 4+ gallons of water to boil, I had to keep the lid on to keep it vigorous.
Questions:
1) Does keeping the lid on have any negative effect on the boil? I've read that you want some of those compounds to escape and I was capturing them and throwing them right back in when removing the lid.
--Hop Additions--
I just added my hop pellets at the times indicated directly in the kettle with no bag.
Questions:
1) was that a bad move? See racking to secondary below for why I think it might have been....
--Whirlpool--
I had never done this before and couldn't find good instructions for it with the equipment (or lack thereof) I had. I ended up just gently stirring the wort to try and simulate a whirlpool and then adding the hops.
Questions:
1) What is the best way to do a whirlpool (the poor man's method)?
2) Was I supposed to let the wort cool before doing this?
3) Is manually stirring it like this acceptable or am I introducing too much O2?
--Cooldown--
Used wort chiller and 1.5 gallons of drinking water to cool down to 70 in 30 min.
--Transfer to fermenter--
Aggressively dumped about 5.5-6 gallons of wort into the fermenting bucket to aerate it. Took a sample and got my OG at 1.078. Pitched my smack pack yeast that I broke and shook about 3 hours earlier and kept at 70 degrees.
Questions:
1) should I have aerated it more?
2) When taking gravity samples I've been using my wine thief and just dropping the hydrometer right in there. Is that a good method? One of the issues I've been having is there are bubbles around the readings and therefore I can't read it very clearly and since the hydrometer is in the wine thief, I can't spin it anymore other than the initial spin.
--Dry Hopping--
Last time I dry-hopped I did it all in the secondary. This particular recipe calls for double dry hopping so I decided to do my first in the primary. After 72 hours, the airlock activity had halted so I took a gravity reading and got 1.014. Took it again the next night and got the same so decide to toss in my first round of dry hops directly into the fermenter (again no bag or filter). I also put a carboy stopper underneath one side of the bucket to try and clear one side for ease of racking later. I also gently rotated the fermenter nightly to try and get the hops distributed.
Questions:
1) Does it make sense to tilt the fermenter? Seems like it would make it so the high side would be where the siphon would go.
2) Is rotating the fermenter doing more harm than good?
--Racking to secondary--
With all these hop additions I figured it would make sense to clear the beer and rack to secondary. Took another gravity reading and it was still 1.014 so figured primary was completely done. Using auto-siphon I transferred it to a 5 gallon glass carboy. the bottom 3 inches or so was pretty thick. I used a clip to keep the siphon above that line for a while and it ran clear but there was only about 4 gallons in the carboy when it started getting cloudy and then it got downright thick. I was determined to get as much beer in there as possible (and reduce the headspace) so I kept at it...I'm guessing this was probably a mistake as there were a few times it got stuck and I had to repump the siphon. At one point I even took the siphon completely out, washed and sanitized it, and started over. A couple of times during the re-priming, I heard bubbles in the carboy...ugh.
Questions:
1) Did I oxidize the s*** out of this beer? Or will racking kick up some C02 to get it out of there? Or does that only apply to headspace and the O2 I forced into the wort is in there for good.
2) Is it normal to have that much trub in the primary? I know I didn't use hop bags and didn't leave it in the primary for very long and did not cold crash so is that to be expected? Should I have done one or all of those to combat this? Or does it not matter as it will all settle now in the secondary instead of the primary?
3) Even though there was a lot of trub, there still seemed to be beer in there too...Is there anyway of getting that all out so that all you're left with is a pretty solid trub that you can be assured you're not losing beer?
I know I just used up a years worth of questions but I wanted to type them out while they were all fresh in my head.
Any and all help is much appreciated.