SS Brewbucket

Thought I'd create a post about my first run-through with my Stainless Steel Brewbucket.  I won this thing in a contest from the awesome homebrewing forum HomeBrewTalk.com that was put on by the awesome guys at SS Brewtech.  It's the kind of thing I'd never purchase and it was wonderful to score such a prize.  It holds up to 7 gallons and has some cool features.

Shiny!

Shaped like a bucket, it has a conical bottom to catch the trub.  While not as deep as a true conical, it's still pretty cool and I was eager to see how well the ball spigot worked for the transfer.

Outside during happier, snow-free times

My first attempt did not go well. I assembled it and did several water tests to make sure there were no leaks.  However I think the transparency of water made me think it was watertight when in fact...it was not.  I had poured five gallons of stout into the fermenter when the unthinkable happened: a slightest of drips began from the spigot.  I ended up transferring the wort to a plain plastic bucket to ferment (which I rinsed out but totally forgot to sanitize - luckily this hobby is forgiving and the vanilla stout turned out great.)

So, first attempt not so good and I was displeased that the thing leaked despite my many tests.  I took it apart and swapped out the o-rings for new ones and this seemed to do the trick.  Six weeks later I was ready for round two with a bourbon barrel porter.  With the new o-rings there was no leak and I was good to go.  The standard brewbucket doesn't feature a thermometer but mine has one built in.  Not completely necessary but it's cool to see the actual temp inside the fermenter.

The temperature gauge isn't vital  but it's nice to have

A much more useful feature is the ball-lock spigot at the bottom.  Taking a hydrometer sample previously required my turkey baster, sanitizing everything and dipping it in several times to get the sample.  Now I just stick the tube under the spigot and twist the handle.  So quick and easy.

It's so easy to take a hydrometer sample

For the bourbon barrel porter I was transferring the contents from the brewbucket to a couple glass carboys to age on bourbon and oak chips.  Here's another place where the spigot shines.  Just stick the sanitized tube on the spigot and away we go.  There was a slight hiccup when the flow stopped for some reason - then I realized I needed to remove the airlock from the lid to keep the flow going.

Racking into secondary is just as smooth

This batch was another of my typical awkward brews as I brewed four gallons in the bucket but had to figure out how to put it all into secondary.  My glass carboy holds three gallons and I had another smaller vessel that fit three liters.  Not ideal but I'd make it work.  The good news is that the brewbucket spigot made is very simple to fill up the big carboy, shut it off, and then switch over to put the rest in the little guy.

Sanitized carboys

Bourbon and oak chips ready to go!

Bourbon Barrel Porter racked to secondary

All in all a very easy process.  Looking inside, there was a goodly amount of gross krausen caked near the top but the spigot inside did it's job - the trub was left in the cone and stayed out of the secondary.  While dirty, the stainless steal was simple to clean and the wide opening made it easy to get in there.

Conical base at work - not much liquid left
in the bucket

Currently I've got five gallons of Chinook IPA in the brewbucket, finishing up it's primary.  I'll dump a couple ounces of Chinook to dry hop soon and then it'll be another easy transfer into the keg, thanks to the spigot.  One thing I'll say is prior to this batch I had to yet again switch out the o-rings in the spigot as they leaked when I tested 'em.  Apparently others have had the same problem and some outside source o-rings have done the trick.  I may have to do that next time.

So there you go, a pretty cool fermenting vessel.  At $225 it's not exactly a cheap way to brew but it definitely looks sharp and works well.

Keezer Build - Part 2

Time to conclude the keezer project I started in Part 1.  Last time I had built the dolly, the temperature controller and cut the wood for the collar.  Now it was time to put it all together.

I went to a welding supply shop in Cranston with my empty CO2 tank.  As I figured, the hydro stamp was out of date (basically ever five years the tank has to be tested to verify it's still safe.)  They charged me for the hydro test but swapped out the tank which saved me having to wait about three weeks.  Great guys and they have good deals on filling your propane tank, FYI.

Anyway, with my new full CO2 tank I quickly discovered that it was heavy as hell.  I decided to double the 2x4 base on the dolly to make sure it could hold it.  Then I fashioned some ramshackle chains to hold it in place and it was good to go.  It won't be winning any beauty awards but it'll do the trick.  The tank could have easily just gone on the floor next to the keezer but this will make it easier if I want to move it.

Time for the collar.  First I drilled a couple holes in the front for the faucets and one in the back for the gas line.  After that I sanded it and put on two coats of polyurethane.  You're supposed to add a base later of some other stuff first and then sand between coats and blah blah blah.  I'm not building an mahogany cabinet here.  I slapped a couple coats on it and called it a day.

Time to drill!

Once dry I attached the collar to the freezer using silicone sealant.  I waited most of the day for it to dry.  I probably should have waited longer but I was impatient.  After six hours excitement got the better of me and I attached the freezer lid to the collar.  It worked great.  The faucets were attached and I screwed the air splitter to the back wall.  The red gas line goes into the splitter and then on to the separate kegs.   It was a bitch trying to get the gas line through the hole I made and I had to run my drill bit around the edges which is probably definitely not recommended to get it through.

The keezer was now ready to hold beer!  I had an ESB that was ready and waiting.  Normally I'd have to transfer the beer to a bottling bucket along with priming sugar and then sanitize, fill and cap many a bottle.  Instead I ran some StarSan through the keg and then racked the beer into it.  So easy!

With the keg half full of beer (it was a 2.5 gallon batch) it was time to learn how difficult it was to move it into the keezer.  It wasn't too bad but then I filled the other keg with water - this was a real bear to lift and I had to use a stepstool to help lift it over the collar.  It was not easy but luckily I won't be doing it that often.

In case you're wondering I filled the other keg with water to improve the thermal mass in the keezer.  Liquid holds a temperature much better than air so the more liquid in you have, the better the keezer will hold the temp.  After I added the kegs, I plugged it into the temperature controller and over the next couple days monitored it.  It would take about 30-40 minutes to climb to 44 degrees before turning the keezer on and cooling it down to 42 degrees.

That's not a great amount of downtime and having the keezer's compressor turn on every 40 minutes or so will wear it out sooner rather than later.  Some more online research on the great homebrewtalk.com really helped me out.  First, I added some pink foam insulation around the inside of the collar.  This stuff was easy to cut and proved to be the perfect size.  I cut a couple holes for the faucets and cut a couple smaller pieces to fit around the red gasline.  Then I screwed the air splitter through the foam and into the wood.  The stuff fit so snugly that I didn't even have to glue it.

The other change I made was to cover the thermometer with bubblewrap insulation and tape it to the side of a gallon glass jug filled with water.  Since liquid temp changes slowly, it is much more efficient to gauge the temp of the water rather than the air temp which can fluctuate wildly, especially if I open the lid.  After I made these improvements, it now takes about 2-2.5 hours for the temp controller to rise from 42 to 44 degrees.

Pink insulation and better thermometer placement helped a lot

A few more small projects rounded out the build.  I attached the temp controller to a board behind the keezer so it was out of the way.  It's held in place but some nuts but can easily be unscrewed in order to move the keezer.  Then I attached another board and did some half-assed woodwork in order to hang some of my favorite glasses within arms reach.

At a craft store I found a couple magnetic photo holders which worked great to identify the taps. The labels slide right in and can easily be switched out.  Hopefully it'll encourage me to get creative with each new batch.

 

Finished!

There you have it!  Come on over and have a pint!

Outdoor All-Grain Saison!

Time for another brew session and a return to All-Grain brewing via Brew in a Bag (BIAB.)  I wanted to make a saison since I recently had a few thanks to my brother's Christmas gift to the rare beer club.  Saisons ferment at a high temp so I figured I get to it before summer showed itself the door.  In order to avoid stinking up the house (as much) I borrowed my dad's turkey fryer for my first ever outdoor brew session.

2.5 gallon batch
5 lbs Belgian Pale
6 oz Crystal 20
Mash at 149 for 60 minutes

1.25 oz Hersbrucker hops (60 minutes)
0.25 oz Hersbrucker hops (10 minutes)

Safbrew T-58 Yeast (rehydrated)

Ingredients

First thing I noticed was how fast the turkey fryer heats up water.  What a revelation after heating up all these previous batches on an electric stove!  It took a few minutes to get the hang of working the fryer and setting up my operation outside but the efficiency of the heat source alone convinced me that this is probably the way to go in the future.

Slowly adding and mixing 5+ pounds of grains

Too high yet again!  One day I'll get the hang of it.

Since this is all-grain I had to mash in the grains and let them rest for an hour at 149 degrees.  Theoretically anyway.  Like my last BIAB batch, I preheated the stove and put the covered pot in there once I hit the mash temp but soon realized the temp had actually dropped down to 144.  So back out onto the turkey fryer to heat it up a bit.  The temp slowly climbed but once I started futzing with my different thermometers I realized that now it was too high!  Somewhat annoyed, somewhat indifferent - I decided not to mess with it anymore and let it be for the next half hour.

60 minutes later and the mash is done

It was so much faster to bring to a boil outside

After another subpar mash it was time to bring it to a boil.  The turkey fryer made quick work of it, though I realized that the sides of the pot were black with soot.  Afterwards, research confirmed that this is the result of an inefficient fryer not burning all the gas.  Another issue to work on!  I didn't really think about the soot issue until it was time to cool it down when I realized that I'd have to bring this filthy pot into the house.  Amanda came home to begin preparing a big seafood dinner and she wasn't exactly thrilled that A) I was still brewing hours later and B) I was going to need to bring the concoction into the house to cool it down.  Still she's clever and can't resist a puzzle - she suggested sticking the sooty pot into my canning pot and cooling it down that way.

Pot within pot for the cooldown

Stuffing stuffies and none too pleased with me

Finished, one way or another

 

First outdoor brew was ultimately a success.  After all, I made beer!

I had forgotten ice of course so I made a quick trip to Cumbies while Amanda set up a fan to push the stink outside (don't listen to her, I think it smells great!)  I got back 10 minutes later with the ice and soon the wort was cool enough to dump into the carboy.  I took it outside and upon pulling the wort pot out of the canning pot, little flakes of soot poofed up into the air and a few landed in the wort.  Super!  At this point I'm just ready to be done so I grab some paper towels and dab up the black flecks as best I can.

After the carboy is filled and a hydrometer sample was taken, I confirmed what I had assumed - the starting gravity (which should have been 1.056) was 1.044.  Low but not that low.  Not entirely discouraged and somewhat as I had planned, I dumped a 1/2 pound of sugar into the carboy.  After a hearty shake session, I took another reading - 1.051.  Good enough for me.  The dry yeast I used was T-58, a strain designed for Belgian beers and fermentation took off almost immediately.  Within two hours the airlock was popping like mad. 

Now a few days later and the fermentation is slowing down.  I can see a tiny black speck floating at the top which annoys me but overall I'm happy with how things panned out.  Brewing outside is definitely better (especially since it keeps most of the beer making operation outside!) and once I figure out the fryer/soot issue (and get a better handle on the mash) I'll be good to go!

77 degrees in the basement - perfect for saison fermenting

Misadventures in Homebrewing - Summer 2014

It's not all sunshine and rainbows in the world of brewing, folks.  I learned this firsthand when a recent batch of brown ale we made at the band house took a turn for the worse.  And by worse I mean exploding all over the goddamn place.

About a week after we bottled it a couple of bombers blew up, sending beer and glass all over the basement.  After that the rest were put into plastic bags and we hoped for the best.  But more continued to explode.  It was clear that these things were way, way overcarbed and they foamed like a bastard when I tried to pour one.  The surviving ones were caked in sticky beer residue and tiny bits of glass.  Just a complete friggin' mess.  When I went over to the band house to help clean up and salvage what we could, things just got worse and more of 'em blew.  At least these blew up outside but it was a scary experience and now we found ourselves picking up shards of glass from the lawn.

We decided to dump the rest immediately.  Most of 'em were in swing tops which luckily hadn't blown and we spent the next 30 minutes wrapping 'em in towels and prying 'em open.

Back at home I still had another ten bottles in a box that was in a plastic tub.  I got decked out in long sleeve clothes and eye goggles and went to work, shaking the tub vigorously.  I felt muted "pops" as the bottles smashed into each other and burst.  Finally the deed was done and I was left with a tub full of beer and glass shards.  Great!

What a mess.  What a waste.

So that batch was a bust.  Luckily we also made five gallons of the 15 Minute Cascade Pale Ale which fared much better.

This past weekend I crafted up another couple batches.  I gave Amanda plenty of notice and she and the girls fled before I filled the house with the delicious scent of malt.  I made 2.7 gallons of Deadringer IPA (a Bell's Two Hearted Ale clone) and 1 gallon of Imperial Stout.  Neither hit the starting gravity I had planned which is somewhat of a bummer but whatever.  It's warm even in the basement so I put 'em in a sideways tub and have been replacing frozen water bottles every 12 hours or so.  Fermentation is well underway now.

With the lid in place, it's a decent fermentation chamber

So there you have it.  One batch brings destruction and sadness.  Yet new batches arise to bring fresh hope and joy.  Circle of Life.