February 2008 Archives

It was finally nice enough outside today for me to take some photos of my home made wort chiller. Instead of spending the 40+ to purchase one of these and wait a few days for delivery, I decided to stop by Home Depot and pick up the things needed to make one.

After spending about 28 bucks and about 15 minutes of assembly time, this is the finished product.

Here's what you need:

At least 20 feet of soft copper tubing. I used 3/8".
Depending on where you chill your wort, you may want to get at least 10 feet of 3/8" ID food grade vinyl hose (I bought 20 feet).
You will also need three #4 hose clamps and a 3/4" FH to 3/8" barb to connect to your sink faucet or an outdoor hose.

I coiled my tubing around one of my corny kegs. You can use a large coffee can or paint can if you don't have a corny keg. Leave about 18 inches or so of tubing to gently bend upwards. You may have to twist it in order to not kink the tubing.

Dry fit the immersion chiller into a 5 gallon bucket and see how well it fits. If it is touching the sides, you'll want to make a tighter coil. Try to leave at least 1 1/2 to 2 inches of space between the bottom coil and the rest. This is so the coils will site above any sediment that may settle at the bottom of your fermenter or brew kettle (or whatever you are cooling in).

Connect the one end of the wort chiller to your faucet and turn on the cold water to give it a test. Make sure your hose clamps are tight enough and not leaking anywhere. You don't want any leaky water running into your wort.

For cleaning, don't use anything that reacts badly to copper. Simply wash it off and dry it.

I'm also working on a 48qt cooler converted to a lauter tun. Check back in the next couple of weeks for that.

Jody and I took a tour at Flying Fish Brewing Co in Cherry Hill, NJ today. I've never been there before so I wasn't quite sure what to expect. When we walked in, we were greeted right away. And the folks at Flying Fish certainly know make you feel welcome: Free Samples!

Yes, I would like to "try" the XPA. I would also like to try the ESB, the Belgian Dubbel, oh and don't forget that IPA! Lovefish anyone?

The tour lasted about 30 minutes or so and we saw pretty much everything. They explain mashing, boiling, fermenting, pitching, filtering, and bottling (ugh).

And check this: the spent grain from the mash is picked up by local farmers for cow feed. Lucky cows!

So if you are ever in the area I suggest you check it out. Free tour and free beer.

http://www.flyingfish.com/

I know I probably shouldn't have, but I cracked open one of the wheat ales tonight. I was looking forward to it all day! (Does that mean I have a problem?)

I opened the bottle and heard the sound of gases being released. So far so good.

I slowly poured the beer into one of my Peroni glasses that I received for Christmas. Nice color, nice thick head. That's about all that was nice. It has an after taste that sort of sneaks up on you. Not my favorite. I think I was a little premature in opening this beer, at least I hope that's all. It will really suck if this beer...sucks.

 

Well at least it looks good!

I'll revisit this beer in a month or so. In the mean time, here are some pics. Enjoy!

The past few days have been pretty productive, as far as beer related activities go. Late last week, I bottled my wheat ale and last night I bottled my amber ale.

If you don't know by now, I've been posting pictures of my brews on Flickr under the name BierBrewer. Of course, Paulbeer was already taken. So instead of using a crazy name like Paulbeer38596748230, I decided to go with something a little different.

Amber Ale: I sterilized about a case and a half of 12 ounce bottles last night and also one 5L mini keg. I was going to do two 5L minis but since we are going on vacation in a few weeks, I want to make sure I can bring along some of my homebrew.

The mini kegs take about 4 weeks or so to carbonate compared to the 1 to 2 weeks for bottles. They are pretty easy to clean and fill. If they condition as good as a bottle, I'll be very pleased.

Since you need different amounts of priming sugar for mini kegs and bottles, I had to transfer the beer twice. Thanks to Google calculator, I was able to easily determine the proper amount of priming sugar per batch.

Priming Sugar Measurements

1 x 5L mini keg - 1 1/3 tablespoons (or 4 teaspoons) of priming sugar.
3.5 gallons for bottling - 8.5 tablespoons of priming sugar. (It was actually 8.4 but I rounded up)

I've done some research and found that the average amount of priming sugar for a 5 gallon batch for mini kegging is 1/3 of a cup. For bottles, I typically use 3/4 of a cup. Keep in mind this is for priming sugar. If you use DME or LME, your measurements will be different.

The color of the beer is a deep amber. The lower left tile in the mosaic shows just how dark it really is. The lower right pic looks like I'm siphoning oil out of a can. I should name it 10W-40 :) As the beer was transferring into the bucket, you could see the oils from the hops mixing in with the beer.

The aroma was very nice. Noticeable amounts of hops without any grassy undertones. I was a little concerned about that since I let it dry hop for longer than I originally planned.

Bottling was a breeze last night. I was able to fill 32 x 12 ounce bottles and have enough left over to fill the hydrometer tube. The fact that I didn't use enough water accounts for the deep amber color and the lesser than normal amount of beer. Oh well, I'm happy with the way it is turning out. I sampled a small amount and I think it will be very good.

We'll know in a week or so!