Brad's Session...and an Offer I Couldn't Refuse!

Well...

it's another Monday and the weekend is over. Why do they make weekends so short?

Anyway's, on Saturday, Bob and I went over to Brad's house at the start time of 8am to observe him brewing a batch of Porter! (Brad does make a killer porter). Well, when we got there, Brad was already mashing out! Geeze Brad...did ya start at 4AM?? LOL!! Talk about a quick visit...! We did manage to witness the boil routine and the highly technical way he clears wort from the HERMS coil, then the transfer of the wort into his primary fermenter. The session was all over at 11:30AM...then we lit the grill and had a few brews and cooked some sausage and relaxed while Bob slaved over the grill! (Way to go Bob!!)

Before I knew it, it was time to leave...and that was about the end of the brew day.

On Sunday morning, I got up kind of early, and started to mess around on the Internet. During my travels, I went to CraigsList to nose around, and I found a for sale ad for a stainless steel restaurant grade stainless steel kettle for 50 bucks! I couldn't believe my eyes! I picked up the phone and called the number....but no answer. I then brought the ad up again and sent an email to the gentleman with the kettle asking if the item was still available.

Then I went into the garage to mess around with the brewery (I do my best thinking out there), and my cell phone rang! I answered it and it was the guy that was selling the kettle. What luck!Well...he gave me directions to his place and I rushed out and drove over to see him and the kettle. The kettle was a bit grimy due to being outdoors and ignored for a while, but was in sound shape. We talked for a while then I made him an offer to purchase it. After counter offering then another offer, we agreed on a price of $48.00!!!!! I was originally going to offer him 40 but the man was really sincere and all, so I let my offer stand. This kettle is a commercial grade .120 thousandth's thick 30 gallon kettle, which probably has a replacement value of around $400 to $600 dollars!!! Man...talk about a lucky find! I asked him if the ad had been running long, and he stated that he had been trying to sell this thing for about 2 months or so, and only received 2 or 3 replies. (I was meant to have this kettle!!)

Well, I bought the darn thing and tossed it into my car and went over to Bob's house, which was on the way home. Bob was shocked at the deal that I had just completed, and I told him of my plan of how I was going to use this nice piece of equipment! I'm going to use it as a boil kettle, and turn my existing 28 gallon Italian kettle into a Mash Tun! Ahhh...i'll finally be able to do full boil 20 gallon batches!! I'm really excited about this!

Well...I cleaned up the new kettle this morning and it looks a LOT better now..(still needs a little more elbow grease).

My 10 gallon batch of German Lager is coming along very nicely and is now being cold crashed and held at 42 deF. I'll be kegging it this weekend, and then will lager the stuff for I figure 5 weeks...then we'll see how it turns out! The last tasting I did was very good...so I am pretty sure that this brew will be one to remember.

I also have to rack some red wine that I have going too. It's a 3 gallon batch and is going on it's 3rd racking. I'll get some pics of that too.

Below are some pics over at Brad's place and of my new boil kettle.

Enjoy!
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Here's Brad keeping an eye on things.

(C'mon Brad...put some grain in that tun, will ya??)

Here's Brad demonstrating how he clears

the wort out of the HERMS coil!

(Brad...did you ever play trombone??)

Below you can see the start of the runoff.

(Wott da hell?? It didn't look like that when I took the picture??)

Another shot of the runoff. (I cannot take photo's and drink) LOL!!

Here's the new kettle I got for $48. Think it was worth it?

A look inside of the new kettle after a minor scrubbing.

Another shot of the new kettle.

A shot of my brewery.

Thanks for visiting and feel free to comment!

Cheers!

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