Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Phat Tire Update

Well...!

Bob gave us this update to his Phat Tire Clone that he brewed last week, and he says the fermentation went a little slower than expected. It was probably due to the type of yeast that was used. Anyway's, he decided to harvest and wash the yeast for more brewing sessions to experiment with, (I hope that he saved me some) and sent me these pics to share! Looks like he did a great job wth his yeast collection effort!

Mean while...I got around to kegging the 10 gallons of German Pilsner and also racked my 3 gallon of Red Table Wine into another carboy, and added some Bentonite fining to help it get cleared out. The wine has to sit about 10 to 14 days until I rack it again, then I'll have to run it thru a filter and add some Potassium Sorbate to inhibit any further fermentation, then bulk age it for a month or so before bottling. The wine tasted really nice and my neighbor who lives across the street liked it a LOT too! I promised to save him 2 bottles of the stuff! It won't be ready until August or so, but the wait will be worth it!

The German Pilsner is now lagering at 33 degF and will be ready to carbonate and bottle in about 6 weeks! Sorry, but I was too busy to take pics of the kegging and all....maybe next time!

I am once again reconfiguring the brewery to accomodate the new boil kettle and mash tun set-up, and am fabricating new covers out of plastic that I had ordered. I'm in the process of making a circle cutting jig for my router, and i'll be taking some pics of that soon. I'll have them for the next post.

Below are the pics of Bob's yeast harvest.

Enjoy,

(_)3






Monday, February 11, 2008

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!
(_)3





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!

(_)3


Monday, February 04, 2008

Bob and his Phat Tire!

Hi again!

I had a good weekend and went over to my brew friend Bob's house yesterday to assist in his brewing of a 5 gallon batch of a Phat Tire Clone that he got as a kit from an online brewing source. Bob has upgraded his system and has added a pump, 2 heat-sticks and a temp controller to keep an eye on his temps. (I guess that my ideas are rubbing off on him..LOL). Sorry Bob!!
Anyways, we had a great session and it went real smoothly too. The session lasted 6 hrs from start to finish including clean up! We started at 8 AM and I was home by 2:45. (I live about 30 minutes from him or so).

Also, I have decided to provide a monthly newsletter featuring homebrewing news from around the planet, tips and techniques, product reviews, interesting brewing related websites and other helpful types of information for homebrewers of all experience levels. Please consider to sign up for the newsletter and feel to ask questions! I will not share anybody's email information with anyone or any company and you can opt out at any time. I will start delivering the newsletter when I get at least 15 people signed up. I just started it this week. If you have any questions about the newsletter and or suggestions for some of the content, please feel free to ask.

In the meantime, here's a few pics of yesterday's brew session at Bob's place!
A side shot at Bob's updated home brewery.
Here's another angle of it. Note the new plumbing and other upgrades!

Here's a shot at my malt mill that was used to crack the grains.

Below you can see the HLT full of water being heated to the desired temperature by 2 homemade Heat Sticks make by Bob. They work very well!

Here's Bob displaying one of his his homemade Heat Sticks!

A peek under the hood of the mash tun reveils the sparging in progress.

Here's the wort coming up to a boil.
Chilling the wort. The cooler has a bunch of ice and water and the cold water is circulated
by a small aquarium pump inside the cooler, through the wort chiller then back to the cooler.


Racking the cooled wort into the fermenter.


Notice how clear the wort is!

Well that's all for now...please consider signing up for the new newsletter..and as always, if you have any questions....please ask! I'd love to hear from you!
Cheers...
(_)3