Hi all,
Just wanted to share that I just did my first BIAB over the xmas holiday, and how it went. Maybe someone can learn from my mistakes. The beer is still in the fermenter, so I don't know how it turned out yet.
First mistake was during the mash. Heat up the strike water to 72deg using my new eletric urn and doughed in. Turned the urn down to 60deg on the thermostat as a "keep it warm" setting. Checked the mash 10 minutes later, and it was up around 80deg - not good! Seems like the thermostat isn't very accurate. It probably killed most of the enzymes, because I got horrible efficiency (~50%). I tried to recover some kind of sugar by squeezing and doing a kind of mini sparge/rinse of the grains. Managed to get it to 60%ish. It probably didn't help that the grains were not milled particularly finely by the LHBS. I ended up adding 300g of dex to the fermenter to try and bring the OG up.
Other good learning points:
Rubber gloves would have been good for the squeezing of the bag..
The bag was far heavier than I thought it would be - I will make some kind of gantry next time.
I won't trust the thermostat next time, I will just insulate the urn with some left over hot water cylinder wrap.
Last one - don't put your spent grains in the garden right next to your front door. Every time we leave the house, it is like something from that Hitchcock movie! We must have the fattest sparrows in NZ living at our place.
Cheers
Craig
Post #2 made 12 years ago
Craig,
Congratulations on your first BIAB!
We have all had some tough brew days. Chalk it up to experience, and you still got some beer out of it
Get a decent thermometer, and use it.
Use the heat during the mash only if the mash temp falls below your target(but beware of the overshoot. A few degrees is not necessarily reason to panic.)
Insulate, insulate, insulate.
Also a good basic set of directions in the comentary.http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=190
trout
Congratulations on your first BIAB!
We have all had some tough brew days. Chalk it up to experience, and you still got some beer out of it
Good points there.Other good learning points:
Rubber gloves would have been good for the squeezing of the bag..
The bag was far heavier than I thought it would be - I will make some kind of gantry next time.
I won't trust the thermostat next time, I will just insulate the urn with some left over hot water cylinder wrap.
Get a decent thermometer, and use it.
Use the heat during the mash only if the mash temp falls below your target(but beware of the overshoot. A few degrees is not necessarily reason to panic.)
Insulate, insulate, insulate.
Also a good basic set of directions in the comentary.http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=190
trout
Last edited by 2trout on 08 Jan 2014, 10:20, edited 2 times in total.
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Post #3 made 12 years ago
craiggynz wrote:Last one - don't put your spent grains in the garden right next to your front door. Every time we leave the house, it is like something from that Hitchcock movie! We must have the fattest sparrows in NZ living at our place.
Welcome to the forum Craig 
.You'll find a lot of stuff on this site that you won't find anywhere else and one of these things is a real emphasis on how you can't rely on a single thermometer or thermostat. Here's one post as an example.
Another important thing is to always agitate/stir your strike water or wort well before taking it's temperature.
One more thing Craig, 72 degrees is a very high strike temperature for nearly any BIAB brew, no matter what the mash temperature. Before your next brew, maybe start your brew plan from scratch here. You'll get the best of help and avoid a heap of errors that are made from a lack of quality advice.
PP
[I'm going to be very erratic in the time I have available to spend here in the next three or so weeks so the above may be all I am able to contribute here.]
Last edited by PistolPatch on 08 Jan 2014, 20:16, edited 2 times in total.
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Post #4 made 12 years ago
Welcome to the forum Craig... don't worry the first brew is always the scariest.
As PP said, 72 degrees sounds too high. You should probably be closer to 68 or 69.
Don't bother trying to use the thermostat to keep the temperature stable, it fluctuates and just wont work. Make sure you get your strike temperature correct then just use insulation like towels and sleeping bags to maintain it. Its summer in NZ, so you probably wouldn't lose more than a couple of degrees over 60 minutes and this really wont make any difference at all.
Definitely get the thickest pair of rubber gloves you can find, then buy a second and maybe a third set. I have them all around the shed so that there is a pair close by what ever you are doing.
As PP said, 72 degrees sounds too high. You should probably be closer to 68 or 69.
Don't bother trying to use the thermostat to keep the temperature stable, it fluctuates and just wont work. Make sure you get your strike temperature correct then just use insulation like towels and sleeping bags to maintain it. Its summer in NZ, so you probably wouldn't lose more than a couple of degrees over 60 minutes and this really wont make any difference at all.
Definitely get the thickest pair of rubber gloves you can find, then buy a second and maybe a third set. I have them all around the shed so that there is a pair close by what ever you are doing.
Post #5 made 12 years ago
Hi everyone,
Thanks for your replies and advice. I did a second BIAB this weekend just been and wanted to follow up this post.
I took on all the advice and things went really well this time. Strike at 68deg which came down to 66 at dough in. Hit all the recipe numbers, great smelling and tasting wort at the end, and 82% efficiency. I made an insulating blanket out of hot water cylinder wrap, and I only lost a couple of degrees in a 90 minute mash. Overall, a big improvement on last time. Now I have a happily burping fermenter in the garage!
I'll let you know how they both turn out - the first batch will be ready to try this week.
Cheers!
Thanks for your replies and advice. I did a second BIAB this weekend just been and wanted to follow up this post.
I took on all the advice and things went really well this time. Strike at 68deg which came down to 66 at dough in. Hit all the recipe numbers, great smelling and tasting wort at the end, and 82% efficiency. I made an insulating blanket out of hot water cylinder wrap, and I only lost a couple of degrees in a 90 minute mash. Overall, a big improvement on last time. Now I have a happily burping fermenter in the garage!
I'll let you know how they both turn out - the first batch will be ready to try this week.
Cheers!
