Hi,

I'm a new brewer from Christchurch, New Zealand. I learned about the site from the Basic Brewing Radio podcast, and it seems like a very educational forum.

I've done two extract brews, an APA which I think is delicious but not quite fizzy enough for me, and currently have a simple wheat beer in the fermenter. I work full time.

Hi all,

Ed from Perth, WA. Been brewing for a while but was only ever able to do small batch BIAB due to kettle limitations. Have just got hold of a 40L electric urn so its time to step up.

Lots of great info here and have enjoyed reading and learning in the past. Hope to be able to contribute more form now on.

Cheers

Hello newtestleper and Hello John and Hello Ed,

Welcome to the forum.

@John
you might be interested in this thread http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php ... +brown+ale. Rigging65 was asking about an English Brown Ale and as I'm trying to develop a recipe myself I chipped in. I did something not dissimilar to your recipe, and just bottled it tonight but I wasn't happy with the colour - turned out more like an Amber Ale than a Brown for me It would be great if you could post on that thread and let us know how your recipe turns out when its done. I will now work on Mark II and I'll post on there once I'm getting somewhere. Might be nice to do a crowd source on a brew... Or at least some rough percentages for a grain bill.

Happy brewing, and good luck to you all

Hi all, new user from UK.

Making the step up from making kit, have 2 extract brews to make over the weekend, then will be getting on to BIAB.

Looking forward to seeing the difference in quality

Thanks guys, really looking forward to giving it a go.

Someone I know likened it to making a meal using ingredients, instead of a premade jar of sauce, and as a former chef this is something that appeals to me.

Evening All.
I'm Del from Gravesend,Kent,UK. I've been looking at this site for a couple of weeks. I got a 70L kettle and gas ring today and will have a go next week. IPA at 5.5 -6% alc is My aim.
I'll write soon and let you all know how it went. hop-head

Good morning, i've been brewing kits and wine for around two years. I recently picked up a 20L burco boiler which i hope to use for BIAB and Maxi-BIAB if i ever need a larger batch... I don't drink much really, I bottled up about 120pints in april and have at least 100 left!

Hi
I am a displaced Kiwi living in Philly (or Philadelphia PA, USA).
I have become somewhat obsessed with beer lately, and am very much enjoying the fruits of our local craft breweries.

I have been making bread for my neighbors over the last couple of years, and have decided it is time to get off the fence a make an effort myself to make my own. Love the IPA style which I understand lends itself to the BIAB system, so am keen to get underway. I am just going through the education path at the moment, but hoping to get the first brew underway by the end of next month.

Thanks

Hello fellow brewers,

I live in San Diego and got back into homebrewing when I quit my day job a few years ago to become self-employed. I am a woodwind musician, private teacher, and technician. I started brewing from a kit years ago and made a few good batches but didn't have the time to get back into it until a few years ago when I found myself making a lot less money and having a lot more free time. I quickly jumped into all grain and realized I was hooked so I did lots of research to find out about different processes and styles of brewing to see which was best suited for me. My approach to brewing that ultimately led me to the biab forums and adopting my own modified BIAB process resulted in my personal philosophy about what I wanted in my beer and the brewing process:

I love beer and drink plenty of it but buying it all the time gets expensive. I was also tired of storing bottles and cans and messing around with recycling. I wanted to find a simple process that didn't require expensive equipment or a computer and I wanted a simple and relatively quick brew day. Also I didn't want to compromise on quality if at all possible.

My first all grain 5 gallon system was pretty typical: square cooler, round cooler, immersion coil, glass carboy, and a fresh vial of yeast for every batch. Also one keg, one 5 lb co2 tank, one small kegerator. After several batches of varying results, I discovered BIAB and yeast washing in my research and realized this was probably more my style.

To jump ahead to my current process, I wanted to offer a few tips that I have discovered for anyone else who was like me and scoured the forums for ways to make cheap and delicious beer without a lot of expensive equipment or spending all day doing it, and with minimal maintenance.

My current set-up is a 10-gallon BIAB no-chill system. Here is my system:

I have a 21 gallon boil kettle with a large bag from wilsen brewer. I use a rope ratchet to hoist the bag before the boil. I don't use the metal basket that came with the kettle. I used to use a corona mill to grind my grain but having just bought a barley crusher with twin rollers I have noticed a huge improvement in some key areas: With the corona mill, it created a lot of dust which led to lots of clumping during mash in and I probably had some dough balls even though I stirred a lot. Hoisting the bag before the boil was a pain because the bag wouldn't drain very well so I always had some spill-over down the sides of the kettle. Also, the beers were pretty hazy and took a long time to clear up. The crusher solved all of these problems and clarity improved remarkably along with efficiency. I spent $160 on a quality barley crusher from Millar and it was totally worth it. Corona mills are cheap but crushing 25 lbs of grain took forever and overheated my cordless drill and two rechargeable batteries before I could even finish. After several batches I am convinced that the grinding action of a corona mill creates too much dust.

I also use a no-chill system with two 5 gallon plastic Winpak containers, thus eliminating all of the time and equipment for wort cooling. I make a 10.5 gallon batch so that the extra half gallon can be used for a starter (I started re-using and storing yeast and can make a ton of beer from one vial of yeast). The wort sits in the containers until the starter is ready. I also made a stir plate and use a 2L erlenmeyer flask.

When the starter is ready I pour each winpak into a 6.5 gallon plastic bucket fermenter from as high as I can to aerate somewhat. I am still trying to hone this skill to minimize spillage.

I made a cheap yet functional fermentation chamber from a mini fridge I bought on craigslist for $40. I removed the door and propped it against a wall, then cut up a few sheets of insulation board to create an extension between the main fridge and the door. I pushed the fridge against the edges of the board which pushed against the door and used wedges to adjust height here and there to eliminate cracks. It has no frame or sealant but it works well. I use a regular johnson thermostat.

I also bought a full size fridge on CL for like $100 to use as a crash cool and aging chamber. I can fit two fermenting buckets, two corny kegs, and a 10 lb co2 tank inside. Of course I also attached a beer tap to the door just in case I wanted to tap a keg. I also have a separate mini-fridge sized kegerator which houses 1 keg and a 5 lb co2 tank.

I have recently adopted a two-step process where I brew a 10-gallon batch and then before I get ready to keg it I brew another 10 gallons to have waiting so I can pour the second batch right on top of the yeast cakes from the first batch. This eliminates the time/process of making a starter on every other batch and it works great. Then after that I can harvest yeast and store it while having 20 gallons in the works which should last me for a month or two. I have also noticed that crash cooling for one to two weeks is optimal and creates a much clearer beer although it is of course hard to wait this long if you are out of beer and thirsty!

I am making some great beers now with the help of Beersmith and figured my cost of ingredients to be around $28.80 per ten gallons of delicious beer.

Hope this helps someone else out there as I learned a lot from these forums myself.

Cheers!

Hello y'all

My name is João Quirino and I hail from Aveiro, Portugal.

I stumbled upon this site on my research into becoming a brewer!

I think it's an awesome resource for people to study and increase their knowledge, it's well organized, explicit and provides great information for advanced and beginning users.

I haven't brewed once so far I am still collecting information, and making a checklist of materials I need. I live in a small apartment so I have to be smart about space usage.

I work as a microbiologist in a pharmaceutical company. I am a pharmacist by formation.

Hope you guys are well and hope I can learn a lot from you

Hello João,

Microbiologist? I'm sure you will be a very handy person to have around in future! BIAB is a great choice for small scale brewing in your apartment. One word of advice on buying stuff, just make sure that everything that you buy first is essential to BIAB brewing. For instance I bought a cooler for a mash-tun before I discovered BIAB, and I now have a $60 bottling bucket. "Essential" or not is of course in itself a judgement call on your part. You will find discussion on that on this site: http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php ... +equipment, you may have checked that already but just in case. Have a good look around here before you invest too much money in purchasing equipment, and that will help you to make the wisest choices. Making your own custom bag isn't too hard either (I managed it ), and that ensures that its the right material, and a good fit for your kettle http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php ... ur+own+bag.

Hello everyone,

I brewed an extract kit beer ( John Bull I think ) around 6 years ago which was barely drinkable but I persevered due to the sheer quantity I'd made and the fact that none of my friends would help me. Turning down free beer what has the world come to?? The equipment has sat gathering dust in my garage ever since while I've been spending my time creating babies ( 3 of the little darlings! )

After tasting a brew from a friend of a friend I've decided to dust off my equipment, add some extra's to it and give it another bash. I'm awaiting delivery of a 21 litre stock pot and some voile material and I will be attempting to brew better beer on a smaller scale in a homemade bag. 2.5 gallon batches, This way if it goes wrong I've not wasted as much. If I start with the attitude that I'll fail drastically then anything other than that is a bonus!

I hope to get loads of info from this site and pose some interesting questions along the way and maybe eventually I'll be of some help to somebody!

Bongobasher

I just listened to the BIAB Podcast and am very interested in switching from my existing 3 tier AG setup to a more simplified BIAB approach.

I look forward to reading this site and determining if this might be something for me.

The real desire if I go to BIAB is to convert to an electric automated Brew setup like the Brew Boss or High gravity for a much more simplified brew day.

Cheers

Hello from the other side of the world. I am a new brewer and probably am wanting to transition from extracts to AG too soon, but extract was no challenge at all! I'm located in the Midwest USA and am an Engineer by trade so I'm somewhat after the primary source info (and this is it) and your calculators, to be completely honest!

But, for me, the batch sizes I want to do, the cost of AG versus extracts here in the states, small BIAB batches make the most sense. Modifying coolers, etc. to make mash tuns just seems a bit crazy at the 3-10 gal batch size...

I also just got a deal on a somewhat larger kettle, a 8.5 gal one.. yeah it's "small" for 10 gal batches but it seems doable for 4-4.5 gal BIAB and I want to try one. I'll have a pound or two of DME on hand in case I don't make it and need to do a partial mash.

--The Crazy One