Single Tier Stand Build

[FrozenInTime]

Getting quite the set-up going there. I'm green with envy dog!

[D_Rabbit]

Ok, Here is inaugural brew day for the single tier stand. I will have to break it up in to several posts to get the pictures on here but will give a play by play after each picture.

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Adding the strike water to the keggle through my filter. Took almost no time at all to get 5 gallons in there and heating.

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Grains weighed and made my cousin do the tough work of milling them.

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Mashed in. My mash in temp was about 3 degrees high so we stirred it for about 5 minutes and added a little bit of cold water to bring it down to 156. Here is where we encountered our first hiccup of the day with the system. For some reason my mash wouldn't start to drain so my cousin came up with the idea of pushing some of the sparge water through the out valve and hopefully clearing the line. It worked great and I was able vorlauf and than plug it back in to the pump and start sparging and transfering to the BK. 1 HUGE issue after that was all human error and had nothing to do with my system. When I removed the out cam lock from the in mash tun (from doing the reverse thing) I forgot to turn off the out valve from the HLT. I ended up putting the hose down in my sanitation bucket and didn't realize the HLT valve was still opened until I dumped about 4 gallons of the sparge water out. Took us an extra 30 minutes of mashing to fill the HLT and bring the water back up to sparge temp. Was a dump error that taught me a great lesson of making sure all my valves are in the right position.... off or on when they should be!

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All set up and ready to start transfer from mash tun to BK and also to start fly sparging.

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This picture came out great! Shows my fly sparging and the transfer to the BK. I filled the BK from the valve port on the bottom.

To be continued.....

[D_Rabbit]

Page 2 continued......

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All filled up and ready to boil. I learned that I need to fill up my BK a little more than I used to or I will need to add some cold water to the fermenter once completed. Ended up with about 5.1 gallons of beer instead of 5.5.

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Hot break is going on so I am standing guard. Hot Break got a little out of control. Realized I can turn my burners down to almost the lowest settings once the boil is reached and it will keep a nice rolling boil.

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Hops going in.

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Brew day hose adjustments

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Hooking up the chiller

to be continued.....

[D_Rabbit]

Page 3, the exciting conclusion......

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Recirculating through the chiller. Worked great for the first 10-15 minutes but than it stalled out around 80 degrees. Couldn't get it below that so I just said screw it and put it in to the fermenter.

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Got the temp down over night to 70 while sitting in the brew closet and dumped my yeast. around 6-8 hours after pitching I was starting to see some activity.

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The following morning I had to add on a blow off tube because it was going nuts!!

Temp got up to around 76 due to the fast fermentation but I surrounded it with some ice and turned the AC a little colder and the temp started going back down.

Overall the brew day was a success and I am very pleased with it. Being the person I am, and I am sure almost all of you are, there are definitely some minor modifications I can make to the routine to make it smoother. Also, I wasn't able to use my conical as planned due to a small leak that I wasn't able to get stopped prior to tranferring to the carboy. My cousin and I are going to work on a rolling stand for the carboy so I can bring it out in the garage to fill and than bring inside and mount when ready. That is a project for another time though

[Inkleg]

Woo Hoo on your first brew day Dan. Huge thanks for taking us along with all the pictures.

A few questions.
What did the neighbors think of "the meth lab"?
And what are the MrBeer cans on the tote in the driveway for?

[D_Rabbit]

My neighbor to my left actually pulled up a lawn chair and he and his wife hung out for a few hours chatting and eating chili. Most of the neighbors love it and will stop over to see what I'm making since most of them know I brew. Others walk by with their dogs and try to peek in without making eye contact to see what's up. Halloween is going to have candy for kids and red solo cups for parents! Hehe

The Mr. Beer cans are old cans I still had around that I gave to my cousin. He bought a Mr. Beer setup on clearance for $5. I gave him a can of Pilsner and 3 cans of Oktoberfest. Told him I'll give him some dme and some hops for a little messing around if he wants too. It's nice having an inventory finally.

[poodie]

Nice!

That is very similar to my rig. I used punched angle instead of strut but it is VERY close. I love mine.

I do need to rebuild my control panel after adding the second pump.

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[Inkleg]

Nice rig poodie. So I take it you don't MrBeer it anymore?

[poodie]

Nice rig poodie. So I take it you don't MrBeer it anymore?

Thanks! It is a RIMS setup.

It has been a loooooong time since I used a MB kit. Probably 6-7 years.

[D_Rabbit]

Nice set up! I need to figure out a RIMS I think. I am not the handiest but am typically pretty good with electrical stuff. Think I need to raise my burners up 1 notch too as I feel the flame gets around the keggle at this point too. But I have only done one run on it so far. Another brew planned in the near future as my kegerator is getting low.

[poodie]

Nice set up! I need to figure out a RIMS I think. I am not the handiest but am typically pretty good with electrical stuff. Think I need to raise my burners up 1 notch too as I feel the flame gets around the keggle at this point too. But I have only done one run on it so far. Another brew planned in the near future as my kegerator is getting low.

It is funny how similar our builds are.

Yea, looking at where you have your burners I would say you could easily move them up. I only get flame outside the kettle when it is windy.

I tried a HERMS but could not get the plumbing sealed so I switched. I have a 120 element. I wish I had 240 but I don't have it wired. I can't really do step mashes with my element. It takes too long to get a temperature rise but once it is there it holds it. I found the wiring diagram online. I was amazed I got it right.

Here is a pic from the back. You can see the RIMS tube. I picked it up from Brewhardware. It is a sweet design.

[Jon]

Beautiful rigs, Rabbit and Poodie.

Rabbit, I'm looking forward to seeing how your rig evolves with future brews!

[D_Rabbit]

Definitely picking up some ideas from Poodies build that I can possibly incorporate in to my stand

[RayF]

Very nice build! I'm going to use a clunky old table my wife was going to throw out for my stand for now.