Stepheweizen 2.0

Ingredients-
Grain-
4.5 lbs Malted Wheat
4.0 lbs 2 Row Pale Malt

Hops-
1 oz Fuggles @ 60
1 oz Fuggles @ 10
 Yeast-
Hefeweizen Ale WLP 300

 OG: 1.059
FG: 1.018
ABV: 5.4%
Collected: 4.5 Gallons
Efficiency: 82%

 30DEC2012- This was a last minute brew after church. Stopped by the brew store down the street and grabbed some yeast. I thought I had some hops left over at my house but was out, so I stole some from the recipe Randy and I are doing on New Years Day. I'll need to get some more before then. Smooth brewing, no hiccups.

15JAN2013- Transferred to secondary and cold crashed over night. Transferred to keg this morning. Fresh, light Hefeweizen with some mildly strong banana flavors.

Another Simple IPA

Grain:

13 lbs 2 Row Pale Malt
1.5 lbs Victory
1.5 lbs Munich
1 lb Crystal 40L

Hops:
2.5 oz CTZ @ 60
1.5 oz CTZ @ 30
1 oz Cascade @ 15
2 oz Cascade @ 5

Yeast:
Safale-05

OG: 1.066
FG:

19NOV2012- I calibrated and added volume marks to my boil kettle sight glass. This helped me get some exact numbers. At 0 minutes I had 8.7 gallons in the kettle. After sending everything through the chiller ended up with 7.5 gallons. That's a lot of wort loss. But whatever, 1.066 is a good IPA and I'm excited to see how this turns out.

Winter Seasonal (7.5 Gallon batch)

Ingredients:

Grain:
15 lbs 2 Row Pale Malt
1.5 lbs Crystal 120L
12 oz Crystal 80L
3 oz Roasted Barley

Hops:
1.5 oz CTZ @ 60
0.75 oz Cascade @ 60
1.5 oz Cascade @ 30
0.75 oz Cascade @ 5

Yeast:
Safale-04 English Ale in 5 Gallons
Safale-05 American Ale in 2.5 gallons

OG: 1.068
FG:


10NOV2012- Brewing went well again without a hitch. I decided to start doing seven and a half gallon batches so I can Keg five for myself and bottle two and a half to give away. I'm not a big fan of doing ten gallon batches, being careful of boil overs and having to bottle a full five gallons. I think this will work out nicely. We'll see if I like it and keep it up if it works out.

I'm not sure how much I collected as I ran out of fermentation vessels and had to use a carboy for the five gallon portion. I know it's at least five and a half gallons but it could be closer to six. Ended up with exactly two and a half in the other. Can't wait for this to be ready.

Mashing:

Cooling:

Mini CDA (2 gallon Batch)

Ingredients:

Grain:
6 lbs 2 Row pale malt
6 oz Roasted Barley (500L)

Hops:

0.5 oz CTZ @ 60
2 oz Cascade @ 5

Yeast:
Pacman Slurry

OG: 1.080
FG:

03NOV2012: This batch was done on the mini system. Basically a 4 gallon pot and a 3 gallon beverage cooler mash tun. Before homebrew club I heated the strike water and mashed in. The cooler is small enough that even when full it's easy to tote around so I just put it in my car and mashed on the way over to Andy's. Brewing while driving, never done that before. Everything went well and is in the basement fermenting away. (hopefully, I haven't gone down to check yet.)

Radical RIPA (Rye IPA)

 Ingredients-

Grain: 
9 lbs 2 Row Pale Malt 
1 lb Rye Malt
1 lb Crystal 20L

Hops:
1.5 oz CTZ @ 60
1 oz Cascade @ 30
3 oz Cascade @ 5
2 oz of some unlabeled hop from my freezer @ 5
0.5 oz Northern Brewer @ 5

Yeast:
Safale-05

Additives:
2 ml of 88% Lactic Acid to Mash (brought down to a pH of 5.2) 

Wort collected: 4.5 gallons
OG: 1.076
FG:


28OCT2012-I lost about a gallon of wort to hops. I previously used a hop spider and would pull it out and let it drain the fluid out of them at the end of the boil. With the new hop stopper I'm using they remain soaked after everything is drained and I lost a gallon. If I would have had that gallon it would put me at 93% efficiency, without it I'm at 76%. Need to figure something out to fix that. Brew day went super smooth. New system is still working perfectly. Enjoying brewing again and loving not fighting things on my system.

Hand Crank Crush IPA

Ingredients-

Grain:
10lbs 2 Row Pale Malt
1 lb Crystal 20L
1 lb Munich
1 lb Victory

Hops:
1 oz CTZ @ 60
1 oz CTZ @ 30
3 oz Cascade @ 5

Yeast:
WLP-01 California Ale

Additives:
3.5 ml of 88% Lactic Acid to Mash (brought down to a pH of 5.2) 

5.5 Gallons Collected
OG: 1.076
FG:
Brewhouse Effeciency: 89%


12OCT2012- Steph wanted to crush the grain with the hand crank instead of hooking up the drill. I weighed it all out and she cranked through all 13 pounds of it, hence the name. Steph also wanted to be able to hang out on Saturday so she asked me if I would brew Friday night last minute. Started brewing at 7:00pm, finished just before midnight. 

Almost there

Wiring the control panel is done (besides the volt and amp meter)
After much headache all the plumbing and leak testing of the kettles is finished.
All to do is install the GFCi breaker and plug, wire the element plugs and mount the control panel.