First All Grain Brew

These look good. I think will be the first brew! Cheers mate. I don’t have a Ph meter but have my water profile from local water added. Worth making the water adjustments if I can?

Thinking of heating up the total volume with sparge water in the zilla and then transferring the extra to a esky or something.

Or should I just heat it on the stove top?

Hey Gash and everyone,

Did my first AG brew on Saturday. Went well! Brewed the recipe Gash edited higher in thread.Was almost a full day (6-7 hrs) but I was in no way rushing and just taking it easy, had the daughter (2.5yrs) helping so made it slower.

Definitely think I could get it dialed in closer to 4 or less hours.Was about 4 points under pre boil on the refrac from a few readings so I added about 170g sugar (all I had left) but then my hydro reading was about 3-4 points high into the fermenter so I think my refrac was out even though I calibrated twice ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Had some issues holding mash temp (went below 66 to 64 from display temp on unit then up to 70 after I put it up to 67 and mucked around with the burners) but the temp coming out of the pump was closer to 65/66. I put this down to maybe some gunk getting on the temp probe? I'm not too worried, got decent conversion (I think) from tasting spent grain and numbers were good.

Had a lot of chit and hop gunk under the bottom screen which felt like it lifted a little during the mash/boil. Think I mashed in a bit rough. It kinda seems like false bottom sits on top of the locking nut for the tap, like it could be a touch lower but not a massive issue, less stirring/whirlpooling next time I think. Maybe could use a grain bag for hop additions.

Included immersion chiller worked ok. Would be a good upgrade, temp probe on unit was reading 74 but internal with handheld was about 34 (hot gunk on internal probe) then couldn't be bothered waiting (getting dark) so got in fermenter fridge to cool it the rest of the way before pitching so I could clean brewzilla.

I assumed there was gunk on top of the probe and pump inlet (mine in in the center of bottom) so I emptied out of the tap (afterwards I checked and there was heaps so good choice/saved pump blockage) and left the fermenter tap open so lost a bit onto the floor but still ended up with 23L into fermenter (tipped unit up a bit) and looked clear as coming out of brewzilla unit. (whirlfloc did its job well)

Pitched at 23 at midnight but fermenter got down to 19 in a couple of hours after and has been stable since.

Wanted to say thanks for all the advice and the vids helped heaps, felt like I knew what to expect and do if something went wrong. Very relaxing brew day all in all.

Also have you ever had issues with the screens lifting? What about temp variance on the controller, I was brewing outside so maybe this affected it? See some pics below of day and set up. Sorry for the novel lol.

I think maybe the whirlpooling too vigorously might have done it. Yeah I was only using the 500w but she dropped down to 64 and 63 at one point so put both on for a
sec and then was up to 70. I think next time I'll just leave it. Is the temp probe inside accurate when mashing? Yeah mate no disasters (except for the wort on the floor but didn't lose much)

Inkbird is at a steady 19.1 and the airlock is happily bubbling away. Getting really thirsty. Gotta brew more now to build up some stocks.

I don’t know how I forgot this but when I was lifting the grain basket the lifting handle came out a couple of times and the basket dropped down.

That probably contributed to the chit and gunk in the kettle. It’s like the malt pipe expanded under heat and I probably wasn’t careful enough with lifting. Screen probably let some gunk in and also made the sparge a bit quick.

Anyways thanks again all.