All brewed out

September 13, 2010

Phew, I’m exhausted after a beer-filled weekend (and it didn’t even involve much drinking) – first was the brew gear building man-fest on Saturday morning, followed by gear cleaning on Saturday afternoon, beer bottling on Saturday night, brew preparation on Sunday morning and finally brewing on my new set-up on Sunday afternoon.

Here’s some pics of my new all-grain gear. The hot-liquor tun is a 37L stainless pot – I’m currently heating this on a 3-ring burner but will soon be putting in an electric element. Mash-tun is a 10 gallon Rubbermaid drinks cooler – picked up half-price (though still quite expensive). It currently has a looped piece of braided hose which may be shortened to a single loop depending on performance. My kettle is a 54L stainless pot heated on the 3-ring burner. And last of all is the massive immersion chiller made from 15 metres of copper with stainless barbs simply hammered in the ends and hose fittings – no brazing required.

A few more bits and pieces and it will be all be complete – thanks to realbeer.co.nz members Dale, Greydog and Evan for your help in getting this set-up. The recipe is a NZ Pale Ale which may be entered in the SOBA 2010 Homebrewing competition, all going well.