Bulldog brewer unpacking(and hopefully soon brewday pics)

[Kharnynb]

So I finally got enough of the long waits on my stove and managed to score a cheap(ish) bulldog brewer and got it delivered this week.

here's some unboxing pics already

this is the newer version with sparge plate and steel wort chiller.

 

[Kharnynb]

Brewday:
Today brewing a german style pilsner which i brewed before as a first brew, pretty basic pilsner with saaz and hallertau.

First cleaned and assembled the brewer:

 

[Kharnynb]

Heating mashing water, adding grains, everything going well and quite nice and fast.

 

[Pkrd]

Nice. Is that a Klarstein knockoff with an external pump?

You really brewing over carpet?

 

[Kharnynb]

It's very similar indeed, the pump is external, it's basically a very cheap version of this kind of device.

Brewing over carpet as our fuses in the kitchen aren't upgraded yet.....

 

[Kharnynb]

mashing out and sparging done, everything working nice so far.

 

[Kharnynb]

came to the boil in under 20 minutes from 60 celcius, not too shabby...

 

[Kharnynb]

first lesson learned, don't use the malt pipe as a hopbag....it doesn't stop pellet hops from going around and it causes a mess of dried up hops around the edges...

 

[Kharnynb]

Next brewday more pictures, the mess from using the maltpipe as a hopbag caused me extra work that stopped me from doing photo's....next time....

There was more evaporation than expected, also ended up with a bit less volume due to losses from junk on the filters.

Other than that, a decent brewday, gotta finetune the profile a bit.

 

[SprocketFuel]

Ordered mine today will get it tomorrow.
Malt pipe defo needs to come out for the boil, it would be a massive heat sink too.

 

[kh54s10]

I wonder how long that tiny little pump is going to last??

Other than that -NICE!

Good thing you didn't have a boil over!!!

 

[Kharnynb]

no boil over, though removing the malt pipe will reduce the risk of boil over even more.

have to make a better hop spider or something similar to get a less messy brew day.

 

[SprocketFuel]

I've got two brews done on mine now and only minor issues.
First day hop pellets straight in for the boil, blocked the screen so couldn't use the pump for my hop stand or transferring.
second brew i used leaf in a bag so no issues with the pump.
I've ordered a hop spider so i can get back to pellets.
Also ran some silicone tube to the sarge plate to prevent splashing

 

[Kharnynb]

Same, Ordered a simple stainless spider last week and should be cleaner to brew now.

 

[SprocketFuel]

spider arrived yesterday absolutely battered

2 out of 3 brews now I've had to siphon from the top, the tap is useless if you use pellets. Leafs in a bag are fine

 

[Kharnynb]

My spider arrived a bit bent, but easy enough to straighten, got one from ebay that was 18 euro's with shipping, one step above the really basic ones.

going to try next weekend, but it looks like a good fit.

 

[Kharnynb]

some pics from my latest brewday with hopspider now....much easier and better, hitting my volume and og to within 2 points.