Rik van den berg
https://www.instagram.com/odrbrewing/
My first brew on my 20G Unibrau was a 5 gallon pale ale. I was trying to get my feet wet without running the risk of effin' up 10 gallons of beer.
I Pretty much winged my way through it. I "graduated" from a 3 vessel system with plastic coolers and a keggle so this one vessel setup it still very new. On my 5 gallon batch I:
Today, months later, I did a 10 gallon batch of Rye IPA. (Target 1.056). This beer has a 24.5 LB Grain bill. I decided to use Beer and BBQ Larry's spreadsheet for this one. I got my equipment profile dialed in as best I could and got a total water volume of 15.5 Gallons. Thinking we're basically doing a BIAB I dumped all the water in the pot and after dough in I had a total volume of 18.5 Gallons in the pot.
When I bought the Unibrau I decided to get the Blichmann Brew Commander in stead of the Unibrau controller. Happy I did, its really nice. Still learning on that one as well though. I did a two step sparge. 60 Min at 156 and then a 10min mash out at 168. After the 60 min the Brew Commander showed "ramp up" with a timer, which I mistakenly thought was the 10 min 168 timer. But instead, when it hit 168 it started that 10 min timer so I guess I ended up with an 80 minute mash..
After the mash I ended up with a 13.5 Preboil volume and a gravity of 1.047, which at the time I thought was pretty good. The 240V Unibrau got to a boil quickly and once it got to a rolling boil, I reduced the power to 80%. After a 60 minute boil I ended up with 11.5 Gallons which is a hefty 2 gallons boil off per hour. I got exactly 10 gallons in the fermenter with a 1.051 specific gravity, 5 points below target..
All in all a successful brew day despite the lower efficiency.. I did use a grain bill that I designed for my old 3 vessel system so I probably have to adjust it for this system. With that long mash and a continuous recirculation I would think that I sucked all the sugars out of those grains.
The Unibrau hop screen is a piece of crap. Clogs up like no other. I had to continually scrape it with a spoon.. the flow stopped the moment I stopped scraping..
For the seasoned Unibrau users: how do you do a 10 gallon batch with a higher grain bill or a 15 or even 20 gal batch? I Can't see how you would fit all that water and the larger grain bill in this 20 gallon pot. Do you add more water after you remove the grain basket?
I welcome 2 cent's, comments and answers!
I Pretty much winged my way through it. I "graduated" from a 3 vessel system with plastic coolers and a keggle so this one vessel setup it still very new. On my 5 gallon batch I:
- had a 12 lb grain bill
- started with 7.2 G of water
- Fly sparged
- went for a Target of 5 gallons in the fermenter at 1.056 OG.
- ended up with 3.5Gallons at 1.080 (!!!)
- Reverted back to my extract days and added 1.5 gallons of water to end up with that 1.056 gravity.
- The beer was meh..
Today, months later, I did a 10 gallon batch of Rye IPA. (Target 1.056). This beer has a 24.5 LB Grain bill. I decided to use Beer and BBQ Larry's spreadsheet for this one. I got my equipment profile dialed in as best I could and got a total water volume of 15.5 Gallons. Thinking we're basically doing a BIAB I dumped all the water in the pot and after dough in I had a total volume of 18.5 Gallons in the pot.
When I bought the Unibrau I decided to get the Blichmann Brew Commander in stead of the Unibrau controller. Happy I did, its really nice. Still learning on that one as well though. I did a two step sparge. 60 Min at 156 and then a 10min mash out at 168. After the 60 min the Brew Commander showed "ramp up" with a timer, which I mistakenly thought was the 10 min 168 timer. But instead, when it hit 168 it started that 10 min timer so I guess I ended up with an 80 minute mash..
After the mash I ended up with a 13.5 Preboil volume and a gravity of 1.047, which at the time I thought was pretty good. The 240V Unibrau got to a boil quickly and once it got to a rolling boil, I reduced the power to 80%. After a 60 minute boil I ended up with 11.5 Gallons which is a hefty 2 gallons boil off per hour. I got exactly 10 gallons in the fermenter with a 1.051 specific gravity, 5 points below target..
All in all a successful brew day despite the lower efficiency.. I did use a grain bill that I designed for my old 3 vessel system so I probably have to adjust it for this system. With that long mash and a continuous recirculation I would think that I sucked all the sugars out of those grains.
The Unibrau hop screen is a piece of crap. Clogs up like no other. I had to continually scrape it with a spoon.. the flow stopped the moment I stopped scraping..
For the seasoned Unibrau users: how do you do a 10 gallon batch with a higher grain bill or a 15 or even 20 gal batch? I Can't see how you would fit all that water and the larger grain bill in this 20 gallon pot. Do you add more water after you remove the grain basket?
I welcome 2 cent's, comments and answers!