barrel aged project

[Hop Bomb]

That's some impressive krausen there Tom!

[montofk]

hey look at that... I'm guessing I now know what a thrumometer is.
very nice... It did cross my mind to take some pics as I was going but didn't.
Have to say I had a fairly impressive krausen myself this morning....  (why does that sound dodgy?)  but admittedly not as large as Tom's...  (??!!)
may take a pic this evening if it's still up.

[barkar]

I think i loaded these correctly

17kg + of grain

mashtun and Tesco kettle herms doing its thing, you will notice the difference in the two temps, top one is in the belly of the mash , the other controls the temp on the herms , after a couple of minutes of recirculation it corrects itself 65c was dialled in for the 90minutes

No pictures of inside the tun unfortuntely but , it pretty much took up a whole 80 litre tun

Heres a pic of new hop plant given to me by Tom from letterkenny- Nugget 3 weeks from a rhizome , not bad eh 

Last one of the og, came in 98- 100 ish

[eanna]

Hows the fermentation going Enda?

[DrowningManatee]

http://imgur.com/a/huLUr#0

first time uploading images so hope this works,

bottled two brews (one for housemates first brew), transferred one to secondary, and brewed this bad boy, then brewed another lager kit got for 1/2 in bargain bin at HBW next day.

I think the hop sack was bad idea for the superhopped brew but live and learn. took forever to get the hops in, and ill have to wreck it gettin it back out. just need one o them racking wands for next time.

was gonna steep some grains in seperate pot but realised they'd be touching the bottom and thought this could be bad so stuck em all in, really reduced the volume when i took em out, but just as well as 4.5 kg LME went in after. (steeped brown malt for 50min, others 30)

came in at 1.07, this is a regular occurence when i try high gravity so im doing something wrong, i dont really do that whirlpool thing, i just pour through a strainer (its been cooled to 35C at this stage), but dont see how that could affect it.

i just added 1kg demerara to the stout today after its fermentation subsided a bit to bring up the gravity, should bring it up to 1.087.

[Kevco5]

If you're doing a partial boil, cool, take a gravity reading and top up with water until you reach your desired OG.
It could be that you're adding too much water. Ie adding water to your desired volume and not taking into account system losses such as boil off rates and hop soakage.

[DrowningManatee]

must be that aright. the balls with partial boils is that youre hitting a desired temp when mixing with cold water, so you have to plan your volume accordingly, Ill just do smaller brews from now on, trying to do one a week these days so dont need so many bottles from each one anyways... you'd think the recipe's (which i use as a guide to plan my own) would account for the hop soakage etc,
cheers

[Bubbles]

All,

The publishing team are currently look at the best ways of documenting the NHC's fantastic "Barrel Project". We've decided to create and publish a series of articles on the project over the next 6 months or so.

The series will cover technical aspects of aging beer in barrels, purchase and delivery of the said items as well as a report from each individual club barrel at various stages of the process.

To achieve this aim, we will need a nominated representative from each barrel project who is willing to supply us with the necessary information like recipe, barrel siting, filling, tasting notes, competition success etc. Photos would be great too, if you have any. If you're interested in being your project's rep, can you attach your name to the thread below?

http://nationalhomebrewclub.com/forum/index.php/topic,2611.0.html

Many thanks,
Conor.

[Hop Bomb]

We talked about what to do with the barrel after this brew at the last meet. What about setting it aside for a lambic? It'd be a lot of work keeping it topped up but you could brew 200 litres to start & leave it as long as you can hold out. Then brew another 100 litres every year & take a 100 litres out so you'd be getting beer to bottle/drink/cellar plus get a blend in the barrel for future & make it a gueuze.

I dont know what the correct wood is for this or even if its possible considering it was a whiskey cask. Just thinking out loud.

[St. Fursey]

Great idea. I'd hate to see the barrel go to waste. Oak barrels are  traditionally used for lambics. It would also be a way of using old hops as lambics use aged hops for their preservative effects rather than for bittering or aroma. We could have some seriously good traditional lambic style beer in a couple of years

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk 2

[St. Fursey]

Any volunteers for doing an article on our barrel brew?

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk 2

[Hop Bomb]

Il be sitting in a van on tour for 18 days from next week so Il have a lot of free time.

[Hop Bomb]

Barrel has been emptied. Its gorgeous! Lambic is in the barrel now. Im sure the lads with the cameras will post pics here.

[Hop Bomb]

Lambic is in the barrel now.

Already? Did ye rinse the barrel out before filling?

Are we seen as the "special cases" or something? Of course we washed it out!  Our transfer method was a thing of beauty also.

Auto syphon -> solar pump -> beer line -> corny disconnect -> down the diptube & into the bottom of co2 purged cornies.  Transfer was slow but worth it. No excess oxidation for our baby. 

[Frequent Sequence]

Congrats lads. Feckin' class project. I wish I could have come out to watch the action.  I'd love to see the pics.

Seán