Crossing to the Darkside

[Spiderwebster]

Having done a few kit brews now and pimped a few , I am finding myself looking at various A.G videos on U Tube along with naked monkeys knife fighting ....another subject.... The big question is for the people who jumped over to the otherside is .....How big a change was it from the kits ,would you ever go back etc etc , I know the question been asked before , but I have got the itch now . I am looking at the Grainfather , I have explained to the wife about the health benifits of beer e.g clear wee ,they are always on about it , plus we have been together near on 35 years and it keeps the conversations going in the marrige like " you brewing again you drunken pig " Knowing that women always hide what they are saying to confuse us simple souls must mean she loves me , I even bought her a cider kit .....Any way jokes aside looking forward to all your replys and advice.....Cheers in advance ....Excuse the spelling errors trying to type this fast ....can hear her comming down the stairs.......THOMASSSSS

 

[Clint]

Mine was...kits,part mash,ag with a picnic cooler and 2 32l boilers...
If you have the space and a hob that will heat 32 litres...then it's an option on the cheaper side. If not..get a GF or a Robo...
As going back...if I had no option I'd have to if I wanted to make beer but I'd stick to premium kits like Young's. As it stands...no.Will I get a GF or similar system....very likely.

 

[Zephyr259]

I did 3 kits over a period of 4 years then found the simple AG method here, did 4 of those (scaled up to 8L) then got a grainfather. I don't have any intention of going back, occasionally I consider an extract batch if I'm wanting to test out a yeast but then I think that a small BIAB batch would be almost as quick and cheaper, then I just do it in the grainfather anyway. :-)

People have been saying good things about the Robo Brew lately, not looked into them myself since I have my GF.

 

[pvt_ak]

I jumped from kit to AG using BIAB and a Peco and love it.
I’ve wanted a GF for ages , but to be honest my method is fairly painless so never been in a massive rush.
That said my birthday end of April is bringing me a GF and rather excited about it !!

 

[Portreath]

If I had the money I'd invest in the robo or GF, as said previously. Having said that my AG brewdays are fairly easy, and take 3 - 4 hour depending on variables. My kit experience is limited as I moved to AG after a handful of kits. My set up is simple and cheap to put together. I'd only do a kit now if something terrible happens, i.e. a troop of knife fighting monkeys ran of with my brew kit.
Happy brewdays bud.

 

[Clint]

Yeah or papa lazarou turned up....

 

[Nicks90]

Moving over to ag using a simple tea urn and biab bag was the best decision I ever made.
Yeah it takes about 4 hours end to end, but the quality is way better than even the best kit I've ever done.

 

[Spiderwebster]

Yeah or papa lazarou turned up....

Now your my wife...lol

 

[Lawrence22]

I moved to all grain after doing 8 kits. I went for the grainfather and love it. Have now done 13 brews on the GF and am starting to make really good beer. Research your recipes before you jump in. I decided to build my own recipe for my first brew and got it all wrong. Now I try to research the style of beer I'm aiming for and read any info on ingredients. My big mistake was putting 40% caramel malts in my first brew, only after did I read that 20% was the maximum advised amount for said malt. Greg Hughes book is great for recipe ideas.

 

[Banbeer]

Started Kits years ago in the eighties and things were not good back then(no tinternet etc) then after a break started AG in the noughties and made some good stuff but could never weigh up the timescale of doing an AG over a premium kit as I never tweaked recipes etc. I still have all the AG kit but not sure I will start again aunsure....

Good luck and happy brewing.

 

[DrGMc]

well if any one is local to me they are more tam welcome to borrow a GF to give it a go and indeed for largers there is even a chiller/fermentor if you are near TS8 and in need let me know DrGMc

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Nice one. :thumba:

 

[cheshirehomebrew]

I now do all grain after graduating from cans of LME, it takes me around 4 hours from start to finish to do an AG, that includes cleaning sterilising boiling the wort and cooling it down ready to pitch the yeast.
Brew from a can took about 30 minutes and the beer wasn't bad, but it was pre hopped LME so I lost a little control over the flavour profile.

 

[MickDundee]

I did 3 kits, then spotted a job lot of BIAB equipment on Gumtree dirt cheap. (£20 for boiler, grain bag, 25kg of grain, a load of bottles and a bottle crate)

The boiler only lasted 4 brews but luckily blew about a month before my birthday so I got an Ace boiler back in 2016 and have never looked back.

 

[Austin]

I moved to AG brewing without spending anything I.e. the absolute most basic kit and get some pretty decent results. What I use is:

1) A huge catering size saucepan that holds about 20 litres. It was free in freegle, all nasty, greasy and messy. Cleaned it all up and is great for holding both the mash and the boil. Cooling relies on gently putting the hot pan in a large sink of nice cold water. I'll improve this with a copper cooler in future.

2) A catering cooking oil bucket made of really tough plastic. Fits nicely inside the above pan. Drilled lots of small holes in the bottom but not enough to weaken it . Used for mashing inside the big pan.

3) A homemade tripod thing to suspend the mash bucket above the pan or other collector, so it drain, be sparged and drain out slowly.

Until last week I thought I was limited to single step mashing but then I realised I can do multiple steps by draining the mash part way through, heating up the pan of wort, then gently lowering the mash bucket back into the pan and gently stirring around the mash with the hotter wort.

Admittedly it's a pain emptying the full boil pan through funnels and strainers so any advice in that is welcome.

 

[Spiderwebster]

I am going about it in an **** about face fashion , just got a Grainfather Conical Fermenter at a good price of E bay , I started homebrew with a Wherry kit , so I will have a go with my last kit in the conical to see if a constant temp and controlled environment to see if there is a difference with trub dumping etc etc it just happens to be a Wherry kit as well. On The Results of that I will get the GF connect and fill the hole in the market where Fullers have sold out to the Japs.....Well that’s what I told the wife .....She just threw things at me and called me nasty names.....women just don,t understand .

 

[dad_of_jon]

I don't have the time / space to do AG. So I do dried extract but with steeped grains or a partial mash where required. I'm more than happy with the results so the only motivator to me would be to save money on extract but that's not why I home brew.