South Union Brewing goes all grain

Well one year later it is safe to say that Home brewing will be a life long obsession of mine. After a year of kicking tires and brewing 45 gallons of extract beer I decided it was time to take it to the next level. So 3 long weeks of getting all the pieces together I finally have a decent all grain set up that will some day allow me to brew with exception of the kettle 10 gallons at a time vs the 5 I do now. 

My new system contains the following an 8.5 gallon stainless stockpot, a 10 gallon water cooler or as brewers call it a hot liquor tank for storing hot water, and a 70 quart Coleman extreme cooler or mash tun for soaking your grains. To start I removed all of the drains on the coolers and replaced them with 1/2" ball valves this allows you to easily transfer hot liquids from place to place in a nice controlled manner without burning yourself!   

A picture of the stainless steel braid used
to filter water out of the grains in the mash tun.

My first brew a multi grain amber ale  taught me a lot. For one make sure you have a good thermometer the one I was using was way off and I was 3/4 of the way though my brew day before I realized this! Keeping everything at the right temp at the right time is key to making great tasting beer. I was so worried the bad thermometer readings might have ruined the batch. But in the end when I took my readings it was only off .004 which is awesome for my first stab at all grain.

Here are the crushed grains and
hops I used for my first brew

So the next phase of worry was when I transferred it to my glass carboy for fermentation.This recipe used a liquid British ale yeast which I had shipped to me in a kit from Northern Brewer. When you have yeast shipped there is always the possibility that the shipping will kill it all off. So after adding the yeast I tossed and turned all night hoping that it was good. I spent close to 6 hours from start to finish brewing this beer yesterday so it would of been a giant waste of effort if I had to dump it because of bad yeast! When I got home from work tonight I was pleasantly surprised and found a good strong fermentation in full swing! Now we just have to wait a long 6 weeks and then finally there will be home brew back in the fridge once again!                                                    

A picture of the fermentation  in full swing!