Hoppy Brewing

APPENDIX – Using Your Brewpot:

Supplies:

• a copper dish scrubber (find it at the grocery store)
• teflon tape (in the plumbing section of the hardware store for a buck)
• a stainless steel spoon, around 2 feet. Find a cheap one here.

After making the brewpot, you want to prep all the threads by putting teflon tape on all male threads ($0.99 at hardware stores). This will keep the threads from leaking: then put it all together in this order:

The spigot goes handle-side outside the brewpot, the threaded end through the hole in the keg (if you can’t figure that much out, you’re in trouble). On the inside, you’ll put on the O-ring, then the stainless steel washer, and finally the female threaded coupler. Coming out from that you will want the copper fitting you have soldered together screwed on, ending up facing down toward the bottom of the keg. It will look like this:

Inside:

Outside:

Next time you’re at the store, pick up a copper dish scrubber. This will act as a screen for all the hops and trub (sidenote: it is pronounced ‘troob’) at the end of the boil. put this around the bottom of the copper ‘L’ fitting. When you get the scrubber, it has a hole right in the middle that is not very conducive to this project. Simply unroll the mesh and you will get something that looks like this and can be folded up and used as an effective screen:

Next you’ll want to test the setup for leaks, and while doing it, mark gallons as follows. Add water 1 gallon at a time (or 1/2 gallon at a time if you want to be more precise). At each point, mark on your metal spoon at the water level. This allows you to measure how much liquid you have left, allowing you to know when you get to your 5.5 gallon mark or whatever you are aiming for.

Now you’re ready to boil the beer! After the beer has boiled it’s course (60-180 minutes), you need to drain it out and cool it down before you pitch the yeast. The easiest way to accomplish this is to put your immersion chiller in the wort for the last 15-20 minutes of the boil to sanitize it, then chill it right in the brewpot. But, if you can’t get a water source to your propane setup like me, you’ll have to drain it into a bucket, take the bucket to where you have water access and then cool it there. If you are going to cool it in the brewpot, do that. If not, just keep reading.

Now before you drain the beer, it is best to create a whirlpool to get all of the hops and trub (sidenote – it’s pronounced ‘troob’) to the middle of the brewpot. Simply stir the wort in a circular motion getting it going as fast as you can, then let it sit for 10-15 minutes. After that, drain it through your already installed copper screen, and you will minimize the sediment that gets to the primary. This is why you put the copper ‘L’ drain on the side, and not into the middle. You won’t need to siphon because all that’ll be left is sediment. You’ll lose a little liquid, but not enough to make a fuss over. Just make sure to boil a little extra to make up for it. After you drain it, if you have not done so, cool it to yeast temperatures and pitch your yeast. If you are draining the beer while it is still hot (without cooling to yeast temperatures), you will need to use special heat resistant tubing, not just the nylon stuff you use for syphoning. You’re local homebrew store should have it.

There you are! Enjoy using your brew pot (or as the cool people say, your keggle).

I also posted this comment with the keg conversion howto.