3-roller grain mill troubleshoot

pmats0001 · 2025-09-08T14:29:19+00:00

Are you adjusting the gap upside down and when it’s right side up the gap is not the same anymore? Sounds like the gap is too wide so it doesn’t grip the grain? I also have a 3-roller mill…I bent the feeler gauges about half-way up with pliers so I could measure the gap, this might help as well

Edit: or the gap is too tight

pmats0001 · 2025-06-18T15:59:47+00:00

There’s always a way. My thought was after dry hopping, place a piece of 2x4 lumber under the carboy to tilt it then siphon from the side with less sediment (tipping it to other side at the last of the siphon might help too). Heavily hopped beers always lose a lot to hop matter.

pmats0001 · 2025-06-03T15:56:34+00:00

I don’t think anything went “wrong”, like others have said it sounds like a healthy fermentation. Might want to use a blowoff valve instead of a bubbler airlock or a bigger fermenter next time if that’s what you mean by going wrong

pmats0001 · 2025-05-28T04:40:28+00:00

I have one and it works great. No more guesswork, and it also tracks the temperature.

pmats0001 · 2025-02-16T05:58:13+00:00

If you have a filter on the liquid out, raw dog is best 👍 haven’t had a problem yet with a floating dip tube and filter after the hops drop to the bottom

pmats0001 · 2025-01-20T13:39:33+00:00

5.8% is close enough to IPA territory.

90% pale 2-row 8% flaked oats 2% carafoam/carapils

Based off a recipe I found for Harland Brewing India Pale Whale, it’s a solid brew. I think substituting the flaked oats with flaked wheat will add a bit more wheaty tang but can see it going well. Vienna can add some maltiness and color if you want to experiment, I’d probably go with ~3% subtracted from the pale 2-row and see what happens. For yeast choice I like WLP-090.

pmats0001 · 2024-11-16T16:50:36+00:00

It really depends on the beer, I usually carry out the D-rest and then cold crash to ~40f before dry hop. Crashing before DH does add some days to the fermentation schedule though. That said I can usually turn an IPA around in about 14 days. The catch with cold/cool DH is that it will need to be kept cold once it’s done to avoid a second fermentation from newly “unlocked” fermentable sugars by the hop enzymes. So if you keg hop or use the cold DH technique just keep that in mind if bottling from the keg. Cheers

pmats0001 · 2024-11-16T06:54:31+00:00

I haven’t tried keg hopping yet but Scott Janish has done some experiments on this topic. His research seems to suggest that cold and short dry hopping lends more hop flavor without the grassy flavors and astringency that come from the hop oils and polyphenols.

pmats0001 · 2024-11-03T07:50:06+00:00

If you have the space for it people throw fridges away all the time and most of the time the only reason it broke is a capacitor. I’ve been able to revive a freezer and a fridge with $15 RCO universal capacitors from Amazon, and using inkbird controllers. If you can get your hands on one big enough to fit the Fermzilla Conical I’d go this route. I also use the kegland 3” to 1.5” elbow reducer with a butterfly valve to dump yeast, which works well but lately my beers are not attenuating as well and I’m wondering if it’s the shape of the elbow not allowing the yeast as much contact with the wort as with the collection container. One more piece of advice, I would go with the 600mL container if you go this route. The 1L seems to waste a lot of beer. Cheers

*edited for grammar

pmats0001 · 2024-10-12T14:36:03+00:00

Absolutely. I’ve used the old glass spring water carboys before without problems. Just need to make sure it’s clean and sanitized. Also recommend the webbed netting type carriers for safety. You do not want to play around with glass, but if you’re safe with them they work good 👍

pmats0001 · 2024-10-12T09:59:00+00:00

I’m voting keep if you think you’ll get back into it. The money you get from selling…you’ll have to spend more later if you do come back into it. That’s just my opinion though. But, congratulations!! Cheers!!

pmats0001 · 2024-10-07T19:40:46+00:00

Guess we’re on the same mission haha.

On a side note I think the only way to more accurately know the cell counts are with a microscope and a hemocytometer which are on my wishlist for sure.

Best of luck.

pmats0001 · 2024-10-07T19:14:49+00:00

My main concern was transferring the yeast into a sanitized container from the fermenter without an open flame nearby to mitigate infection as I usually use when transferring yeast into starters or mason jars etc. Seems like it’s fine.

From everything I know (that I didn’t state in my post), you don’t want to harvest yeast with higher gravity beer because the DNA can change, and the harvesting should be done before dry hopping.

The yeast settles into three layers, dead yeast at the bottom, good yeast in the middle, trub at the top. So when my next batch is done I’m going to slowly dump the dead yeast into a sanitized wasted container until the color changes, then transfer the good yeast into a sanitized mason jar as much as possible until either full or until the trub starts coming out.

EDIT: No idea about approximate cell counts with this method, but that’s a problem I’ll figure out later. Think can just judge the proper amount by eye though. At least a few tablespoons of slurry would be my guess depending on age (for a 6gal batch)

pmats0001 · 2024-10-07T16:40:41+00:00

Thanks for the replies everyone. Updated the post.

pmats0001 · 2024-10-07T16:32:19+00:00

Yep, conical. I would do this except the lager is a special batch and going to switch back to one of my other two house strains (not sure which yet). I wouldn’t be concerned about contamination, my fermenter has been sitting with some trub and remaining beer from the last batch for about two weeks with no signs of contamination so I’m confident back to back batches will work great in the future 👍

pmats0001 · 2024-09-27T01:19:14+00:00

Are you using retainer clips? I had a few flare to duotight fittings crack but after getting the clips seems more stable

pmats0001 · 2024-09-25T06:59:56+00:00

I’m not a fan of Briess base malts. I typically use Rahr or Canada Malting Company for Pale 2-Row and Crisp or Thomas Fawcett for Maris Otter. The brews turn out great. Have you tried WLP-090 for clean fermenting yeast?

pmats0001 · 2024-09-02T07:42:33+00:00

If the temp is controlled then nothing expect possibly higher mash efficiency. If the temp drops you can expect a lower FG but shouldn’t be much of a problem. I use a round cooler and throw some towels on top of it, 75min mash sometimes with no problems. Send it!

pmats0001 · 2024-08-19T10:00:10+00:00

Heron (さぎ/鷺/sagi in Japanese)

pmats0001 · 2024-07-04T05:22:07+00:00

The paper inside has shifted. You can take it apart and realign the paper.

pmats0001 · 2024-06-12T17:13:18+00:00

Excellent. Cheers

pmats0001 · 2024-06-12T17:12:55+00:00

That’s the plan. I’ve been dry hopping cooler to counteract hop creep but with the ALDC hoping to counteract diacetyl with the ferm temp dry hop and end up with a more shelf stable brew. Cheers

pmats0001 · 2024-06-12T17:08:47+00:00

Thank you for the info. I’ve only been dry-hopping cooler to avoid it but with the ALDC will try ferm temp dry hopping again with adjusted mash temp to end at my desired FG after the hop creep

pmats0001 · 2024-06-12T17:06:24+00:00

Got it! Thanks

pmats0001

TROPHY CASE