H2DC v. 3

Well, I brewed H2DC the other day, and in addition to a new copper manifold in my mash tun, I have a new Blichmann burner, so I have two new things in my brewing process.

I cleaned the copper over the weekend, and submerged it in the Five-Star Chemicals Powdered Brewery Wash, which dissolves organic stains. I let the copper soak in hot water an hour. When I came in to rinse, there was a white deposit that looked like Elmer's glue floating in the water above the solder on the center tube. I gave everything a good hot rinse and let air dry.

When I assembled the manifold and put in into the cooler, the manifold was suspended above the bottom of the cooler about 1/4 inch. I managed to get it on the bottom, and mashed the grains.

I noticed I collected a lot more liquid that I used to. So I am quite happy with how it turned out. There's a slight learning curve using it, but not too bad.

The new burner added its own complication. It puts out more btus than the old one, so I boiled off a bit too much liquid. The burner has a steeper learning curve.

The copper manifold seemed to work well. Pre boil gravity was 1.031 and was predicted to be 1.028. I finished at 1.041. Shooting for 1.032. I lost about a half gallon on the boil.

We'll see how well it worked when the beer is finished in a month.