I aerate by doing an energetic transfer as you describe, then once yeast is added I cap the carboy and shake it for about 60 seconds. I've always had fermentation within the first 24 hours, usually much sooner.

If you can collect the waste water it can be used for watering the garden or washing your brew gear.

I get my 10 pound tank filled at a nearby fire extinguisher service company. $36 per refill.

I bottled for 20+ years before I switched to kegging last year. Currently have a 4 tap keggerator with a couple extra kegs. As much as I am loving the kegs, I never really understood the hate people have for bottling. I would do a lot of the prep work before bottling day, so when the time...

Looks like somebody is going for the Walter Weiss/Breaking Beer look.

I wound up using the dish detergent, but I may try this next time I need to clean a bunch of small keg parts

I've never tried PBW, but Oxyclean has never been able to get rid of all the lube in my experience.

It's mostly due to the fact that when I started brewing I always heard that you should never use soap or detergent on your brew gear. Rationally I know that it's fine to use if rinsed properly, but I still don't like doing it.

Exactly. I have no issue with keg lube (though I wouldn't use the quantity the previous owner used) I just don't trust somebody else's goo.

I just bought 2 used kegs and while they are in great shape, the previous owner was a big fan of keg lube. All the O rings and fittings were covered in a rather generous amount of lube, and while I was able to get it off easily with Dawn dish detergent, I was wondering if anybody has any other...

Happens to me all the time. Clean the lid, wet with StarSan and continue with your day. the solution in the bucket is fine.

I've been using this for the past couple of years...

I've tried thicker and thinner mashes, and I can't really say I saw a difference, at least in terms of the quality of the final beer. I find thinner mashes (I do 1.5qt/lb) easier to stir, and it seems in my experience that the larger volume of water helps to maintain mash temperature a bit...

Also, stir the wort while chilling, it really helps the process go faster.

I think in your situation the immersion chiller route is your best option. What I would do is use one chiller as an immersion chiller, and use the other in an ice bath between the faucet and the chiller to cool the water passing through the immersion coil. When you start chilling, the...

Then I know what I am asking for for my birthday.

I assume I could install one of these and just connect its beer line to whichever keg I wanted to bottle from?

I assume the procedures you've described are the same ones you've been using for a while? I suspect rinsing isn't the cause of your issue, you seem to be rising more than enough, even if there was some cleaning residue left, after being diluted with 20ish liters of beer it should be well below...

Is your immersion chiller hooked up to a faucet? It sounds like you may be manually pouring water through it?

Other people have addressed your water issues, so let me help (I hope) with the chilling. A 1 gallon batch doesn't really need an immersion chiller in my experience. Placing your pot in a sink of cold water can chill it just as fast provided you do two things. First, you need to stir the...