1) Strike temp at 163 and mashed in which didn't drop the temperature really at all so I tried stirring down with the lid off for about 10 minutes and got it down to 156 which I left at for 30 mins before stirring again. It still read 156 so tried to lower and left the lid off which it fell to about 150. I picked up the bag and added a little hit to get to 152 and let it ride for the remaining 15 or so minutes.
2) Started boil after draining and squeezing bag (yes, I squeeze).
3) Normal boil, but lost more beer than my last apt. This is a new stove in a new place which gets a much stronger boil so I lost about a quarter gallon more.
4) Hopped at 10 remaining and dropped in my cleaned immersion chiller.
5) Started immersion chiller right after boil and ran for about 2 minutes and found my temp had dropped from boil to 140F! I was shooting for 170 on the hop stand but went with 30 mins in 140.
6) Following hop stand, I cooled to ~80 and transferred to sanitized fermenter via ball valve and 1/2" tubing. No issues - left beer and hop trub behind.
7) I setup fermenter in my ferm chamber which was cooled to 68. I attached the temp probe with plumbers putty to my SS brewtech mini which read 72. Once it cooled to about 70 I pitched the yeast (wyeast smack pack that was ballooned, no starter). In the morning I checked and temp was right at desired temp of 68.
8) Vigorous fermentation 6 hours in and I've found a small leak from my spigot... debating what to do.
9) Leak turned out to be minimal. I gave the spigot a turn clockwise and it seemed to tighten it and stop the leak.
10) Dry hopped per recipe and pulled a sample prior to adding second dry hop one week in. I had a tiny amount of N1/69 experimental hops leftover that i decided to throw in with the second dry hop. They are south african aroma hops that are said to be tropical so hoping they add a little to the end aroma.
10) Gravity registered at 1.012 but i didnt measure the OG so no idea on FG target (fail with the new equipment). Beer is hazy, very hoppy, and tastes very good. Blow off is still bubbling. I raised the temp control to 72 and let the chamber free rise to 71.
11) Finished beer of and siphoned to keg. As this was my first kegging experience, I ended up siphoning too much trub and it clogged the keg multiple times. I was finally able to unclog it after cutting my dip tube by an inch. Although this sucked, I was able to get beer flowing through my new kegerator.
Tasting Notes: Beer was absolutely fantastic! This was by far the best I've ever made with a huge pungent smell of citrus. Although I lost a lot of beer to trub and unclogging, I was able to enjoy about 12-14 pints of some very good beer.
Fermentation temp: 68F for first week
Let ferm temp rise to 71F after second dry hop for remaining
