Great advice, thank you.

Side note, I kegged my first IPA tonight. Sample tasted good. Will see how it decelops with CO2.

Man I got so excited cause the homebrew store I frequent just started carrying spike brewing equipment, and they have the CF10 right there ready to go. I got all excited and started talking to the owner about how I'm real close to getting one.. he said, well that's got your name on it, the price is fixed with their online pricing so buy from us!

Then I get back to office and realize, purchasing this on spikebrewing.com would save me ~$70 in sales tax. It sucks for the local guys to compete with that.. but man $70 is $70.

I almost wish I didn't visit this store until I already bought one from spike. Now I have this moral dilemma.

Tell him and be honest about it. If he knocks the price down, win-win. If not, now you don't have to lie about it.

maybe you could try to deal with him and see if he would give you a gift card to his store covering a little of the extra cost? of course he would probably just tell you you're supposed to pay the tax either way.

Yeh I was thinking about seeing if he'll throw in two accessories. A clear 4" TC cap and the racking arm. Retail for that is $45, probably only cost him about $25. That would close the gap enough for me to be good with it. I would have it for this weekend, which I so happened to be brewing, so I could break it in.

Was shipping free?

AlaskanAg99 said:

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Was shipping free?

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yeh, orders over $100. Apparently they ship out pretty quickly too. And, it would be new in a box. The store only has one, and it's on display on the floor. Not that anyone could really mess up an item that's 100% stainless steel.. but still, people's grimey hands have been all over it!

I had it in the cart the other day on spike website... no tax and free shipping. Got so close to hitting submit, but wanted to wait until first week of dec when I get bonus... just to make sure I'm good.

Moxie said:

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Tell him and be honest about it. If he knocks the price down, win-win. If not, now you don't have to lie about it.

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im thinking he won't budge on price. I don't see any retailer ever having these on sale. I think the margins are already slim. This thing is 100% welded in Wisconsin and loaded with 2 butterfly valves and a bunch of tc ports, thermometer, etc. $625 seems cheap as it is.

Spike had 25% off kettles on cyber Monday for the first time according to them, but not conicals. I would have been all over that if so.

My grimey hands have been all over that. I have 2 more beer 14's and I like the look and feel of the spikes. Love the 4" top port, really wish mine had that. Not a fan you have to buy some of the extras. It's how they are keeping costs down.

All that being said I'll probably buy a 7 gallon version for standard sized batches of 5 gallon. I don't always want 10 gallons of everything I make.

Wife won a Spike 10gallon BK which we will buy a false bottom for so she can make her lower grist wheat beers. It's solid construction there too.

You know, I'll accept donations just in case you don't want that Spike....

AlaskanAg99 said:

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My grimey hands have been all over that. I have 2 more beer 14's and I like the look and feel of the spikes. Love the 4" top port, really wish mine had that. Not a fan you have to buy some of the extras. It's how they are keeping costs down.

All that being said I'll probably buy a 7 gallon version for standard sized batches of 5 gallon. I don't always want 10 gallons of everything I make.

Wife won a Spike 10gallon BK which we will buy a false bottom for so she can make her lower grist wheat beers. It's solid construction there too.

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I like the idea of a basic model for low intro price, then customize how you want. Everyone is going to want different stuff, so it doesn't make since to have it as one huge expensive package. It's the best pricing model for them IMO.

Their CF10 can do 5 gal. batches. Thermometer is right at 5 gal. mark, or it can be lowered to the sample port which is around 4 gallon. It's only another $100

I can't complain too much about my morebeer 14, cause it was free. But, it only cools, no heat, and without heating I can't really brew about 5 months a year, or do lagers.
Plus these new spikes are just so much smaller than these older morebeers.

I'm getting the carb stone and pressure transfer kit. Hoping the store will throw in that lid and racking arm, or at least something to reduce that tax burden.

I would think you cut cut the neoprene off and then use a solvent to remove the glue, wrap a heater around it and reinsulate.

nice!

Hell yes that's a good deal and I'm sure Landon was happy to move a unit.

I do agree the new construction conicals have more features than the older ones.

Who is Landon?

62strat said:

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Who is Landon?

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Wait...you're not in Houston. Right?

A local store is now selling Spike.

Besides being a sip, great guy and strong homebrew advocate in Houston. Farmboy Brewshop

AlaskanAg99 said:

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62strat said:

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Who is Landon?

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Wait...you're not in Houston. Right?

A local store is now selling Spike.

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nah I'm in Denver... you didn't think I needed heating 5 months out of the year in Houston did you?!

This is quirky homebrew in Thornton CO.

awesome man!

So baller

What's the process for pitching yeast and aerating the wort during all of that?

Chipotlemonger said:

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What's the process for pitching yeast and aerating the wort during all of that?

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For oxygenation, I generally use this

which is in line after the counter flow chiller. I didn't use it this time, I just filled the conical through the tee (where the 90 degree barb is), so it fell down and splashed all in there which I think is plenty of oxygenation.

However, I did want to test a process of oxygenation in the conical itself since I don't always get it to 65 and sometimes pitch a few hours later. The carb stone can be used for this of course, but it's a ball lock qd, and my oxygen bottles is just that skinny 1/4" tubing. I'll have to convert it somehow.

Instead, on the racking valve I hooked up the sight glass and then oxygen wand (shown in that pic), opened the valve, and nothing filled the sight glass. I held the relief valve open (making sure there was no negative pressure), still nothing. Then I even hooked my CO2 line to the pressure port up top, got to 10psi, and still nothing came through that valve. I was puzzled.. My racking arm is about the 1 gallon level, so good there.
I got nervous like something bad was about to happen, so I scrapped it! I figured the splashing while filling was good enough. I'll have to test that process again with water some other time.

After removing oxygenation set up, I attached the sample valve to the racking valve, and took a sample for my hydrometer test, and it came right out. So I'm not sure what was going on with the oxygenation setup.. but I had to leave and didn't have more time to mess with it. I clearly was doing something wrong.

For pitching, after I transferred the wort, I purged it a few times with CO2, then just opened the 4" top port and tossed in the yeast. That imperial yeast is twice the size of wyeast or white labs (has 200b cells), so no starter was necessary. I had a nice little cloud of CO2 swirl out of the port when I poured in the yeast.

I'd love to get a true glass front fridge.. just not in the cards for now! Would be nice to see the temp without opening door, and those Trues have a separate power cord for compressor and lights, so the lights always come on even when the temp controller has no power to the unit. My light is off unless it happens to be running.

New recommendations on dry yeast is no aeration at all. I'm not buying it though. I did it on my last batch and it finished 5 points higher than it's supposed to

Seven said:

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New recommendations on dry yeast is no aeration at all. I'm not buying it though. I did it on my last batch and it finished 5 points higher than it's supposed to

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Ha, I'm in the same boat... I don't buy that at all!

My first batch of beer I used S-05 in July, and was wondering why fermentation wasn't occurring near a couple days in. Realized I forgot to aerate...pulled the carboy out, covered it with some sanitized foil, and shook it all around. Did the trick and I was bubbling away in no time.

Ive played with oxygen for years, but I got an aeration stone + air pump + filter last year, and I've seen my FGs drop from 3-4 points over expected to right at expected Everytime.

I'll never skimp on oxygen again. Every batch will get 2 mins per gallon (or more for higher gravity brews).

Ornlu said:

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Ive played with oxygen for years, but I got an aeration stone + air pump + filter last year, and I've seen my FGs drop from 3-4 points over expected to right at expected Everytime.

I'll never skimp on oxygen again. Every batch will get 2 mins per gallon (or more for higher gravity brews).

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I have an oxygen tank, i wonder how that translates as far as time/psi?

Got home yesterday (24 hours after pitching) and my conical was up to 10psi, so it was definitely chugging away! It was a bit on the cold side at 63, so I turned on shop light, left for 15 minutes, and it got up to 70! I def. need that ceramic bulb, for a much gentler, slower heat cycle. Supposed to arrive today. This morning, it was down to 68. I'm curious if it cycled another time or two overnight, or if it didn't because that freezer really holds in the heat.

Your temp probe is still hanging in the air?

I know you intend to replace it which give you much more accurate control once it's in a thermowell.

And you don't need to CO2 purge the conical prior to filling. You're adding O2 back so there's not really a benefit. Probably won't do any harm but just chew through CO2 faster.

If you have an O2 bottle, you don't want to see bubbles coming up because it's just wasting the oxygen. Just a small ripple on the surface to know the gas is flowing. And with pure O2, maybe a min for regular 1060 beers and 2 mins for high gravity.

For high gravity you need to make sure you have enough zinc as most yeast nutrients do not have adequate amount so a zinc supplement is needed. And hit the wort with another 1min blast of O2 24hrs after pitching yeast.

If you harvest and repitch yeast zinc is most def needed.

AlaskanAg99 said:

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Your temp probe is still hanging in the air?

I know you intend to replace it which give you much more accurate control once it's in a thermowell.

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That probe is from an old johnson controller. I have a ranco controller on it now with probe in the thermowell, but it's a single stage (controlling heat for now). My dual stage inkbird arrives today. The cooling cycle won't be running for this particular beer though, as my garage is about 45 deg (well, except for a cold crash), but come march/april it will begin to use the dual stage functionality.

Quote:

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And you don't need to CO2 purge the conical prior to filling. You're adding O2 back so there's not really a benefit. Probably won't do any harm but just chew through CO2 faster.

If you have an O2 bottle, you don't want to see bubbles coming up because it's just wasting the oxygen. Just a small ripple on the surface to know the gas is flowing. And with pure O2, maybe a min for regular 1060 beers and 2 mins for high gravity.

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Yeh.. purging was a little redundant I guess hah.

It looks likes this when I oxygenate. This is inline, between counterflow chiller and conical.


But I'd rather oxygenate through my new carb stone after filling conical, only because it would be much easier to set up. That oxygenator seen here is 5 parts with 6 TC seals/clamps.. not exactly a quick setup. Plus, when I can't get wort cool enough, I pitch the next day.

I just need to convert from that small oxygen tubing seen there on the right to a ball lock gas qd, which is what the spike carb stone has.

1 seal and done.

Ok, gotcha. I saw the pick with the Johnson probe. I have one as well and I hate that thing. Actually, I may have sold it at a swap.

I have the little O2 containers as well, I keep meaning to get a real refillable O2 tank with a better regulator that will handle larger tubing. I currently use a wand with a stone attached so I'm filling via the top hatch.

The real tanks require a medical prescription. Not joking. I tried repeatedly to buy one, and then to get a script but no dice. I detest the wastefulness of the disposable tanks, so I just settled on oxygenating with air.

The O2 tanks for welding are contaminated by oil vapors and you don't want to brew with them.

Strat, how do you sanitize that aeration stone??