TBA.

A term that has been on my mind a lot lately.

Ironically, also the name of the beer I’m sipping on while writing this post.

I’ve sat down to write an update on the brewery several times in the last few weeks, and the only excuse I have for not doing it is one of uncertainty.

I’m not one to talk bad about people, and I’ve always tried to heed the advice of ‘if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all’.

I believe that may be why I’ve kept quiet on the updates on the brewery recently. You see, I’m stuck in a quagmire of regulations, permitting, and zoning codes that seems to be dragging me under only slightly slower than a finely tuned bed of quicksand.

I’ve spent the last month and a half in discussions with the city about what they believe are requirements for me to move forward with my permit, and I believe are unnecessary and frivolous expenses and ever-complicating demands. We have gone from installing a couple drains, some sinks, and some electrical circuits, to building 2-hour firewalls, installing sprinklers, building bathrooms, and installing heated strainers on the sewer outflow. I have tried to reason, I’ve tried to read building codes, and I’ve tried to ask for explanations for all of it.

I want to believe that the people I’m communicating with truly believe they are doing the right thing, but I’m just not convinced. Demands pile on top of demands, and every solution I propose is shot down swiftly and more requirements are piled on top. I am up to 4 distinct sets of requirements from the city, each with an increasing number of renovation requirements.

I know that we’ll work through it eventually, but it’s a long, painful, and expensive process. It’s made me lose some faith that I had in the motivation of the city to help small businesses get up and running. I still believe there are good people at the city who want to move things like this forward, but unfortunately the folks who believe in taking the path of most resistance are the ones who are the loudest. I know they believe they are covering themselves against liability, but it’s gotten out of hand.

But time marches on. And if it was easy, everyone would do it.

In fact, it’s become a long enough process that I will most likely have my tanks for the brewhouse in my possession before I cut the first bit of concrete (which was initially going to happen at the beginning of april). I got the call yesterday that my 3 brewery tanks (hot liquor, mash tun, and boil kettle) are in portland, and are getting loaded on a truck to head this way. The fermenters are in either the first or second week of june, and the rest of the equipment and control system is on it’s way as well.

Shiny new stainless. I’m gonna need a big tarp to cover it up while they cut concrete.

So, for those of you who have been wondering. That’s where I’m at. The fundraising has begun again, as I feel like even if I make it out with only half of the things they are requesting, I’m still doubling my construction budget. So goes the way of the startup.

If anything, this has cemented my dedication to opening the brewery; although there were times when the thought of throwing up my arms in frustration, posting an ad for brewery equipment for sale, and pulling out crossed my mind. I am making this thing happen, and it will be successful. Beer will be brewed, and it will be mind-numbingly delicious beer. All of you will be witness to this and we’ll all look back on this frustration, shake our heads at the insanity, and then set the sights firmly on the future. A future of shiny stainless, beautifully designed packaging, and (most importantly) ridiculously delicious beer. The timeline may be set back a bit, but it will move forward. And in the meantime, I’ve got a big empty warehouse which will soon have a grill outside.

On a much lighter note, if you want to come by the brewery space and check it out, Sunday is your day. I’ve decided that we need an excuse to do some quality control on the test batches, fire up the grill, and hang out a bit at the space. I’m not using it for brewing yet, so lets use it for something. In addition to the festivities, we’re gonna make a solid attempt at putting together the walk-in cooler that I’ve got sitting in pieces right now. It’s full-on Ikea-style, so it only requires a couple tools and a few people who don’t mind moving big insulated panels around in exchange for beer and grilled meat.

So, if you’re around on sunday, come by the brewery space at 1519 N. Main Street, Suite 102 around 11am. Bring a set of closed toe shoes, a camping chair, and a side dish to go with the grilled meat. I’ll have some tools, a general set of instructions (how hard can it be?), hot dogs, hamburgers, a light summer pale ale, a porter, and all the necessary eating and drinking accessories.

Maybe we need to construct a cornhole set as well…. That would be a good sunday project, and I’m willing to bet we can put it to good use right away.

Anyone want to sew some bags for it?

I feel like we’re going to bust out the fridge construction in short order, so we’ll just have to make sure the cornhole set works.

If you don’t happen to make it by, we’ll catch you next time around. However, you should definitely check out what else is happening around here (or wherever you are) for American Craft Beer Week.

And if that isn’t your cup of tea, and you’re up in the Flagstaff area this weekend, the other event which is totally worth checking out is the Overland Expo which starts friday down by mormon lake. I’ll be out there on saturday checking out all the crazy machines that some like-minded folks are rocking. Good stuff for sure.

That’s all I got for tonight. If you’re on facebook, you can check out the event page for sunday with more details, or just shoot me an email and I’ll hook you up with some info.

My beer is officially drained (and it was a good one), so I’m outta here.

Laters.

What did I say about Murphy’s law? Not 2 hours after I hit the submit button on my last post, I got a call from the city concerning the zoning of the building that I wanted to have the brewery in. Turns out we didn’t do the proper checks, and since the zoning all changed this past november things were a bit unclear. It was a stressful week thinking that I may have to reverse course and find a completely new place to move everything.

Fortunately, by weeks end I had finally tracked down the person who makes the decisions at the city in that regard, and it’s looking like things are back on for the current location. The decision will (hopefully) be official after a planning commission meeting, and we can get back on construction. Everyone keep your fingers crossed.

A lot of folks have asked me if I’m going to race my bike this year with all the brewery stuff going on. My answer is usually something along the lines of ‘probably not any big races’. The reality is that I think I need the escape of the bike more than anything at this point. I’ve been getting out an average of about 3-4 days a week, which considering how much other stuff is on my plate at this point, is pretty damn good.

It’s a great stress relief, and it tends to give me some time to sort out my head what the crisis du jour is.

Sunday provided a good opportunity to get away from all the brewery planning for a solid afternoon ride with the hobo crew. It was the annual Baah! ride that Richardo the bike man puts together. It’s the first year I made it out for it, and damn was it fun. A pre-ride beer and stretch session at Moustache Cycles HQ and then a group spin to the top of elden got everyone’s blood flowing.

The ride in years previous had been a downhill race down Elden Lookout road, but this year they decided to put a twist on it and send us all down the heart trail. If you haven’t done it, go ride it….. once….. and then you’ll probably not want to ride it again.

Tight switchbacks, and about 1700 vertical feet of baby-head size rocks makes it a pretty brutal trail. Two-time defending champion Scott took the hole shot and was out of sight before we knew what happened. A slip on the uphill put me in second as I passed Richard. Unfortunately, my downhill skillz were no match for his long-travel 29er hardtail and precision switchback cutting skills. He passed me after about 3-4 switchbacks when he lept from the bike and jumped a switchback cyclocross style. My desire to ride as many of the switchbacks as possible was my undoing. Unfortunately for Scott, he went a little too big on one of the nasty sections and ended up getting passed by the two of us as he retrieved his bike. I ended up not seeing Richard again until we hit the bottom, where he was waiting when I arrived.

The rest of the crew trickled in and we commenced the Beaster Egg Hunt that had been set up a couple days before. As the warm Beasts were uncovered from the landscape around the finish line the last of the crew rolled in, including Ray on his fatbike, and Dre in his easter sunday churchwear. After the last beers were uncovered, we set back around the mountain for home.

Unfortunately, I had some permits to attend to that evening, so I didn’t get to stick around for the Bar-B-Q, but I left them a couple growlers of beer, which I’m quite sure got put to good use.

The ride was a blast, and you can rest assure that if this is what you consider ‘racing’, I’m planning on racing my bike this year, even with the brewery unfolding. If you want Richards account of the event, check it here.

The week wound down, and this morning I jumped on a plane to Oakland with Jason to go visit our good friend Rob. He’s got some health stuff going on right now, and it wasn’t even a question that we were going out to pay him a visit and make sure his spirits are high.

If you haven’t ever met him, that means that you’ve never been to a Turkey Fry at my house. He’s been to every one of them, save one, since I started doing it. He’s also the man who, 7 years ago, walked into my office at work and informed me that he had a brilliant idea, and it involved us brewing beer.

I agreed, and here I am today, starting a brewing company. I owe Rob a lot for introducing me to this passion, and he’s been the biggest supporter since the idea’s inception. He’s an all around great guy who I’m glad to know. I had suspected that these recent health issues weren’t getting him down too much, as he’s about the most upbeat person I know, and when we got off the plane, I knew immediately that I was right. Good stuff.

We’ve got a trip planned tomorrow to head up and tour Lagunitas Brewing Company, and then head up to Santa Rosa and sample the wares at Russian River. It’ll be a great day of beer tasting and hanging out with some good friends. Lets be honest, hanging out with good friends is a big part of getting this brewery off the ground, so it’s going to be a trip well spent.

Yes, I’m going to be out at art walk tomorrow night, and yes, I’ll have some delicious beers to taste.

I’m sure some of you have heard about another business starting up here in town called “Green Car Company”. It’s a taxi/limo service that my good friend Chris is starting up. He’s always had a bit of a passion for old diesel cars, and has amassed a small collection of Mercedes that he’s been running on some home-processed biodiesel. His plan is to paint all his cars bright green and run the service totally off biodiesel (although not his own initially).

He’s got a sweet space in a building behind the Green Room downtown to run the whole operation out of. It’s a building that you’ve probably seen a thousand times but may not have taken much note of. It’s right on the corner of the alley by Martannes and the alley by Swadee Thai, it’s got a mural on one side of it, and says “Aspen Machine” on the south side (which faces Rt. 66).

You know it’s gotta be a cool space when the address has a “1/2″ in the number.

We’ve been throwing plans together for a couple months on this, and it’s gonna be a fun time. I’ve got three beers ready to roll for it, and he’s got some cool music lined up.

The three beers I’ll have on hand are:

Belgian Pale Ale – A cross between an american and belgian pale ale. Brewed with American base malt, belgian biscuit malt, a belgian yeast strain, and a mix of american and belgian hops. Really smooth and crisp with a nice citrus finish.

Oatmeal Stout – What more do you need to know? One of the richest, most delicious beers I brew. This beer is smooth, creamy, chocolaty, and all-around ridiculously good.

Flagstaff Farmhouse Ale – The latest beer in a series that I’ve brewed with a yeast strain that was harvested off local apples. This one is flavorful brown ale brewed with some local honey to boost the alcohol content and keep it from being too sweet. The wild yeast gives it a bit of a earthy, funky bite to it. Really unique beer that can lay claim to being one of the more locally sourced brews I’ve made.

We’re gonna get started on friday around 6:00, so come by and grab a beer and check out Chris’ new space. I’ll also have a stack of stickers, and a box full of t-shirts if anyone wants to pick one up. The t-shirts are $20 apiece, and I’ll have a full run of mens AND womens sizes in both styles for the occasion.

When you’re starting a business, everyone always asks you how things are moving along. Fortunately, it seems as though there’s always something to talk about.

Unfortunately, it’s not always the most glamorous of things to talk about. I would love to tell you how I’m builidng a bar, or testing out tanks, or whatever the case may be. But, the bottom line is really that there hasn’t been a lick of work going on at the brewery space yet. The main work that’s been happening is digging out from under a mountain of permit applications.

The whole brewery startup has been a huge effort in managing timing. I sat down when I first started putting plans together, and tried to get an idea on how long each of the different elements that play into it would take. From there, I started working backwards from my goal of having the space ready for when the equipment arrives.

Equipment order went in during february (at least for the brewhouse and tanks) and is set to arrive in may. The longest lead time item, by far, was the state liquor license application. I could cut and pour concrete, and let it dry for a month three times over before getting a liquor license approved by our esteemed state of arizona.

Based on the information from their website (pdf file), I should expect my license to take 105 days to approve. So, as soon as I had an address, the license application went into the state.

The strange thing about the timeframe they give is that 75 days are for ‘administrative completeness review’, and 30 days are for ‘substantive review’. This was a bit unclear to me at the outset, but it became very evident after my license application was initially submitted. It was immediately returned to me for deficiencies from an ‘administrative completeness’ standpoint. Things as important as:

Please list the middle name for Nathan Friedman in section XX.
We need you to list the square footage of the brewery space.
Please clearly mark the main entrance and exit to the brewery.

There were some others as well. There was a lot of face-smacking every time I got another version of the license application returned to me. My middle name was listed in 4 places, but not the 5th. The length and width of the perfectly rectangular brewery space was marked, but I didn’t list the ‘overall square footage’. The single ‘door’ in the building was marked, but I had not labeled it as the main entrance and exit.

This went on for about a month before my license was accepted. I consider this a win, since they budgeted 75 days for it on the website.

It’s actually unfortunate, because I believe they have resorted to being nitpicky about the applications so that they don’t have to process them as quick, but in reality they’re creating much more work than they need to. So it goes.

Either way, I got the application in and *finally* accepted, and they have now posted on my front door for my liquor license. If you want to see my neatly typed application with 2 layers of handwritten corrections on it, drop by and thumb through it.

That stays up for 20 days, and then I put on a monkey suit and go wow the city council with my illusions of grandeur for the brewery.

In the meantime, I’ve had a whole other stack of applications to get through. The city building one has been another fun one.

I’ll be perfectly honest, the city has actually been really easy to work with. I’ve heard horror stories about unreasonable requirements and complicated plan reviews, but I got some great advice when I went in there, and since the renovations are relatively simple, it’s actually been quite smooth. I ran into a little hitch when I was originally wanting to build a small room within the big space, and if you build any sort of wall (even non-load-bearing) in a building over 3000 square feet, you need an architect.

The second you need an architect, they need to hire engineers, because really, an architect is just the designer. They can’t tell you what kind of concrete to put in, or what load center you need for you power requirements, or how to build the walls. They hire that out. It’s one massive ponzi scheme if you’re trying to do something simple. I didn’t need any engineering, I didn’t need any design, I needed to build 16′ of wall to store grain in.

Again, the guys at the city were really apologetic, and said they wished they could help me, but it’s a state statute (go figure). Yet again, it seems as though the state is really the red tape here. So it goes.

So, I erased the 16′ of wall I wanted to build, and the problem disappeared. No wall, no architect. I walk in, I tell them what I’m doing for electrical and plumbing upgrades, give them some money (always essential) and walk out with my permits. Bing, bang, boom.

Now I’m planning on a temporary ‘paint booth’ setup for when I mill the grain, along with a really nice wood shop dust collection system on the mill itself to keep everything contained.

On to the next…..

State, check. City, check.

Federal was the next on the list, with a quoted average turnaround time of 51 days right now (max: 80). Back to the paperwork……

The federal was a much more in-depth application, but (I thought) much more straightforward. It’s online, which is nice because you can do part, save it, and return later. The hardest part was actually scanning all the documents in. You need area maps, diagrams, leases, promissory notes if you have personal loans, bank statements, and all other manner of documents. I ended up with 12 attachments totaling about 100 pages. This was in addition to the several long pages of typed info into their online forms. But, with the state license posting up, motivation was high to get it done and submitted.

It went in on thursday of last week, so that clock is ticking as well.

Health department plan meeting was friday morning, and with that final push, I think I’m in the clear for permits for a little while.

I won’t lie, it’s been a bit exhausting. I don’t mind paperwork, but it’s a painful system with all the different people needing the same information but presented in a slightly different way. My autocad drawing of the space has gotten a bit out of hand with all the layers on it. Here it is with everything turned on. It’s a bit of a mess.

(and as I look at it, I think it may be missing a couple little revisions as well, since there were a few I just made a quick change, printed it, and moved on).

Wowza.

With all this push for paperwork, I’m closing in on the t-minus 2 months to my goal. I have hesitated to tell people exactly when I’m opening, because if my history as a project manager at work has taught me anything, its that timelines and budgets are uncertain up until the very end. Fortunately, so far we’re looking to be within a reasonable schedule. My goal is to get as much wrapped up before the tanks arrive as possible (mid to end of may) so that when they do, I can plug them in, run some test batches, get my health department inspection, and then start some beer soon after. I would love to be opening in June sometime, but I’ll be ecstatic if beer is flowing by july.

And now that I’ve publicly stated that, you can probably count on september because Murphy’s law will most likely be rearing it’s ugly head any time now.

With all this paper pushing, I felt like I needed to actually go out an build something for the brewery. Fortunately, Nate was free this past saturday, and we decided to tackle the frame for the mill. Being the engineer I am, I have a 1hp motor sitting in my garage which should work perfectly for the mill, and so I designed up a drive system and frame to step it from 3450 RPM to the requisite 300 rpm and I designed a hopper that should hold upwards of 2 bags grain (which is 110 lbs) at a time. Since my batch sizes are going to be in the 150-250 lbs of grain per batch range, this should make it really easy to manage the grains going into a batch.

Here’s the cad file of the frame and top that I whipped up while staying late at work one night: Grain Mill (pdf) Nate had some extra 1″ square stock sitting around that he had picked up from somebody, and I’m getting the mounting plates for the pulleys and motor machined at Mayorga’s Welding here in town.

Nate is getting pretty good on the TIG welder, and with two of us working to get everything all cut, cleaned up, and welded together, it came together pretty quickly. If you ever see it in the flesh, ignore the ugly, blown out welds. That’s where Nate let me try my hand at the TIG torch (I did it once before, about 8 years ago).

I made up the top plate for it yesterday, and started fitting up the hopper sides. I was originally going to make the sides out of plywood, but I may go back to sheet metal. I haven’t decided yet, and those can wait until the final plates are on and the thing is powder coated anyways.

(there’s a mill under the top plate, attached to that monster of a pulley)

Finally, something I can say is getting done other than paperwork for the brewery.

I do think the next couple weeks are going to start seeing some big changes at the space, so that will be exciting. I’ve got permits in hand, and so the hope is that the concrete for the sloped floor and the floor drains will get cut this next week, and then we can really start making a mess of things. It’s gonna be fun.

Have you ever heard of the four stages of competence? It’s also sometimes referred to as the four stages of learning. It refers to a psychology model that describes the stages that somebody goes through when they are learning a new skill. It’s a model which, I’m sure, is taught if you’re a psychologist, but it’s something that’s simple enough to understand and recognize in people learning a new skill that we actually get taught about it during a lot of our seminars and training classes at work.

It’s one that I always remembered, because it makes a lot of sense, and can really help you recognize what somebody who is trying to learn something new is going through. In case you aren’t familiar with it, I took a little trip over to Wikipedia and copied their description of the four stages.

1. Unconscious incompetence

The individual does not understand or know how to do something and does not necessarily recognize the deficit. They may deny the usefulness of the skill. The individual must recognize their own incompetence, and the value of the new skill, before moving on to the next stage. The length of time an individual spends in this stage depends on the strength of the stimulus to learn.

2. Conscious incompetence

Though the individual does not understand or know how to do something, he or she does recognize the deficit, as well as the value of a new skill in addressing the deficit. The making of mistakes can be integral to the learning process at this stage.

3. Conscious competence

The individual understands or knows how to do something. However, demonstrating the skill or knowledge requires concentration. It may be broken down into steps, and there is heavy conscious involvement in executing the new skill.

4. Unconscious competence

The individual has had so much practice with a skill that it has become “second nature” and can be performed easily. As a result, the skill can be performed while executing another task. The individual may be able to teach it to others, depending upon how and when it was learned.

When you start thinking back about all of the new skills you may have learned over the years, it makes a lot of sense. Think about your first bike ride, your first day on skis, your first time you tried to bake a cake, or even the first time you used that new widget or gadget that you just bought.

It’s an interesting model, not just because of it’s descriptive quality, but because if you can recognize what stage you (or somebody else) is in, you can act accordingly to get them to the next stage as quickly as possible, thus hastening the discomfort in the middle stages and moving them forward as quickly as possible through those stages.

Being the meticulous and slightly obsessive person I am, I’ve noticed that when I am confronted with a situation where a new skill is required, I’m quite quick to move into the “conscious incompetence” stage as I tend to research things incessantly once I realize my shortcomings in an area. My personal goal is almost always to ‘find out what I’m up against’ and then systematically knock those unknowns off the list. I hate being in a stage where I’m not able to discern the situation and where I need to focus efforts. After I’ve gotten through that, the ‘conscious competence’ stage is a bit slower for me to move through, and there are many many areas where I never reach the fourth stage, but that doesn’t seem to bother me as much.

So where am I going with all of this? Why are we talking about psychology on a blog dedicated to biking, skiing, and more recently, starting a brewery?

Well, fear not, I’ll enlighten you.

The reason this model has been on my mind of late is because starting this brewery has been an endless stream of new skills and new knowledge that I’ve been acquiring at what amounts to a breakneck pace. Everything from learning how to navigate liquor license applications, to permit applications, to sizing electrical systems, to figuring out how many kegs to order (and a whole lot more).

When I started digging into the initial equipment purchases and leases and such with the brewery, I was in a state of blissful ignorance, or ‘unconscious incompetence’. I thought, “you just get a liquor license, buy some equipment, build a little bar, and away you go”.

Now, to be realistic, I knew there was a lot of items that added up to those three things and enabled all of them to happen, but the details were not clear to me on exactly how to get from point A to point B.

And as they say, the devil is in the details.

What details does the liquor board need; what equipment, down to the model numbers and exact prices (including shipping, which can be painful) do I need; and importantly, what permits do I need to get to make all of this construction happen?

Well, I’m finding all of that out, and chipping away at it one piece at a time.

Lets take a couple examples. The chiller is one of my favorites, because I spent an uncomfortable amount of time (for me) in the conscious incompetence stage with it. I knew I needed a glycol chiller to keep my tanks cold and to chill the beer prior to carbonating it and putting it into kegs and bottles. I knew that there were calculations that needed to be done to figure out loads, and if I didn’t get a chiller that was big enough, I could end up with one that just couldn’t handle it. So, I went out to a couple equipment manufacturers and got some load calculations done (a big shout out to Andrew at pro refrigeration for dealing with my endless stream of incompetence).

Easy peasy, right?

If I wanted to chill my walk-in as well as the tanks (including room for about double the number of tanks I have right now), I needed about 35000 BTU/hour of capacity. If I just wanted to chill the tanks, I could bring that down to about 22000 BTU/hour.

They spec’d me a 5 hp chilling unit. So, I started looking at some used 5hp chilling units. Turns out the guy I bought some other equipment from had a chiller that was a 3.5 hp unit. Alright, sounds close, but a little on the low side. I was on the fence about it as it seemed like it wouldn’t meet my needs.

Turns out chillers are also spec’d in ‘tons of chilling capacity’, which is some crazy unit derived from melting a certain quantity of ice in a certain amount of time. It equates to about 12000 BTU/hour per ton of chilling capacity. Great, 3 Ton chiller should be plenty. Turns out that the 3.5 hp unit was rated at about 2.6 ton (31,200 btu/h), which puts me close enough to the chilling capacity I need that I thought I was good to go. He gave me a good deal on it, and away it goes.

I thought, at this point, I was getting the hang of it. I had moved past the conscious incompetence when it came to spec’ing chillers and had ended up with a unit that was going to do the trick for a good price. I got a hold of Andrew to see what the last little bits and pieces of the chilling system were that I needed to get, and he asked what chiller I had ended up with.

I proudly sent him the spec sheet which he promptly replied by pointing out the line in the chiller specs (which I had glossed over, not knowing what it was, and not thinking it was important) that stated that the rated BTU/h was at “50F exit water temperature”.

That means the chiller will give you that output when you’ve got it set to 50F for the outflow.

And, of course, I need it to be at 28-32F outflow.

Which, apparently cuts the chilling capacity down about 40%.

Crap.

I had a slightly sleepless night thinking I just dropped a bunch of cash on something that wouldn’t work for what I needed to do. The perceived ‘conscious competence’ quickly turned into ‘conscious incompetence’ with suspicions that I was still missing something and I was sitting on equipment I couldn’t use.

Fortunately, I think Andrew sensed a bit of this in one of my midnight emails that night, and talked me off the ledge the next morning. I’ve got plenty of capacity for what I’m doing right now, we can daisy-chain a second chiller in if you need it, and you can always buy a standalone unit for the walk-in fridge and just run the tanks off this chiller (which is what I ended up doing).

The whole process of moving back and forth in these stages of competence is a really taxing process, but it’s also exciting because of the amazing amount of knowledge that I’m absorbing right now. Every day seems to be a new challenge and every day is a new set of things to figure out.

Admittedly, most of them lately have been about navigating the bureaucracy of permitting and licensing, but hopefully that will turn into learning how to finish bars and get chillers up and running. Although that’s still not brewing, it’s way more comfortable to me that paying out wads of cash to every conceivable government entity within a couple hundred miles of here to get stamps of approval.

On a more exciting note, I do have a couple equipment updates for everyone. I’ve got in my stuff for the beginnings of a basic yeast lab, and have started practicing doing yeast health tests and cell counts so that I’m ready when everything scales up to keep track of the little beasts that actually make the magic happen. I also have gotten in my new mill which is about 3 times the size, and 4 times the throughput of the small homebrew mill I’m using. And the really big item is that the walk-in refrigerator is bought and should be on it’s way in the next couple weeks.

If anyone is interested in coming over and helping piece it together, it should be pretty interesting. I’ve never put one together, but the impression that I get is that the panels basically just snap together. It’s like a big jigsaw puzzle that you use allan wrenches to lock into place. You can see the cold box I got here: 9’6″ x 12′ Walk-in, and note that each of those panels has little cam-locks on all sizes of it that connect into the adjacent panels.

I am itching to start building, so I think I’m going to tackle starting in on the frame for the mill soon. I want to get cracking on the bar as well, but I need a bit more infrastructure work done before than can happen (namely: sinks).

Sometimes I walk into the brewery space and feel like not much is happening, but then I look at the stack of papers next to my desk (and the quickly diminishing bank account) and although I don’t feel any better about it, at least I feel like something is moving.

And on that note, I’m going to go to work today and then go for a nice bike ride after, because I am solidly ‘unconsciously competent’ at that, and I think I could use a bit more time in that stage.

I know a lot of folks have been itching for a detailed update on the Brewery, and I apologize for not getting one sooner. The only excuse I have is that things have been in a pretty major state of flux the last few weeks, and I didn’t want to put anything up until I had something solid to report.

Well, solid or not, I’m feeling a lot better about where everything is at, and enough to start to share with everyone.

I know I’m writing this in the morning, but it’s worth grabbing a beer for the story and sitting back and relaxing. I’ve got lots to update on.

The big one is the location. As many of you saw about a month ago, I had secured a location and was working through all of the permitting and such with the city, the state and the feds. I had contractors looking at it, and was getting ready to go for getting all the construction started.

I even had a layout of the space ready to roll. I had somehow figured out how to fit all of my brewery and a small taproom in about 850 square feet. It was sizing up to be a bit of a squeeze, but I just thought of it as ‘cozy’.

There was room for a few high-top tables, and a handful of chairs around the bar. I had even proposed a small patio space outside the big rollup door.

All was well in the world, and then the electrician came in. We had thought there was plenty of power for the brewery space since that building had housed some large scale mixing equipment at one point that required pretty heavy-duty 3-phase power for the mixers. Turns out that it wasn’t going to cut it. All of a sudden everything was turned a little upside down when they started talking about 400amp 3-phase service, and new drops from the power company, and other such expensive items.

All of a sudden my whole renovation budget was shot on just a power box.

On an 850 square foot space which, if things went well, I would outgrow in a year or two.

You may be asking yourself “what the heck does he need with all that power?”. Well, the brewhouse that I’ve ordered is an all-electric brewhouse and is designed such that the heating elements have enough power that I can do 2 batches in about a 10 hour brew day. There are two tanks which have heaters in them: the hot liquor tank, which is basically a 160 gallon water heater; and the boil kettle. Each of these tanks have 4 x 6000 watt heating elements in them. Running at 220V, these pull about 25amps apiece, so all of a sudden we’re talking about a 200amp circuit just for the brewhouse (and that doesn’t even count the chiller and the mill.)

Things started looking very expensive, but I was ‘in too deep’ as they say. This was happening, and it was just up to me to figure out how to make it happen. So, I gathered my thoughts, and gave my landlord a call.

Fortunately for me, I have just about the best landlord ever. He actually renovated all the buildings right around the one I’m in and was a commercial contractor in flag for many many years. He’s retired down to phoenix and basically keeps these buildings around as a little bit of income and something to keep him busy. Fortunately for me, he’s also enthusiastic about the brewery and wants to help where he can with getting me what I need.

Also fortunately for me, he has a few other units open right now in the same business park. One of which has all the power I could ever need (2 x 200 amp 3-phase circuits), an ADA accessible bathroom, and a nice big 3/4 inch water pipe coming in.

It’s also 2200 square feet, and costs a decent amount more per month. Then again, it’s a whole lot less than upgrading the electrical would have been on the other place. We went over there a week ago and took a look at it, and I’m signing the lease on the new place this friday.

So instead of 1515 N Main Suite H, I’ll be at 1519 N Main, Suite 102.

All-in all, it’s a much nicer place. It’s got all the infrastructure I need, it’s got an office/lab space that will be really nice,and I’ve got lots of room to expand if/when things take off.

Here’s my proposed layout that went into the liquor board earlier this week for the permit approval.

The taproom is about as big as my whole space was before.

I’m still finalizing all the little details for the building permits, but it’s looking like Wanderlust just expanded and we don’t even have a single piece of equipment yet.

It’s been a rollercoaster ride already, and I’ve just got empty buildings right now.

Here are a couple pics of the new space as well. It used to be an old bowling alley, I’m told. It’s got really tall ceilings with these really cool steel girders and an arched wooden ceiling in between them. It’s also got two huge skylights that are big enough that I doubt I’ll have the lights on during the day. When all of these pics were taken, there was no power in there yet, so you can see how much light they let in. Very cool.

The brings you up to speed on the space, and you now know why I’ve been a bit quiet the last few weeks on updates. Didn’t want to take everyone along with me on that adventure.

In other news, I’m starting to get equipment rolling. I’ve got the brewhouse ordered, and it should be here in may. If you’re interested in the details, I’m getting the tanks for a 3 barrel (93 gallon) brewhouse and two 6 barrel (186 gallon) fermenters from a company called “Stout Tanks” (I also have a 6BBL ‘brite tank’ for carbonating and cold-conditioning in). The heating system, piping, pumps, and control system is being made by a guy name Kevin from a company called “Brewmation”.

I also bought some used equipment from Props Brewing in florida who was getting rid of a glycol chiller, a heat exchanger, and a filter.

The mill has been ordered as well, giving us plenty of time to build a frame and hopper for it, and I’m scheming on a home-grown keg washer as well. Kegs, bottles, and growlers are also spec’d out, but are waiting until renovations have started and died down to get ordered.

More importantly, I’ve got stickers in already, and t-shirts should be all printed up and ready to go by the end of this week. In case you haven’t seen the facebook posts on the t-shirts, I’m getting two styles printed. They’re both going to have the Wanderlust logo on the back, and they each have a little one-liner on the front. One says “beers for the journey” on the other says “not all who wander are drunk”. They’re getting printed here in flagstaff at Flag Tee Company, and I’m getting them printed on a nice soft American-made cotton t-shirt from Anvil.

I’ll have a paypal account set up to order them if you’re not here in flag. If you are, I’ll probably have a couple open houses in the next few weeks to see the empty brewery space. I’ll let everyone know when I do that so you can come by and pick one up.

Also, I’m getting some work done on the website (even though it’s still just a placeholder page right now) and at some point blog entries will move over there. Again, I’ll certainly let you know when that happens. In the meantime, keep an eye out here for updates.

I think that about brings us up to speed. I’m sure I’m forgetting a bunch of stuff still, but at least we’re a little bit caught up. Every day is an adventure, that’s for sure.