[jeffy]

Ya know that bumper sticker that says, "a bad day fishing is better than a good day at work?"  Well, I can now tell you that a bad day homebrewing is not any better than a bad day at work.
My brew day Sunday was frustrating at almost every turn.  Most of the problems came from using some huge cones of whole hops that kept getting stuck in all the valves, pumps, drains and chiller.  I ended up pouring almost ten gallons of still warm wort, hops and all, into another 1/2 bbl keg to ferment.  I hope I made beer.
The thing about brewing is that you're always learning something.  I learned that if I'm going to make an IPA with whole hops, I will need to modify my kettle drain.

[dbeechum]

Jeff, I feel your pain there! Had a few brew days stopped dead in their tracks due to the same issue.

[chumley]

My first roggenbier took time, but it came out okay.  First, I don't think my idea of grinding 6.5 lbs. of malted rye into flour was such a great idea.  But, I compensated for that by adding 2 lbs. of rice hulls to the mash.  With a step infusion mash of 85°F (10 min) - 105°F (20 min) - 140°F (40 min) - 152°F (60 min), the boiling water infusions filled my 10 gallon gott to the brim....and I only has 13 lbs. of malt in the mashtun.  

The beer drained 2 gallons of wort, then got stuck.  I just re-stirred it, recirculated a bit, then the remainder drained just fine.  No issues with the addition 2 gallons I batch sparged with.

Second, the wort had a crazy hot break....foam was 3-4 inches thick.  Took a bit of finessing with the propane burner to avoid a boilover

Ended up with 5.5 gallons of 1.060 roggenbier fermenting nicely in my 60°F basement.

Oh, and here is my final recipe:

6 lbs. rye malt
0.5 lbs. crystal rye
1.5 lbs. Clobal pils
2 lbs. Weyerman munich
1.5 lbs. MEB special aromatic
0.5 lbs. Dingemann aromatic
2 oz. Carafa II dehusked
2 lbs. rice hulls

Boil for 90 min.
1.25 oz. Tettnangers 60 min
0.50 oz. Saaz 15 min

Pitch on WY3333 yeast cake.