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Got a bit of a different issue, I'm trying out a conical fermenter for a christmas mead project and the temp in my (I'm starting to realize) insufficient fermentation chamber is uneven, too warm up top and too low at the bottom. I used a slightly old yeast and it's going slow. It's going, but it's visibly so slow I'm worried it might stall. Rather than do the obvious (make a new one, buy more equipment), which won't help me now, I thought of a good idea: take off the yeast collector in the bottom, pitch the small trub there again, swirl it a bit and leave the bottom bit dry and the valve closed. But I can't get the loving yeast collector off. And it's plastic, so if I try and unfuckle it with a handy pipe wrench, I risk just plain destroying the thing. I'll have to figure out a way to do this, as gentle as possible. Really annoying though, and I think I'm seriously risking brew contamination at this point. Given that it's well over 100$ worth of ingredients, that kind of stings.
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Jan 2, 2021 20:44
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Wouldn’t it be better to just warm it up? It sucks that it’s stuck, but I’d still just rock it without opening anything.
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Jan 2, 2021 21:02
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Jhet posted:Is your fermentation temp lower than normal? Your mash temp isn’t too high and is really pretty standard range. If your current temps are normal, then maybe you had an older yeast sachet and it’s struggling? You can try to rouse it by agitating it, but you could also just pitch another sachet if you think that’s possible. gamera009 posted:Echoing this. I’d just make a starter and fire it in at high krausen. If that doesn’t move, that’s that. Maybe fire in some sugar to thin it out and bring up the ABV. Thanks for the advice guys.
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Jan 2, 2021 22:13
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Nice piece of fish posted:Got a bit of a different issue, I'm trying out a conical fermenter for a christmas mead project and the temp in my (I'm starting to realize) insufficient fermentation chamber is uneven, too warm up top and too low at the bottom. I used a slightly old yeast and it's going slow. It's going, but it's visibly so slow I'm worried it might stall. Rather than do the obvious (make a new one, buy more equipment), which won't help me now, I thought of a good idea: take off the yeast collector in the bottom, pitch the small trub there again, swirl it a bit and leave the bottom bit dry and the valve closed. Maybe a bit late to ask for this particular batch, but did you put plenty of silicone tape on the threads? My Fastferment conical came with a whole roll of tape and instructions not to stint - and after the first use I put on more because the threads cut through most of the layers I'd used. To save this batch though, could you not just get a cheap bucket fermenter and siphon the mead into that before messing with the stuck yeast collector?
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Jan 3, 2021 00:24
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Sashimi posted:Temps are fine for the yeast, measured my samples at 18-19C. I did try agitating it on the last reading so I'll take one last sample to see if that did anything but my gut's telling me it won't work. Good experiment here. If the fresh pitch fails to drop the gravity, I’d consider having some exogenous enzyme on hand. Not glucoamalase but rather fungal alpha amalase, it functions more as a beta and will bring attenuation to 80-84%.
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Jan 5, 2021 14:08
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big scary monsters posted:Maybe a bit late to ask for this particular batch, but did you put plenty of silicone tape on the threads? My Fastferment conical came with a whole roll of tape and instructions not to stint - and after the first use I put on more because the threads cut through most of the layers I'd used. I did, yes. Well, at least I hope so. The cone feels a lot looser than it ought to be but I don't want to overthread it. I did use plenty of tape though. I figured it out. I looks like if you close the valve before you try and get the yeast collector off, it creates a vacuum and it just won't come off. Finally tried opening the valve and presto  So, repitching may have helped, but it's still got a sucky seal because the airlock isn't bubbling or the fermentation is just slow. There's a fair krausen and visible activity though so I'm just gonna leave it for a while. gently caress it.
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Jan 5, 2021 14:58
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Been keeping an eye on diy for a brew thread never thought to look at gws because I'm a large idiot. Excited for Sunday where I try my hand at an extract wee heavy. It'll be slightly interesting because I'm trying out several new equipments at once. My 9 gallon digiboil should be here tomorrow, my anvil 7.5 gallon fermenter arrives today and for once in my life I'll also be using a way to actually measure gravity with a refractometer. (I spent a lot of my life doing 2.5 gallon batches in an apartment so never wanted to waste any.) In about 3-4 weeks I'll also be stepping into brew in a bag to do a irish red for the spring.
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Jan 6, 2021 01:53
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tater_salad posted:Been keeping an eye on diy for a brew thread never thought to look at gws because I'm a large idiot. Make sure when you take any refractometer readings mid- or post-fermentation that you're correcting the reading, since the alcohol will mess with the refractometer. The easiest way to do that is with the OG, so make sure you've got that recorded.
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Jan 6, 2021 02:42
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Thanks, it's a good call and I did read.up.on thst and am aware that I'll need to get a pre fermentation brix reading and plop it into a calculator because of the alcohols. My previous method was just check for airlock activity within 24-48hrs of the pitch and let it sit for 2 weeks or whenever I felt like bottling / had enough bottles to do it. I just figure it'll be nice to have some numbers to go along with it and see if I'm getting the numbers I should be. My homebrew game is very relaxed generally.
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Jan 6, 2021 02:52
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Wouldn't a hydrometer be sufficient for the measurements you're trying to take here?
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Jan 6, 2021 03:30
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I got a refractometer but I got different gravity readings than I had initially expected from it. I did an extract recipe with an expected 1.052 SG and ended up with 1.060 reading on my refractometer (I'm doing small batches so I didn't try a hydrometer). That would have been a volume difference of about 0.25 gallons (going from 2.75 gal -> 2.5 gal) which I don't think I was off by that much. I also compensated for the expected volume the malt extract would give, so maybe I did that wrong, or maybe it's being double-counted on the calculator. Maybe I should try a known sugar solution to see if I get what I expect. At any rate, I got one of those in-vessel tilting hydrometers so I'll use that for now. I think they're not as precise as a regular hydrometer but it should be good enough for me.
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Jan 6, 2021 03:58
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In 2021, I am trying to get back to brewing about monthly. I've been occupied with other hobbies (building a car), so I have fallen way behind, but I am going to try for 10-12 batches in 2021. Brown ale tomorrow.
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Jan 6, 2021 04:00
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Eeyo posted:I got a refractometer but I got different gravity readings than I had initially expected from it. I did an extract recipe with an expected 1.052 SG and ended up with 1.060 reading on my refractometer (I'm doing small batches so I didn't try a hydrometer). That would have been a volume difference of about 0.25 gallons (going from 2.75 gal -> 2.5 gal) which I don't think I was off by that much. I also compensated for the expected volume the malt extract would give, so maybe I did that wrong, or maybe it's being double-counted on the calculator. Maybe I should try a known sugar solution to see if I get what I expect. I've had that issue when I started using mine. Did you leave the sample to cool before looking at it? I know most refractometers have temp adjustments, but that only works if you move the screw for that temp. I just take a small sample on a spoon and leave it to cool for a couple minutes and then it gives the right readings. Cools much faster than a hydrometer sample which is great. Jo3sh posted:In 2021, I am trying to get back to brewing about monthly. I'm shooting for about double that, but some will be longer term mixed ferm projects. I just have to figure out how much space I'll have and if I can turn a closet in my new garage into a cooler for my kegs or if I need to just use a chest freezer. I would love to have a two tier system where I can ferment above and keg below with doors that swing open, but that just probably won't happen this year.
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Jan 6, 2021 05:20
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In an attempt to make sure I have my "proper" homebrew beers sitting in their bottles for 6 weeks or more before I get impatient and crack them open, I'm looking for beer kit recommendations. Preferably ones I can buy in the UK. (And any tweaks you might suggest for those kits). Currently, I have: Wilko's Winter Ale - nice enough, but the spice flavouring seems a little artificial to me. Not really improving over time but the fermentation stuck for about a week while I sorted out a heat source for the fermenter so I think it mostly conditioned during the wait. Mangrove Jack's Pink Grapefruit IPA - only bottled on the 3rd, so no idea. I did half the bottles with around 10g/litre of lactose as a bit of an experiment. I'll report back. Death of Rats fucked around with this message at 13:22 on Jan 6, 2021 |
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Jan 6, 2021 11:56
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Pillow Armadillo posted:Wouldn't a hydrometer be sufficient for the measurements you're trying to take here? Sure would, and a refractometer is sufficient as well as requiring just a few drops of liquid.
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Jan 6, 2021 12:13
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Jhet posted:I've had that issue when I started using mine. Did you leave the sample to cool before looking at it? I know most refractometers have temp adjustments, but that only works if you move the screw for that temp. I just take a small sample on a spoon and leave it to cool for a couple minutes and then it gives the right readings. Cools much faster than a hydrometer sample which is great. Yeah I just put like a single drop on it and put the plastic plate over it, so no real cooling down. I thought it was supposed to just cool down really fast since it's a big hunk of glass basically? At least that's what I heard somewhere but I could be wrong on that one. Edit: oh and I should add that measuring an actively fermenting beer can be difficult if it's still cloudy. For me the cloudiness blurred out the measurement line so I couldn't get a good reading until the yeast flocculated. Eeyo fucked around with this message at 00:13 on Jan 7, 2021 |
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Jan 7, 2021 00:11
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Eeyo posted:Yeah I just put like a single drop on it and put the plastic plate over it, so no real cooling down. I thought it was supposed to just cool down really fast since it's a big hunk of glass basically? At least that's what I heard somewhere but I could be wrong on that one. Yeah, it only takes a minute sitting on the spoon, but once I left it to sit I got accurate measurements. I thought it would cool fast enough, but it seemed to be messing up anyway. So the sample I referenced it with via hydrometer half an hour later would be what the refractometer would give from that same sample jar, but not the one it gave right as I pulled the sample from the kettle. If it hasn't flocculated you at least know that you're not done, but it's annoying if you're shooting for 65% before dry hopping. I prefer to be just about done with fermentation if I'm not dry hopping in a closed keg anymore. I get better aroma that way, but if you're still on the hazy neipa craze then it gets complicated.
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Jan 7, 2021 00:32
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Eeyo posted:Yeah I just put like a single drop on it and put the plastic plate over it, so no real cooling down. I thought it was supposed to just cool down really fast since it's a big hunk of glass basically? At least that's what I heard somewhere but I could be wrong on that one. I mean, they're "supposed to" have Automatic Temperature Compensation, which is clearly not really the case, and probably refers to the liquid cooling on the plate. I've found that this is not enough, and likewise set a sample aside to cool before using the refractometer. It sucks, because it defeats a lot of the presumed utility of the device, but my reading are all over if I don't. Measuring fermenting/fermented beer with a refractometer will never work well, they're not designed for that.
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Jan 7, 2021 00:46
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Welp I'll see if I it works for me or doesn't I see a lot of folks say it works well enough they don't use a hydrometer. At this point I have enough beer I cns probably spare some for hydrometer readings.
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Jan 7, 2021 02:24
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I use this for post ferment. Does a nearly perfect job when I had been tracking both with refractometer and hydrometer. There’s a spreadsheet too. http://seanterrill.com/2012/01/06/refractometer-calculator/
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Jan 7, 2021 02:27
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I need to figure out my correction factor.
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Jan 7, 2021 02:46
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tater_salad posted:I need to figure out my correction factor. Correction factor should really be determined on a beer by beer basis. Unfortunately that would mean getting the hydro out and the refractometer making the refractometer less quick and easy. Alternatively probably pretty marginal in how much influence a slightly off correction can have.
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Jan 7, 2021 20:35
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I've been using a refractometer for awhile and I think it works pretty well? I pull samples from the mash or post boil with a pipette, put the bulb of the pipette in a cup of cold water for a few minutes and it's normally cool enough to give an accurate reading. During fermentation I pull a small sample into a cup, then chill it to drop solids out of suspension so the reading is clearer. I don't trust leaving samples on the plate of the refractometer to chill because they drastically change all over the place between different samples of the same wort, which I assume is a result of evaporation. Whereas my method at least gives consistent results, though they might be inaccurate because I don't always bother to do a hydro sample to calibrate against.
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Jan 7, 2021 20:54
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Realistically I just want to test if my beer is done or not with 3 readings of the same across 3 days. My current method of 'welp it's been 2 weeks I guess it's done' At this stage I don't really care too much about numbers. I might care when I do brew in a bag but we will see.
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Jan 8, 2021 00:47
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Going to be brewing up a Schwarzbier this weekend. This will be my first try at the style so if anyone has any input on the recipe I've drafted up, I'm all ears. I'm also going to throw some oak in the keg for a bit while it's lagering. I had an oak aged dark lager from a local brewery recently that really impressed me recently which spurred my idea for this beer. 6 Gallons 6lbs Pilsner Malt 4lbs Light Munich 8oz Carafa III Special 8oz Caramunich I 1.5oz Hallertauer at 60 min .5oz Hallertauer at 15 min Imperial Global Yeast Also got a Tilt hydrometer for Christmas. I'm excited to give that a try on this one.
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Jan 8, 2021 19:15
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rockcity posted:Going to be brewing up a Schwarzbier this weekend. This will be my first try at the style so if anyone has any input on the recipe I've drafted up, I'm all ears. I'm also going to throw some oak in the keg for a bit while it's lagering. I had an oak aged dark lager from a local brewery recently that really impressed me recently which spurred my idea for this beer. That is an excellent malt bill for a dark lager, it's pretty much identical to my czech dark lager recipe, although I use Carafa II special and Caramunich III. If you wanna push it more into Schwarzbier territory you could eliminate the crystal malt and go just a tiny bit higher on the roast and pilsner malt but these styles have significant common ground.
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Jan 8, 2021 19:28
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rockcity posted:Also got a Tilt hydrometer for Christmas. I'm excited to give that a try on this one. I really dig mine, make sure you go through the calibration process. Accuracy concerns aside, it serves as a great monitor and indicator for fermentation completion. I feel like I don't have to pull as many samples for testing; once the Tilt levels out for a few days, I'll pull samples for the hydrometer. Mine consistently reports a +0.002 reading on my hydrometer. Really the only qualm I have with the thing is that I can't get a reading inside my house since I use a stainless fermentation vessel and an upright freezer for a ferm-chamber. I have to open the chamber and put my phone pretty close to the vessel. Brief update on my rye lager + vanilla bean brew... Turned out fantastic, and got drank WAY too quickly. Ended up exactly as I had hoped: Great balance between a wintery-spicy taste and vanilla sweetness, somewhat of an attempt at recreating Anderson Valley's Winter Solstice. I bottled the vast majority of the batch so I could distribute to friends and family over Xmas, and honestly I feel like it had a more balanced taste in the bottle than it ever did coming straight from the keg. Definitely going to do a full 10 gallon batch next time... but the rye lager as it stands is crazy tasty too. And here I am talking myself into expanding my capacity... again. Scarf fucked around with this message at 20:04 on Jan 8, 2021 |
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Jan 8, 2021 19:55
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Scarf posted:Really the only qualm I have with the thing is that I can't get a reading inside my house since I use a stainless fermentation vessel and an upright freezer for a ferm-chamber. I have to open the chamber and put my phone pretty close to the vessel. I usethis to transmit data to a RaspberryPi with fermentrack. You can set the Tiltbridge to use google sheets and other services.
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Jan 8, 2021 20:47
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My gf got me an ingredient kit for Christmas which pretty much led to me getting a kick in the pants to try home brewing for the first time. I bought the brewers best deluxe equipment kit and a 5 gallon kettle for extract brewing. It means I have the following inventory: Primary fermenter pail with lid and grommet for airlock Airlock Secondary fermenter - a glass carboy A bottling pail with a valve Auto siphon 5 gal stainless steel kettle Hydrometer Lab style thermometer Bottle capper PVC tube with cutoff valve. A tube with a sprint mechanism at the end (forgot what it’s called) Easy-clean powder On its way from Amazon Wort chiller Star-San There’s some other stuff there that I missed but I should be all set to get going. My big question is I don’t know how to ensure everything is sanitized. My first move was to use the easy clean to clean up the interior of the pails and carboy but I read I need to use star-San after to ensure nothing is contaminated. Can someone explain to me an easy process for sanitizing everything to avoid contamination? I don’t know what to do. Also I plan to use the kitchen electric stove for the boil but then I have to carry the hot pot to the basement sink where the wort chiller will better attach to the tap. Is this time delay going to be a problem?
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Jan 9, 2021 19:34
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Kraftwerk posted:My big question is I don’t know how to ensure everything is sanitized. My first move was to use the easy clean to clean up the interior of the pails and carboy but I read I need to use star-San after to ensure nothing is contaminated. Save the powder for when your equipment is really scummy afterward. Beforehand clean anything that will touch your wort / beer after the boil with mild dish soap and then give it 2 minutes of contact with a star san solution. Putting the san into a spray bottle and spritzing the interior of the bucket / carboy is sufficient. If the carboy has the narrow neck you can't get your hands into, then pouring star san in, and swishing it to coat all of the surface will be needed. As far as carrying to the basement, the delay won't be a problem, but carrying your pot and 40 pounds of 200°+ wort down some stairs is kind of dangerous. Be careful. A common refrain is keep calm, don't worry, and have a homebrew. We first figured this poo poo out over a thousand years ago. You'll be okay.
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Jan 9, 2021 19:56
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Buy a spray bottle to mix your starsan into and just spray surfaces. I think it’s 3mL of it to a 1L spray bottle. You can spray it through hoses and just move it around to wet the surfaces. Time delay is not the biggest issue unless you’re whirlpool hopping or adding a bunch of hops in the last couple minutes (a bunch being 3-4oz+). Beginning tips are to watch for boil overs at the start and when you add anything to the boiling kettle. It’s very frustrating to clean it up on your kitchen stovetop. Just back off the heat early if it’s starting to foam up a lot. If you creep up on the boil it will do fine. You should have just about everything you’ll need to start, but if you start wanting to expand, check Craigslist and local resale markets. You can often get cheaper equipment that way.
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Jan 9, 2021 20:03
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thotsky posted:That is an excellent malt bill for a dark lager, it's pretty much identical to my czech dark lager recipe, although I use Carafa II special and Caramunich III. Yeah, I'm sort of playing a middle ground to a Czech dark lager and a Schwarzbier on the malt bill. I found a lot of varying recipes for Schwarzbiers out there some were even more munich, some were very little, some had darker more roasted malts in there, some just de-bittered ones. Almost all of them had some form of crystal in there. I kept that at just a half pound and also balanced that with a crispier, drier lager yeast. I'm going to pick up a sack of Mecca Grade's pilsner malt and use their munich for this as well. I've heard glowing things about their malts and the price on them isn't that wild through Midwest Supplies who are less than 10 minutes from my house. Spendy for a base malt, but close to the price of normal malts per pound if I'm buying a full 50lb bag. Scarf posted:I really dig mine, make sure you go through the calibration process. Accuracy concerns aside, it serves as a great monitor and indicator for fermentation completion. I feel like I don't have to pull as many samples for testing; once the Tilt levels out for a few days, I'll pull samples for the hydrometer. Mine consistently reports a +0.002 reading on my hydrometer. Good to know about the calibration, I haven't done that yet. Also, I have basically the exact same fermentation setup and I did wonder how well it would transmit through stainless AND a freezer. It's not a huge concern if I have to open the freezer for me. Eventually I'll probably build one of those raspberry pi transmitters, but that would just be for fun really.
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Jan 9, 2021 22:59
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Jhet posted:Buy a spray bottle to mix your starsan into and just spray surfaces. I think it’s 3mL of it to a 1L spray bottle. You can spray it through hoses and just move it around to wet the surfaces. I see a lot of videos of people soaking everything in a plastic tub with like 2-3 gallons of water and the appropriate starsan dose. Is there any difference?
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Jan 10, 2021 00:45
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Kraftwerk posted:I see a lot of videos of people soaking everything in a plastic tub with like 2-3 gallons of water and the appropriate starsan dose. Is there any difference? I fill my fermenter with sanitizer and soak things inside that, then drain the fermenter right before I fill it. Not that much really needs to get sanitized for a normal batch really, just anything that touches your beer after it's cooled. Anything that touches it before or during the boil doesn't need to be sanitized. Even your hydrometer and flask for it don't really need to be sanitized as long as you don't pour the sample into the fermenter. I basically only sanitize my fermenter, airlock and the scissors I use to open the yeast pouch now. When I was using a traditional carboy I had a funnel and strainer that I sanitized too, but I use a stainless fermenter now and don't need a funnel. Where you'll end up doing way more sanitizing is bottling. For that I'd get a 5 gallon buck and soak your (well cleaned) bottles in there. I soak them for a few minutes, dump the sanitizer from the bottles back in the bucket then place them back in their box and cover the tops in a sheet of saran wrap. Bottle caps I soak in a pint glass of the sanitizer from the bucket. A spray bottle is super handy though and if you used distilled or RO water to make the sanitizer it keeps for months and you can keep using it. I keep it handy for anything that contacts the beer during or after fermentation.
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Jan 10, 2021 01:04
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rockcity posted:I fill my fermenter with sanitizer and soak things inside that, then drain the fermenter right before I fill it. Not that much really needs to get sanitized for a normal batch really, just anything that touches your beer after it's cooled. Anything that touches it before or during the boil doesn't need to be sanitized. Even your hydrometer and flask for it don't really need to be sanitized as long as you don't pour the sample into the fermenter. I basically only sanitize my fermenter, airlock and the scissors I use to open the yeast pouch now. When I was using a traditional carboy I had a funnel and strainer that I sanitized too, but I use a stainless fermenter now and don't need a funnel. Can I use city water for the sanitization process or do I need to load up on distilled water? I’m going to use a large cooler sized bottle of spring water for the actual boil.
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Jan 10, 2021 01:15
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Kraftwerk posted:Can I use city water for the sanitization process or do I need to load up on distilled water? poo poo I used city water for everything
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Jan 10, 2021 01:20
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City is fine. So long as the acidity is there it'll do its job. I think the distilled is to make it keep longer. It'll keep for a long time either way. Seconding to watch for the boil over. When you turn on the heat to get it boiling don't turn your back on it till it's gotten super foamy then calmed down. A spray bottle of normal water would be handy to have at hand. If it looks like it's going to reach the top just mist it and that'll knock it back down.
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Jan 10, 2021 02:18
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Yeah, city water is fine for sanitizer, it’s just supposed to keep longer in a spray bottle if you use distilled. Related to city water though, you probably want to buy some campden tablets. They will help remove chlorine and chloramine from your water which can cause some off flavors in your beer. Stirring also helps boil over as does adding your first hop addition the second the boil starts.
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Jan 10, 2021 02:28
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A lot of good info on the star-san, but I wanted to add something that's maybe not obvious: you don't need to rinse the starsan out. Like it's totally food safe and the little bit left on the surface won't do anything to the beer. It feels really weird at first, but get everything sudsy and well-covered for the couple of minutes, dump out the excess liquid (without touching the part the beer will come in contact with), and use the equipment with the starsan still on. It's totally fine I promise.
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Jan 10, 2021 05:24
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Yeah, seconding that it will foam up when agitated, don’t worry about getting the foam off of things. It won’t leave enough actual starsan in the beer for you to ever taste it.
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Jan 10, 2021 05:34
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