Messages

2431

Equipment and Software / Re: Pump question

« on: January 12, 2010, 10:33:38 AM »

Supposedly (according to the instructions) it uses the water that it's pumping to cool itself.  I guess I'll find out how effective that is when I fire it up for the first time.

2432

Yeast and Fermentation / Re: Can I use yeast nutrient without a starter?

« on: January 12, 2010, 10:18:05 AM »

Hi y'all.  I was wondering if it would be helpful to add yeast nutrient to my wort before fermenting.  I've been using US-05 lately, so I haven't had the need to make a starters.  I wonder if adding it would help the yeast, or just mess up the beer. 

So while we await the results of a side by side test and possible dissection of individual yeast cells to see how much zinc they have in their bellies I believe the short answer is:

It might help, it certainly doesn't hurt, and it's cheap so go for it.  Even if the only thing it ends up giving you is peace of mind then its still worth it in my opinion.

2433

Equipment and Software / Re: Pump question

« on: January 12, 2010, 04:32:36 AM »

Great, thanks for the help guys.

2434

Equipment and Software / Pump question

« on: January 11, 2010, 08:10:08 PM »

So after my last sub-freezing brewing experience with using garden hoses and my IC outside to chill I decided to build a simple system to chill using water recirculated via a pump through the IC into a cooler.  Found a cheap aquarium pump on Amazon and not knowing what I was doing bought it.  Attached hose fittings to two lengths of 1/2" ID clear tubing and fired it up.  No surprise, it didn't have the juice to move the water.

So I went out and got one of these:

http://www.homedepot.com/Building-Materials-Plumbing-Pumps-Utility/h_d1/N-5yc1vZ1xr5Zasgg/R-100178274/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

Now I'm not sure if I went overboard or not.  There's no question this will move the water through the system but I'm worried it's got too much power for the 1/2" tubing and the chiller coil.  I don't want to either 1) burn out the pump motor, or 2) rupture something somewhere else.

Anyone have an opinion they'd care to share or experience with this pump?

2435

General Homebrew Discussion / Re: priming

« on: January 11, 2010, 07:58:16 PM »

I would like to add that I use to make a simple syrup by adding the priming sugar to a half cup of hot water to dissolve the sugar and then cool the liquid down and adding it to the bottling bucket before racking the beer into the bucket.

+1 to this but I'll add that I don't bother to cool the syrup down at all.  I just take it from the stove, pour it into the bucket, and rack the beer on top of it.  It'll cool down fast enough when the cool beer starts flowing into it.

2436

All Grain Brewing / Re: Malt Conditioning

« on: January 10, 2010, 08:19:04 AM »

Thanks Kai.

2437

All Grain Brewing / Re: Malt Conditioning

« on: January 09, 2010, 09:16:24 PM »

How do you calculate the amount of water to add to a certain number of lbs of grain?  Kai's site gives the example that a 2% moisture increase would be 100ml of water for 11 lbs of grain.  Coincidentally, my next batch will have exactly that much in the grain bill so I'm good to go with that one however can you just scale that for different grain bills?

2438

Extract/Partial Mash Brewing / Re: More Yeast, Temp boost?

« on: January 08, 2010, 07:57:24 AM »

Your temp is probably a little low.  What yeast did you use?  How big a starter did you pitch?  Warm it up a bit and rouse the yeast and see if that helps.

2439

General Homebrew Discussion / Re: what are your goals for 2 ought 10

« on: January 05, 2010, 12:17:35 PM »

Temperature control and kegging here.

2440

General Homebrew Discussion / Re: Winter Brewing Photos

« on: January 04, 2010, 07:28:26 PM »

I froze my ass off brewing on Saturday.  Everything was fine, nice and toasty in the garage until I had to run the hoses to chill.  Then I had water freezing as soon as it was exposed to the air.  I had a hell of a time keeping the hoses from freezing and they did freeze between the point where I was done chilling and draining the boil kettle into the fermenter.

Based on that I decided not to brew today.  I didn't have the energy to wrestle with those hoses again.  I ordered an aquarium pump and I'm going to work on a closed chilling system to make it easier both for the winter and summer months.

2441

General Homebrew Discussion / Nice find

« on: January 04, 2010, 12:44:59 PM »

Was getting ready to bottle today, first time in the new house and was going through the taped up boxes that I was under the assumption contained my bottles.  Well, it did, in addition to 5 RyePAs that I brewed almost 3 years ago today and which I didn't realize I had.  Guess I have some homebrews to drink while bottling today after all.  They still taste pretty good.  No real hop aroma left and they're showing their age a bit but still a really nice brew to enjoy while doing homebrewing activities 

2442

Yeast and Fermentation / Re: No Carbonation: A bad condition

« on: January 03, 2010, 09:13:42 AM »

Yeah, I would think that warming them back up and giving them a little shake will probably work fine.  I've found that it generally takes a week to carb and two weeks is more like it to get consistent carbonation.

2443

Equipment and Software / Re: Coleman Extreme 70qt Silver

« on: January 02, 2010, 08:53:14 PM »

Got the washers ground down on three sides and slapped this together.  Brewed with it today and it worked great.  Couldn't feel any heat on the top or other areas outside the cooler with one exception.  Right where the indent is to open the cooler there was some heat loss.  I noticed it easily when I was preheating the mash tun with boiling water in 20 degree weather since vapor was pouring out.  I just put a think towel over that and that seemed to work.

2444

All Grain Brewing / Re: Malt Conditioning

« on: January 02, 2010, 07:49:53 PM »

I may need to give this a try since I'm having stuck runoffs.  In total I left about 0.17 gallons per lb in the mash tun today in "absorption" between the first runoff and the batch sparge.  Maybe I'm trying to run it off too fast as well.  I'm going to stick with what I've been doing for the brew I'm planning to do on Monday and slow down the runoff a little and see what happens.  If I get similar results I guess I'll give this a shot. 

2445

General Homebrew Discussion / Re: Whatcha brewin' this week? - 2009 Dec 31 - 2010 Jan 6

« on: January 02, 2010, 09:03:37 AM »

Mashed in on the Belgian Strong Golden Ale.