Messages

1

General Homebrew Discussion / Re: Recommendation for RO system to use for homebrew

« on: August 31, 2017, 03:39:57 PM »

Most large grocery stores have RO water dispensers and charge between 35 and 40 cents a gallon.

Unfortunately, not universally true. Areas that have low or really low TDS are unlikely to have RO machines in any stores. In essence, if you can't find RO machines in stores in your area, there probably isn't a great need for RO treatment and the tap water is more likely to be usable for brewing (of course, you still have to adjust it for brewing).

FWIW, we definitely have RO machines at Kroger and Safeway in Longmont despite having water with a TDS ~50 coming out of the faucet. Form-factor of the 5 gallon jug has some appeal,  I guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

2

General Homebrew Discussion / Re: Interpretation of Beer Experiment Results

« on: August 23, 2017, 10:33:32 AM »

Statistical outcome: None. No statistical conclusions can be drawn.
Practically it means that you should ignore the results until further information is collected.

So much this ^^^!

Put another way ( from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistical_hypothesis_testing#Interpretation )

If the p-value is not less than the required significance level [...] then the test has no result. The evidence is insufficient to support a conclusion.

Great write-up and super important to keep in mind when reading the results (or non-results, as the case may be) from Brulosophy and Experimental Brewing, thanks for the literacy lesson!

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All Grain Brewing / Re: Water Quality

« on: August 17, 2017, 07:37:19 PM »

This is a link to the WHO report: http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/dwq/nutrientschap12.pdf

Doesn't seem like there are any real strong conclusions in the report.

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General Homebrew Discussion / Re: Backsweetening Cider

« on: August 17, 2017, 05:01:57 PM »

For backsweetening for ciders I use global wine conditioner. I got this from the cider episode of brewingtv (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tDP1ubIci8) and it works great!

5

Yeast and Fermentation / Re: I would like to make a gose

« on: August 01, 2017, 05:17:03 PM »

I've had good luck with the Milk The Funk recipe: http://www.milkthefunk.com/wiki/Gose#Milk_the_Funk_Gose_Recipe

I subbed out the Omega OYL-605 for Inland Island L. Brevis (https://inlandislandyeast.com/yeast-library/inis-991-Lactobacillus-Brevis/ — local yeast FTW!)

Recipe uses half an oz of fleur de sel at the end of the boil.

One weird thing to watch out for is the variability of coriander is kind of huge. One place I went to had dull, tiny, vaguely herbal-smelling coriander; then next place I went had some nice, plump, fruity pebbles smelling coriander. You want the latter

6

Equipment and Software / Re: Pressurized transfers are amazing

« on: June 28, 2017, 06:29:08 PM »

If you want to make another incremental improvement: use a barbed swivel nut to connect your liquid tubing to a disconnect seated on your keg liquid out post and connect some tubing to a gas disconnect on the gas in post and run it into a container of sanitizer.

That way you can keep your keg lid completely closed and ditch the tin foil.

Whoa, living in the future

Would be cool to do this and/or spunding valve counter pressure kinda deal.

Soooo I guess I need to find something to connect my 1/2" conical ball-valve to 3/16" tubing...

7

Equipment and Software / Pressurized transfers are amazing

« on: June 28, 2017, 12:52:33 PM »

It probably seems like a trivial reason to own a conical, but no-worry pressurized transfers are definitely my favorite thing about my conical. I used to use a sterile siphon starter, but I still had endless worries about oxidation and about my racking cane's connection to the transfer hose...and when I used a carboy cap with a CO2 hose barb I was always worried that some clog would dramatically explode my carboy, sending huge glass shards flying in all directions. Anyway, I guess what I'm saying is that conicals are neat and my conical has been my favorite brewing purchase in recent memory in terms of piece of mind.

8

All Grain Brewing / Re: PH Increase Post-Boil vs Pre-Boil

« on: June 28, 2017, 10:17:53 AM »

I've definitely had pH rise by several 100ths of a unit during mash and boil so 5.16 up to 5.17 over the course of a mash doesn't seem atypical but the jump to 5.9 at the end of the boil is kind of huge

I would expect the wort to have some buffering power against DAP.

Some questions to help troubleshooting:

• Did you calibrate the meter on brew day?
• Did you check against a reference solution before/after each reading?
• If so, when was the reference solution prepared? Was it fresh?
• What did you add to the mash to drop the pH? 5.16 is pretty low for 100% MO in my experience.

9

Homebrew Competitions / Re: NHC 2016 Final Round scores

« on: June 13, 2016, 02:37:35 PM »

I cant figure out how to check. Either my password isnt working,  or I forgot it. And I cant change it because there's no displayed question for the verification answer. Oh well, I'll just have to be surprised

I could get into mine earlier.... but mine is doing the exact same thing now.  Perhaps they just disabled the whole thing until after the awards.

This is still happening for me

If the whole site was disabled, it would be nice to have a message to that effect rather than the username/password message.

FWIW, finally able to get in to the final site now. Unsure what (if anything) changed.

Both of mine made it to mini-BOS. Got a 40 in fruit beer. No medals this time around though

Kudos to the organizers, judges and stewards, and all the medal winners—strong work all around!

10

Homebrew Competitions / Re: NHC 2016 Final Round scores

« on: June 13, 2016, 06:38:54 AM »

I cant figure out how to check. Either my password isnt working,  or I forgot it. And I cant change it because there's no displayed question for the verification answer. Oh well, I'll just have to be surprised

I could get into mine earlier.... but mine is doing the exact same thing now.  Perhaps they just disabled the whole thing until after the awards.

This is still happening for me

If the whole site was disabled, it would be nice to have a message to that effect rather than the username/password message.

11

Zymurgy / Re: Zymurgy Live: Brewing Local with Stan Hieronymus

« on: May 25, 2016, 01:03:48 PM »

Loved the idea of this event. Thanks to Stan for taking the time to put on the presentation and tell us about his new book. Really looking forward to this being a regular thing.

Now to the complaining. That WebEX software horrible. How in this day and age such a collection of utter garbage code can be allowed to exist is beyond me. Crappy code that does not execute coupled with horrible interface design decisions and terrible aesthetic choices should not be supported. I cringe to think that some small fraction of my fees went to pay for that steaming pile of s***. There are much better options out there, please use those instead.

Hi stonebriar -

I am sorry to hear that you had such a negative experience with the WebEx portal. I'd be interested in hearing more about how we could improve Zymurgy Live for all users. I'm aware that there were a few audio issues, and we are taking steps to alleviate that for the next webinar. If you could email me with some suggestions on how we can improve the aesthetics of the presentation, I would really appreciate it!

I'm looking forward to hearing from you!

Thanks!

Matt Bolling
AHA Events & Membership Coordinator (and the guy who set up the steaming pile of s***)
matt@brewersassociation.org

I'm (obviously) not the OP, but I do work remotely and therefore have some experience with remote participation events. I am also a software developer and have (very negative) Opinions about client-side java which is the technology used by WebEx (https://support.webex.com/webex/v1.1/support/en_US/rn/system_rn.htm).

In my view there are several problems with WebEx:

1. Relying on the JRE, which is reasonably complex and large. Anecdotally, it has been difficult to use (see: OP)
2. This technology does not work on most mobile platforms

FWIW, hangouts-on-air (https://support.google.com/plus/answer/2553119?hl=en) seem to be a good option here with less technical overhead (in my limited experience). SparkFun electronics uses this for "SparkFun Live" events (ex: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sYP_tzBVf0)—which is, AFAICT very similar to this event—it seems to work well.

Hangouts on-air:

1. Do not require any plugins to watch (AFAIK)
2. Have most functionality built in to browsers and are available via mobile
3. Allow easy remote participation

At work we use hangouts-on-air along with an IRC back-channel to ask questions. There is some chat system built into youtube hangouts events, which might be usable.

Kudos for putting out the Zymurgy Live events: very exciting. Thank you for being open to feedback!

EDIT: corrected SparkFun Live example link (previous link was for a promo video)

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All Grain Brewing / Re: Low Oxygen Brewing

« on: May 23, 2016, 12:01:42 PM »

use Brewtan B in strike water (and the boil)

What's Brewtan B doing in this case?

I'd never heard of it until just now: https://www.wyeastlab.com/com_b_productdetail.cfm?ProductID=13

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All Grain Brewing / Low Oxygen Brewing

« on: May 23, 2016, 06:37:07 AM »

Ran across this article on very low oxygen brewing method for making a helles: http://www.germanbrewing.net/docs/Brewing-Bavarian-Helles.pdf

Seems fairly difficult to pull off. I've heard of this technique a couple of times now—has anyone here tried it?

14

Commercial Beer Reviews / Re: NE IPA reviews

« on: May 20, 2016, 03:40:14 PM »

On thing I still don't understand, as hard as I try, is what the haze and thickness add to the beer in a positive way.  What do you, or others, like about it?

Just to play devil's advocate here: what does it add to a German Hefe other than: that's what's expected of the style?

I'm definitely interested in this style of IPA. I live far enough away from the epicenter of this style that I haven't had any opportunity to try it first hand. Would be interested in brewing Michael Tonsmeire's version at some point: http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2015/06/hop-juice-north-east-ipa-recipe.html

I'm also curious as to how expectations are affected by the appearance of this style. Is the drinking experience changed by the fact that you're expecting a hoppy milkshake? Probably so.

Thanks for the write-up denny

15

All Grain Brewing / Re: Getting low OG.....?!

« on: May 17, 2016, 06:26:23 PM »

In addition to these tips there is one other point to consider. Mash efficiency is a number with two components:

• conversion efficiency
• lauter efficiency

kai has a really thorough article on his wiki: http://www.braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=Understanding_Efficiency

Most of the suggestions here have to do with conversion efficiency, but your problem may have something to do with how you are sparging/lautering. Or it could be a combination of the two.

Good luck in troubleshooting and let us know if the problem persists.