[brulosopher]

Without stepping on any toes, I would say they published it, not because of "investment in the process" because they did exactly what they set out to do fulfilling the outlined Purpose and Methods.

I have no doubt this will exbeeriment will be repeated, hopefully with a smaller gravity difference, but I've yet to see any constructive suggestions as to how to avoid this in the future, and name calling for Jake is pretty low.

If they were to not publish this experiment, it would not be ethical, nor scientifically sound. Sure, "no one would know but them". That's not the point.

Excerpt from APS guidelines for professional conduct, since I'm familiar with them and know that all of the ethical guidelines for chemists, and other scientific fields have similar statements.

"Fabrication of data or selective reporting of data with the intent to mislead or deceive is an egregious departure from the expected norms of scientific conduct, as is the theft of data or research results from others."

Side note: I'm more surprised in the attenuation differences. 1.044 to 1.014 for 68% and 1.035 to 1.006 for 82%.

This isn't a case of selective reporting of data. The fact that the beers are completely different in OG, FG and attenuation makes it hard to give any supporting evidence, one way or another, to any sort of hypothesis proposed. If your experiments don't work in some consistent, repeatable way to begin with, or you don't have a way to explain the inconsistencies, you don't publish - at least that's how I was trained as a chemist.

Those differences being a function of the variable tested, LODO, is the main reason we wouldn't trash the data. It's not our place to explain the inconsistencies, in fact our hope is that we can get closer to better explanations by sharing all of our data without censorship.

Plus, it's just beer!

And I agree, spunding has had a terrific influence on my beers.

I have all but one of the parts for my spunding valves and I can't seem to find them anywhere! Urgh...

There is a slew of collective experience as counterpoint to this single experiment though. People across 4 forums that I know having great success, zero process issues and reporting the production of great beer.

Not to mention the competition results starting to come in. There is a member of the GBF who just scored a 44.5 on his first competition entry. Plus at least 4 others there with a pile of medals that I know of.
So on the bright side, regardless of the damage done by bad pseudo science, in the end low oxygen brewing science will more then likely be vindicated in competition. I doubt the deniers will be able to tamp that down.
[/quote]

I scored a 41 on a German Pils in 2015 NHC that was fermented with unrinsed Kölsch yeast slurry.

I scored a 41 on a Vienna Lager in 2016 NHC that was fermented at ale temps with W-34/70.

I'm just not convinced competition scores are a great gauge of one process being better than another.

I think that analyzing the experiment and trying to troubleshoot the inconsistencies is still a worthwhile discussion. I think there were some real great technical exchanges in this thread.


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Couldn't agree more. This is why we keep doing this sh!t

I apologize to the other forum members for being a big part of taking this thread in a contentious direction. The brulosophy experiment and subsequent comments of Marshal basically implying mass delusion of 50 or so of the best brewers there are.. made my blood boil.  But more importantly there is a lot of good information on the LoDO process being exchanged and I see now that it's getting drowned out under the angry noise. I gotta step away from from this and let my blood pressure come down a bit.

I certainly never intended to imply such a thing and apologize if that's how something I said came across. It's just beer, mate, no need to get angry

I would say it's NOT if you can get a great crush with husks intact. It's just an easy way to make that happen if you boil it down. 


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Hey Bryan, is this something that can be accomplished by simply widening the mill gap?

Some other things:

- We will continue to explore LODO, I think it's fascinating and think it could potentially be a game changer for brewers, despite my occasional complaints with the way the method has been presented. Kudos to the GBF and LOB crews for their dedication to Bavarian Lager brewing!

- Will someone coming to HBC PLEASE bring me a good example of a LODO beer?! I'll hook you up with cool things!

[Hand of Dom]

Not been on the forum for a few weeks, so it took me a while to plough through this thread, and I'd like to add my 2p worth.

1.  I have done 3 batches using LODO techniques (not all of them), using a Grainfather.
2.  I've never experienced any sulphurous smells in the resultant beer.
3.  I have taken an efficiency hit on all 3 batches (60-70%, down from ~80%).
4.  I have put that down to a couple of things, firstly the first 2 batches I didn't stir the mash, and secondly, I reduced the recirculation rate to minimise overflow down the centre pipe.  Stirring definitely improved things in my most recent batch.
5.  For my next batch, I'm going to keep the overflow rate on full like I had on non-LODO batches, and see how that affects things.
6.  My experience of actually implementing the LODO techniques is that it's very little additional work over my normal practice.  I use the bakers yeast/sugar method of deoxygenating the initial water, and still use a copper CFC.  I do a minimal sparge, with a less dense mash than before.  I think in terms of my effort, it's probably an extra 20mins top.

[stpug]

Thanks for the report on using the grainfather in low oxygen brewing. I think it's the first report I've seen, and it's nice to know that it's fairly easy to implement on that system.

[hoprod]

Not been on the forum for a few weeks, so it took me a while to plough through this thread, and I'd like to add my 2p worth.

1.  I have done 3 batches using LODO techniques (not all of them), using a Grainfather.
2.  I've never experienced any sulphurous smells in the resultant beer.
3.  I have taken an efficiency hit on all 3 batches (60-70%, down from ~80%).
4.  I have put that down to a couple of things, firstly the first 2 batches I didn't stir the mash, and secondly, I reduced the recirculation rate to minimise overflow down the centre pipe.  Stirring definitely improved things in my most recent batch.
5.  For my next batch, I'm going to keep the overflow rate on full like I had on non-LODO batches, and see how that affects things.
6.  My experience of actually implementing the LODO techniques is that it's very little additional work over my normal practice.  I use the bakers yeast/sugar method of deoxygenating the initial water, and still use a copper CFC.  I do a minimal sparge, with a less dense mash than before.  I think in terms of my effort, it's probably an extra 20mins top.

I've been strongly considering trying LODO on my GF here pretty soon.  From what I can tell, I can almost do a complete no-sparge for most beers up to around 12-13lbs of grain (sparge water would be like 2-3 qts max).  I don't know for sure till I try it, but at that thin of a mash, the overflow tube might just be permanently full which should reduce any DO pickup from wort overflow.  A few questions if you don't mind.

1. Do you slowly lower the basket full of grain into the boiler when mashing in?  This seems like the only practical way to do it.

2. Do you still lift the basket to sparge?  This seems like the most likely way to pick up DO in the process as I've thought it out.  The alternative I've thought of is to turn the pump on and very slowly pump out from under the grain bed into another pot, though you'd need a longer run of silicone tubing than the one used for mashing.  When the pump runs dry I'd pull the grain and then slowly run the wort back in.

3. Have you seen the anticipated LODO results in these three batches?

[Hand of Dom]

Not been on the forum for a few weeks, so it took me a while to plough through this thread, and I'd like to add my 2p worth.

1.  I have done 3 batches using LODO techniques (not all of them), using a Grainfather.
2.  I've never experienced any sulphurous smells in the resultant beer.
3.  I have taken an efficiency hit on all 3 batches (60-70%, down from ~80%).
4.  I have put that down to a couple of things, firstly the first 2 batches I didn't stir the mash, and secondly, I reduced the recirculation rate to minimise overflow down the centre pipe.  Stirring definitely improved things in my most recent batch.
5.  For my next batch, I'm going to keep the overflow rate on full like I had on non-LODO batches, and see how that affects things.
6.  My experience of actually implementing the LODO techniques is that it's very little additional work over my normal practice.  I use the bakers yeast/sugar method of deoxygenating the initial water, and still use a copper CFC.  I do a minimal sparge, with a less dense mash than before.  I think in terms of my effort, it's probably an extra 20mins top.

I've been strongly considering trying LODO on my GF here pretty soon.  From what I can tell, I can almost do a complete no-sparge for most beers up to around 12-13lbs of grain (sparge water would be like 2-3 qts max).  I don't know for sure till I try it, but at that thin of a mash, the overflow tube might just be permanently full which should reduce any DO pickup from wort overflow.  A few questions if you don't mind.

1. Do you slowly lower the basket full of grain into the boiler when mashing in?  This seems like the only practical way to do it.

2. Do you still lift the basket to sparge?  This seems like the most likely way to pick up DO in the process as I've thought it out.  The alternative I've thought of is to turn the pump on and very slowly pump out from under the grain bed into another pot, though you'd need a longer run of silicone tubing than the one used for mashing.  When the pump runs dry I'd pull the grain and then slowly run the wort back in.

3. Have you seen the anticipated LODO results in these three batches?

1.  That's exactly how I do it.  It doesn't need to be particularly slow, just sufficient to avoid splashing.  You will need do a careful mash-in once it's lowered, otherwise you end up with clumps of grain, low efficiency, and it seems to form a vacuum that makes lifting the basket at the end of the mash extremely difficult.

2.  I lift the basket slowly to try and minimise splashing when it drains.  I have also used more liquid in the mash stage, so that I can minimise the sparge volume.

3.  2 of the batches were NE IPAs, so probably not particularly suited to see the malty benefits of LODO, but were good beers nonetheless.  The other brew was a Rochefort clone, where I was under on my numbers, and then finished high on the fermentation, it definitely had a malty taste (I'm not sure whether that is due to the LODO, or the high FG).  I should taste another bottle to see how it's dealt with age (was bottled in Nov).  I'm going to have a go at something like a kolsch later in the year, to see how that turns out.

I'd say give it a go, it's not really much additional effort (maybe 30-45 mins), there is some efficiency loss (at least in my experience), but assume going from say 75% to 70% when you draw up your recipe, I think you'll be there or thereabouts.