---

	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Digest Janitor: janitor@hbd.org
		Many thanks to the Observer & Eccentric Newspapers of 
		Livonia, Michigan for sponsoring the Homebrew Digest.
				URL: http://www.oeonline.com


Contents:
  The Jethro Gump Report ("Rob Moline")
  The Jethro Gump Report ("Rob Moline")
  Re: high final running SG question (phil sides jr)
  brazing  on a sparge tank (J Daoust)
  Dr. Pivo and Al Gore ("Jim Bermingham")
  Gas/Pitching/Color ("A. J. deLange")
  HBD size and frequency ("Murray, Eric")
  new beer (Marc Sedam)
  Judges Call- Palmetto State Brewers Open ("H. Dowda")
  bulk malt extract ("Penn, John")
  If it ain't broke... ("G. M. Remake")
  Re: Hop cultivation ("Doug Marion")
  Re: Practical RIMS Modifications (patrick finerty)
  Why pitch high? ("Alan Meeker")
  YEAH!!, Starters and Pitching rate, emoticon invention (Dave Burley)
  Re: Re: high final running SG question/Archivists ("Stephen Alexander")
  Trouble with Yeast Starters (JDPils)
  U.S.Open 2000 Competition ("Keith Royster")
  Final MCAB Agenda (RBoland)


* Beer is our obsession and we're late for therapy!

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* Entry deadline for the Mayfare Homebrew Competition is 3/15/00 
* See http://www.maltosefalcons.com/ for more information

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----------------------------------------------------------------------


Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 00:03:34 -0600
From: "Rob Moline" <brewer at isunet.net>
Subject: The Jethro Gump Report

			The Jethro Gump Report

AHA Board Of Advisors Election...
     In it's infinite wisdom...(sorry, just thought I would warm you up with
a joke!)...the AHA Board of Advisors is ready to announce it's final slate
of candidates for election to the Board.
     This year, members of the AHA will choose 4 candidates out of a slate
of 9. The candidates names and a brief notation about each is as follows:

Scott Abene		Founder/Operator of the BrewRatChat, the first and only Web
based Brew Club.
Pat Babcock		Janitor of the HBD, and the AOL Brewer's Chat site.
Louis Bonham	MCAB Founder, Columnist for Brewing Techniques.
John Carlson,Jr.	Organizer, Reggale & Dredhop HBC, National BJCP Judge, GABF
Judge.
Stephen Mallery	Publisher, Brewing Techniques. Organizer, Homebrew Publicity
Campaign.
David Miller	AHA Homebrewer of the Year 1981, Author, Professional Brewer.
Randy Mosher	National BJCP Judge, Author, Columnist- All About Beer, BT
Editorial Advisor.
Lynne O'Connor	Owner St. Patrick's of Texas Brewers Supply.
Martin Stokes	AHA Cider Maker of the Year '93, National BJCP Judge.

     These notations regarding the candidates is limited...fuller details
regarding the candidates histories, and the individual Candidates Statements
will be available to all members of the AHA in the next Zymurgy.
     You may be interested to know that the Board has had 4 resignations
this year...Ed Busch resigned, but as he is the past Chairman of the Board
he remains an Advisor for an additional year, as required by the Bylaws, yet
this leaves a vacancy to fill.
     Both Randy Mosher, and Dave Miller resigned their positions, as
required in the ByLaws, as they had served their full 3 year terms. They
remain eligible for re-election, and were nominated for such consideration
by the membership.
     Ray Daniels also resigned his seat on the Board, as he felt that there
could possibly be a perceived conflict with his newest roles, Editor of
Zymurgy and New Brewer.
     So there you have it....to my mind, an excellent group of candidates,
offering a wide expanse of service and dedication to homebrewers, ready to
offer their support and guidance to the AHA membership. Ballots must be
returned by May 15th, 2000, and the winning electees shall be installed on
the Board at the Detroit Nationals in June. At that time, there will have
been 5 members of the Board elected by the direct voting of the members, and
as the years move on, there will be further elections, leading to the full
Board having been chosen by direct vote. I trust that you will see this as I
do, a positive step in improving the AHA.

Cheers!
Jethro Gump

Rob Moline
AHA Board of Advisors

"The More I Know About Beer, The More I Realize I Need To Know More
About Beer!"



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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 00:23:08 -0600
From: "Rob Moline" <brewer at isunet.net>
Subject: The Jethro Gump Report

				The Jethro Gump Report
Yeast Questions....
     It has come to my attention that there has been a public call for
attention to the HBD by the yeast manufacturers that monitor said digest.
     I personally hope to catch up on my reading and get some answers to you
soon, but I have also arranged a treat for you.
     Starting April 10th and running for 2 weeks, until April 21st, Dr.
Clayton Cone, retired from Lallemand, shall be available to the HBD, to
answer your questions regarding yeast. Further announcements shall be made
in the period before the 10th, in order to stimulate the event, but I can't
think of a greater resource of yeast knowledge than Dr. Cone. I hope that
you will enjoy it.

Siebel on HBD.....
     I have contacted Bill Siebel, with reference to a repetition of last
May's participation on the HBD by the staff of the Siebel Institute. He was
most receptive to the idea, but stated that time would tell, as the
Institute is still undergoing resheduling of all agendas. Keep your fingers
crossed!

Cheers!
Jethro Gump

Rob Moline
Lallemand
jethro at isunet.net

"The More I Know About Beer, The More I Realize I Need To Know More About
Beer!"



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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 01:22:12 -0500
From: phil sides jr <psides at carl.net>
Subject: Re: high final running SG question

Bruce Taber <Bruce.Taber at nrc.ca> asks:

>a very low SG?  If your final runnings have a SG > 1.020, then the SG
of
>your wort would be nice and high meaning that you have good extraction
>efficiency.

What George is saying is that you still have sugar in the Lauter Tun
i.e. not in the Boil Kettle.  The efficiency is going to be very low...

Personally, I always taste my last runnings for sweetness.  It's not
good scientific method, but it works for me.

Phil Sides, Jr.
Concord, NH
- --
Macht nicht o'zapft ist, Prost!




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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 05:28:22 -0800
From: J Daoust <thedaousts at ixpres.com>
Subject: brazing  on a sparge tank

I was going to do some brazing on my sparge tank soon, and was thinking
of chemicals and stuff. I have a solution for lead, are there any other
chemicals/metals I should be concerned about??
Email is ok.
Thanks, Jerry


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 07:42:14 -0600
From: "Jim Bermingham" <bermingham at antennaproducts.com>
Subject: Dr. Pivo and Al Gore

Dr.Pivo claims to be the originator of (*).  Maybe the Good Dr.'s real name
is Al Gore.  Everyone knows that Al invented the internet.  This makes me
wonder, does this mean that Phil & Jill are really Bill & Hillary?

Cheers,

Jim Bermingham
Millsap, TX.



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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 14:10:28 +0000
From: "A. J. deLange" <ajdel at mindspring.com>
Subject: Gas/Pitching/Color

Some Guy wanted to know why gasses dissolve more in cold water than
warm. If there is one fact that is more valuable than any other other
(IMO) in understanding chemistry it is that matter moves until chemical
potential is equalized. The chemical potential of a gas (or anything
else for that matter) in a dilute solution is u = u0 + RT ln{xi} where
xi is the molar concentration of   gas i (u0 is a constant that depends
on the gas and the solvent). In the gas above the liquid the chemical
potential of gas i is
v = v0 + RT ln{Pi} where Pi is the partial pressure (or really the
fugacity, if you want to get fancy) of gas i. If the chemical potential
in the gas is higher than the potential in the liquid, i will move into
the liquid and conversely. Now R is the universal gas constat and T is
the temperature in Kelvins. Thus, the chemical potential in the solution
goes up as it temperature does. If a solution and the gas above it are
in equilibrium and the temperature is increased by some amount, T/T0 for
example, then ln{xi} would have to decrease by
T0/T meaning xi would have to decrease by exp(T0/T). Or, in plain
English, molecules of gas dissolved in liquid have more energy at high
temperature and therefore have a better chance of being able to escape
from it.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
*

Cass wonders, based on all the furor here, what the big deal in is in
high pitching rates. The answer is simply that so many people have
reported that increasing pitching rate and oxygenation have resulted in
dramatic improvement in their beers that it is  worth your while to
consider doing it. You've made 5 extract beers. You are at the beginning
of a potentially long and very rewarding journey. Keep at it and in a
few years you'll laugh at the stuff you are brewing now because your
beers will be so much better and you will probably, but not definitely
as you have been reading here, have concluded that high pitching level
is as important as sanitization. At the beginner level high pitching may
not be the most important thing you do (sanitizing and getting
unoxidized extract probably are) but file this away in the back of your
mind for the future. After that "extract tang" is under control, try
pitching at a higher level and see what happens.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * *

Mark asks about the Davison guide. In a quick search on the net I find
Cascade Brewing Supply, http://members.aol.com/greatbrew/about.html,
lists them in their on-line catalog. I cannot remember where I got the
one I cut up but it wasn't there. Yes, it does have it's flaws but it is
the best way I can think of to roughly estimate color short of toting a
photometer or colorimeter (electronic or optical) to contests. I did
check furtherinto the "cheap" photmeters - $299 and available with  420
or 450 nm filters - no 430. Because beer absorption spectra are so
predictable (have an exp(-0.016*wavelength) shape in 1 cm) the
measurement could very probably be taken at 420, scaled to 1 cm,
multiplied by exp(-0.16) and that value used, properly scaled for path,
in the SRM (1.27 cm) or EBC (1 cm) formulas.


Return to table of contents


Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 09:25:36 -0500
From: "Murray, Eric" <emurray at sud-chemieinc.com>
Subject: HBD size and frequency

Martin Brungard wrote:

In my opinion, we would be better off with a minor revision 
to HBD to either increase the digest size or to increase the frequency. I'll

bet that a majority of the subscribers have a reasonably fast email 
connection and having more or larger HBD posts is not a significant problem 
anymore.

Amen brewing brother. I second the motion. I could never have to much HBD to
read. I am also a systems administrator for a large chemical manufacturer,
and don't think the size or frequency would bother anyone to much.

Hope this helps!

Eric Murray



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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 09:29:02 -0500
From: Marc Sedam <marc_sedam at unc.edu>
Subject: new beer

Hi all:

My wife was in DC this past weekend and picked up a bottle
of "Delirium Nocturnums" from the Hughuye (sp?) Brewery in
Belgium.  These are the same people who make "Delirium
Tremens", one of my favorite beers ever.  Anyhoo, DN appears
to be a dark verson of DT, malty, chocolatey, and very
warming.  I thought it was fantastic and thought I'd share.

Be sure to pick up a bottle if you can find it.  Not a whiff
of sweaty horsehair to be found.

Cheers!
Marc



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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 06:29:48 -0800 (PST)
From: "H. Dowda" <hdowda at yahoo.com>
Subject: Judges Call- Palmetto State Brewers Open

BJCP judges are solicited for the 2nd Annual Palmetto
State Brewers Open, April 8, Columbia, SC.  BJCP/AHA
sanctioned. On-line sign-up:

http://www.sagecat.com/judge.htm

General competition information:

http://www.sagecat.com/psbcomp2.htm

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 09:42:30 -0500
From: "Penn, John" <John.Penn at jhuapl.edu>
Subject: bulk malt extract

I use a lot of bulk 33# M&F malt extract and noticed in my lastest jug that
I seem to be a couple of #'s shy of 33# based on my notes for the batches
I've made with this one.  Does 33# include the weight of the large plastic
jug?  Anyone else notice a similar shortage or am I just imagining this?  My
notes show 27.5 # of malt used for my last three batches of 4-5 gallons of
imperial stout, belgian tripel, and a scotch ale, so I was expecting to have
about 5.5# left but only seem to have about 3.3#.  Could be some measurement
error and there's always a tiny bit that I can never get out, but based on
my notes I'm pretty sure I"m about 2# shy which is about what the jug must
weigh. TIA.
    John Penn
   Eldersburg, MD


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 08:52:18 -0600
From: "G. M. Remake" <gremake at gsbpop.uchicago.edu>
Subject: If it ain't broke...

Cass wonders if it's worth making yeast starters, since he likes his
results.  I'm sure there will be many replies, so I'll keep mine short (and
help minimize the queue, too).

I'm in my fourth year of homebrewing, and the two variables I've found to
yield the most significant improvement in my beers have been:

1) Longer, slower fermentations at the low end of (or below) the
recommended fermentation temperature range, and

2) Pitching huge (scientific term) amounts of yeast, such as onto a
previous batch's yeast cake (yes, even with all those other terrible things
in the muck).

Cass, if you don't want to bother with starters, then don't, but you'll
never know what you're missing until you try it.

Cheers, 

Greg


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 08:07:40 MST
From: "Doug Marion" <mariondoug at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Hop cultivation

Wayne,

Had some trouble getting this post into the queue for the last few days. 
Sorry the response is a bit late but here's my two cents anyway.

I'm currently growing Liberty, Mt Hood, Perle, Kent Golding, Tettnanger, and 
Cascade in my hop garden. A total of 22 plants. This doesn't make me an 
expurt, but I did learn a few things by trial and error.

>   1-  Do these plants usually bear flowers ( hop cones) the first year or 
>is there a time lag where they must first get established?

You should get cones the first year. But, it depends quite a bit on the 
variety. Each variety reacts differently to different soil conditions ... 
weather ect. so you will see more on some than on others. Mine produced 
quite a few cones the first year but did much better the second year. There 
are a few things you can do to help them along every year though. I'll go 
into that a little more at the end here.

>   2- Do deer (white tail) enjoy hop plants? ( they sure are a pest with 
>most of my flower gardens)

Don't know. Don't have any deer near my home. Sorry. Anyone else out there?

>   3- Do they grow their full height the first year? (assuming they are 
>properly nourished and planted properly)

Again, same as above. Varieties differ, soil conditions differ and climate 
differences. Generally, if you do some of the things that I will mention 
later, you should see some if not most of the first bines reach 10 to 20 
feet the first year, but, don't worry if they don't. Most of mine made it to 
14 feet or beyond the first year.

>   4- Have you been pleased with the overall results of your hops? ie Have 
>they been close to the alpha units, flavor  and aroma as you expected? Or 
>are the commercial grown clearly superior?

I've been very pleased with the results. Flavour and aromas are consistent 
with what I had been accustomed to for the different varieties. Alpha units 
are difficult to exact from home grown hops. However, I have done pretty 
well using figures towards the lower end of the ranges generally seen for 
the varieties and adjusting from there by taste.

I'm lucky enough to live in an area that produces a large quantity of 
commercially grown hops in the north west. The commercial growers have a 
great deal more resources at their disposal than we homegrowers do. They 
have their soil tested professionally several times a year and can adjust 
their soil exactly to what the hop plants requirements are. The soil 
conditions are monitored constantly. The fertilizers and pesticides they use 
are more specialized and more advanced than what you and I have available 
too us. Consequently, we probably don't achieve quite as high of alpha 
yields as the commercial growers do. But we can get close enough, and is why 
I lean my alpha values toward the lower end of the varieties range. This is 
just my opinion. Maybe someone else out there could chime in.

>   5- Any helpful hints or advice for the first time grower will be 
>gratefully appreciated.

The first year, only let one or two at the most bines grow. Trim all other 
bines back. This forces the nutrients that are available into the growing 
bines and root development. The next year you can let four to six bines 
grow.

Irrigate if you can rather than sprinkle. Keeps the plant dryer which helps 
prevent disease. I get flood irrigation water to my property, so I can 
furrow my hop garden and flood the furrows once a week during the growing 
season. This is ideal and I know many poeple can't irrigate this way, but it 
does achieve a good deep soaking which is good.

Here's one that I had to learn on my own and then confirmed with the 
commercial growers out here. When you're shoots start coming up in the 
spring, the tendency is to let them grow. At least this was my tendency. 
Don't to this. Trim the shoots back for at least a month and don't let them 
start growing until late April or early May. For two reasons

1)During that month of March and Early April when they want to start 
growing, the weather and soil conditions are not very conducive to healthy 
plant growth. Yea, they'l grow. But you will see thing you think are bad and 
its really just that the weather hasn't stabilized yet and the soil isn't 
warmed up yet. Some warm days and cold nights. Some cold days and cold 
nights. Warm front warms things up, then it changes and freezes. Not very 
good on plants that are trying to grow. Trimming back for a month takes the 
early growth period out of that "Danger Zone" and puts it into more 
favorable conditions.

2)You want your hops to do most of its growing during the time when the sun 
provides the most daylight for the hops to use which in turn forces the 
harvest to occur at the right time of the year. In most places that's the 
spring puts their growing period during the time of the year with the most 
sunlight which in turn makes for healthier more vigorous plants and gives 
them the opportunity to develop the most amount of lupulin.

Feed them lots, water lots, and watch for pests. Aphids are the most 
prevalent in my area. They can be controlled though. Be carefull which 
pesticide you use though. Like, Diazanon is hard on the plants I found. Keep 
your weeds knocked down or pulled if you can.

Hope this helps

Doug Marion in Meridian Idaho

______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com



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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 10:24:17 -0500 (EST)
From: patrick finerty <zinc at zifi.psf.sickkids.on.ca>
Subject: Re: Practical RIMS Modifications

On March 13, 2000, Bill Write from Alaska wrote about his RIMS:

 > Finally, and this is not RIMS related, I replaced the 3/8" valve in my 18 
 > gallon stainless pot with a 1/2" valve.  It used to take forever to fill 2 
 > carboys with that little spigot and it was prone to clogging.  Yesterday, I 
 > drained 11 gallons in what seemed like a couple of minutes.  It was like 
 > turning on a faucet.  'Course, I had my hops in bags, which didn't hurt.  

i don't use a RIMS but i have a suggestion for something that might
increase the flow out of the kettle when the hops aren't in a bag. i
bought some 1/2 in. soft copper pipe and a T sweat fitting to build a
filter. using the inside of my kettle as a mold, i formed a length of
the tubing into a circle and soldered the ends into the T fitting.
then i cut slots in the pipe every 0.5 - 0.75 in. along the outside of
the circle.

the filter just fits along the bottom of my kettle and the outlet from
the T fitting is snug in the inlet for the 1/2 in. ball valve i
installed (on the inside of the kettle the inlet is actually a 1/2 in.
brass close nipple that screws into the ball valve). the filter is
held in place only by the tension of the tubing and is simple to
remove.

i always use leaf hops and never have to remove them to get good flow
out of the spigot. each time i drain the wort i'm amazed it works so
well. generally, i don't lose very much wort, maybe around a 1 qt or
so is held up in the hops. since i'm brewing 10 gal batches this
doesn't bother me too much.

 -patrick in toronto
- -- 
       "There is only one aim in life and that is to live it."
 Karl Shapiro,(1959) from an essay on Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer
	      finger pfinerty at nyx10.nyx.net for PGP key
		 http://abragam.med.utoronto.ca/~zinc


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 12:55:10 -0500
From: "Alan Meeker" <ameeker at welchlink.welch.jhu.edu>
Subject: Why pitch high?


Cass in Portsmouth NH likes his beer and asks about whether or not he should
try a higher pitch rate.

A few comments: You are currently making "good" beer but could it be
improved? Could you instead be making "great" beer?  If so, will increasing
your pitch size help you to get there?  The only sure way to know is to try
it out on your own system. Personally, I think there's a decent chance that
increasing your pitch size may improve the your beer's quality. When I
started brewing I was in exactly the same situation you were - I made
extract-based beers that I though were good and I was happy with. However,
they never got very close to my favorite commercial beers or even my
favorite homebrews made by my friends. It was the drive to make even better
beer that led me to do things like convert to all-grain and increase my
pitching rates. I am convinced that increasing my pitching rates was one of
the factors that helped me improve the quality of my beer (though certainly
not the only factor). This is in keeping with most of the brewing literature
(both texts and basic research) as well as the opinions of many
well-respected brewers though, as you've no doubt noticed, this is by no
means a universally held opinion.

Again, I'd stress that you should try it yourself on your own set-up. The
key question is, will increasing your pitching rate help /you/ or not?  Only
you can answer this question.

It may be that you will see no great effect if you increase your pitch.
Since you seem to have no problem with infections your sanitation procedures
may be good enough that underpitching doesn't pose a contamination threat
for you. Also, you may be pitching pretty high already. You didn't give
details as to your batch size or your protocol for things like aeration of
the wort but assuming your batch size is 5 gallons and you get at least some
aeration then pitching a single packet of dry yeast is not "underpitching"
by all that much. I would say however, that this seems a bit risky as there
is apparently quite a range of viable yeast present in a dried yeast package
(dependent in large part on the age and storage conditions) so throwing in
the dehydrated yeast without at least some form of "proofing" first may not
be the best way to go.

Of course you can take the attitude of "ain't broke don't fix it"  if you're
happy with what you've got now then don't change anything. But, if you're
looking for further improvement then you'll have to start changing things
and the yeast pitch rate is one easy thing to try. See for yourself, let us
know what you find out!

 -Alan Meeker




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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 13:15:05 -0500
From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley at compuserve.com>
Subject: YEAH!!, Starters and Pitching rate, emoticon invention

Brewsters:

Thank goodness I can now type full sentences without having to space after
each short line. Only those New Yorkers used to reading a double vertically
folded newspaper on a subway hadn't complained.
- --------------------------------------
Anyway, Cass asks a question. What's all this about pitching rates and
starter size anyway?

My first suggestion is to read all the comments in the archives. My second
suggestion  is to actually try the experiment yourself by adding a 5, 10
,15 and 20 gram packets of your favorite yeast to the identical wort.  Now
you can determine if your favorite yeast makes any difference in your beer
with your level of sanitation. Generally, higher pitching rates are
desirable, up to a point.  That point is largely a personal preference and
is likely yeast dependent, which is why this subject gets so much comment.
There are unofficial commercial guidelines which actually may be the
maximum, as I have suggested in past HBDs. These are usually higher than
many homebrewers use. While the population is increasing yeasts often
produce by-products that may or may not be desirable to the brewer. You
will have to experiment to find out what you like. In the meantime, lots of
knowledgable homebrewers suggest numbers like 10 - 11 grams of dry yeast
per five gallons, to give you an idea..

The startup time to VISIBLE fermentation ( actually the time the CO2
solubility is exceeded* fermentation begins immediately that the yeast have
adapted to the wort) and begins to bubble is important since the pH of the
beer drops, the oxygen is removed and in some cases certain strains of S.
cerevisiae ( wine especially) actually make a protein which kills
competetition. Some yeasts actually make sulfite. So the pitching rate has
some relationship to producing a beer without the interfering effect of
other less desirable organisms**. But probably not as much as your
sanitation habits, if they are not good. More yeast will help reduce the
impact of bad sanitation in some instances.  Best thing is to develop good
sanitation instead of trying to get away with something.

* Actually the CO2 content is likely over the equilibrium solubility as we
often see a fermentation "stop" and yet when we rack the CO2 comes out of
solution demonstrating the CO2 was actually dissolved and above the
equilibrium solubility value. Often after we rack an actively fermenteing
beer, the CO2 emission is seen to stop. This is merely because we removed
some of the excess CO2. Eventually the CO2 will begin to  bubble off again.
In other words, the equilibrium solubility is not reached instantly because
the kinetics of CO2 emission are slow ( as we all know when we open a beer
and it doesn't gush out).

** In some beers bacteria are actually part of the taste, notably some
Belgian ales and the German Weisbier.  Problem is when you make these kinds
of beers ( or have a contaminated yeast which you recycle)  you will have
to be very strict with your sanitation or you may contaminate your brewery.

Now about starter size.  Terry Foster in his ale books suggests either a
half gallon to a gallon of starter for 5 gallons of beer, as I recall. This
makes sense as we often read that a yeast population is supposed to
increase 3 to 5 times during a fermentation as a commercial standard. This
number is incredible when first read, as the starter will have a major
influence on the taste of the beer if it is all put in.  If you stir the
starter in the presence of air ( a recommended practice to get healthy
yeast) even occasionally you will have a lot of potential staling agents in
the starter beer. Lager yeasts fermented cold need to have twice the amount
of yeast as in an ale. That's two gallons!  And the lager doesn't tolerate
the aldehydes and ketones like an ale. If we have 50 mls of starter from a
Wyeast pack, it will take two step ups to 500 mls and then 4000 mls to get
to this kind of number, if we obey the suggested max 10X step-up ratio.

Are we crazy or what?  What seems to be missing from all this is that only
the yeast <slurry> is put in the wort to be fermented. The starter is
chilled and the starter beer is poured off and the yeast pitched. At least
that's the way I do it and recommend you do too.  From time to time, you
will read that a starter in full kraeusen is to be added. This can only be
if the starter beer is nearly identical to the wort and hasn't been stirred
in the air ( not as good)  or its effect has been taken into account.  Home
brewers successfully wash their yeast slurry recovered from the bottom of
the secondary in cold boiled water three times ( to remove any bacteria
food) and store it under sterile water in a capped beer bottle in the
fridge until they want to make that style again. This will be just about
the recommended amount and is an excellent method if you aerate your wort
before the fermentation. Just wake it up in a small starter before
pitching.
- -------------------------------------
As far as Pivo inventing (*) as a "moon", and in agreement with Alan, 
frankly, I doubt it. But an accidental (I guess that makes it an invention)
punctuation combination in my above comments did remind me of what I think
of many of Pivo's  unsupported diatribes...
 
   *) 
- -------------------------------------
Keep on Brewin'


Dave Burley 


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 14:16:56 -0500
From: "Stephen Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Re: Re: high final running SG question/Archivists

Patrick Finerty asks 

>although i sparge at 170 F, i'm not sure why temperature is so
>important for extraction efficiency.

It's not.

As Pat mentioned viscosity is a factor, but a relatively small one.

There is a pretty solid argument that  the mashout coagulates
additional proteins and so changes the flow through the grainbed. 
There's a paper in the 'Journal of Rhealogy' that supported this. 
There is also an old JIB paper that cooled the mash to
near freezing temps and still got reasonable extraction.

I performed abt 10 no-mashout, cool lauter experiments a couple
years back. I have typically gotten extraction rates within 3-5%(1pgpp)
when performing no mashout and using sparge water no higher than
155F, and as low as 100F.  Occasionally tho' the loss is much
greater (~12%).  I  suspect this is related to the malt.
This method does require that you sparge a little slower than usual.

The problem with no-mashout is not that the average extraction
rate is much lower (it's not), but that the extraction is more variable.

IMO mashout *does* significantly improve the consistency of the
extraction, but 4 times out of 5 the actual extraction change is quite
small.  The lauter water temp is only responsible for a marginal
improvement in extraction, one we HBers can choose to ignore.

===

re: Dr.P.IXI - apparently he is not able to accurately read what I posted,
regarding enterobacteria in sauerkraut, or my methods from the archives,
nor to accurately extrapolate from this.  Little wonder that someone
who cannot read or reason rejects my posts

Thanks to AlanM for reposting the yeast viable cell count info. I had
searched the archive for this w/o success.

 -S




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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 15:08:56 EST
From: JDPils at aol.com
Subject: Trouble with Yeast Starters

Dear fellow brewer's,

Ever since my local homebrew shop, Evergreen Brewing Supply burnt down (soon 
to reopen as Mountain Homebrew) and I have purchased dry malt extract 
elsewhere, I have lost the recipe for making yeast starters.  All my starters 
are active but do not have any foam head or sediment stuck to the sides of 
the containers.  My procedures have not changed knowingly.  I first bought 
what I thought was American Dry Malt and turned out to be a dutch supplier 
(other than Laaglander) and second English Dry Malt which was suppose to be M 
& F, which is what I purchased from Evergreen.  I am looking for some advice. 
 So here is my data.

I make  1.040 - 1.060 gravity starter.  I usually am not too concerned about 
it.  I shake the container for about one minute and place at 68F for ales and 
50 - 60 for lagers depending on the size of starter.  I sanitize with 1/2 - 1 
tsp bleech per gallon of water and triple rinse.  I do not add any hops and 
the last two ale yeasts I added some yeast nutrient.  When stepping up new 
yeast I use a 1pt, then 1/2 gal starter for Wyeast and 1/2 gal for White Labs

The list of poor or failed starters is:

Wyeast 2206 1 qt slurry from a brewery
Whites Labs Pilsener and Octoberfest(WP820) from the secondary of a previous 
batch
White Labs Irish Ale from the vial
Wyeast 1968 from the 50 ml smack pack.

My definition of a failed starter is no kreusen on the surface and no trub 
stuck to the sides of the container.  If you shake the container foam will 
form and the airlock is active.  

One starter came from a test gallon of double bock which had amylase enzyme 
in it.  After a couple days this did form a kreusen and trub on the sides of 
the bottle.  This confirms my belief that both extracts where high in 
dextrins. 

Since I had no other yeast I pitched anyway into an Octoberfest for the 
lagers at 55F and a NW Porter for the ales at 60F.  So how did the beers come 
out?  Am I being to anal retentive or should this issue be resolved?

The brewery 2206 started in four hours and finshed at 1.016 in seven days.  
The WP820 started in 24 hours and finsihed at 1.017 in 14 days.  Perhaps Dr. 
Pivo would like this and I think the beer will turn out fine, but the lag is 
just a little long for me. 

The White Labs Irish starter in eight hours whereas the 1968 took 18.  Both 
were done in two days at 68F.  The Irish finished at 1.018 and the 1968 at 
1.016.  This is the third identical batch of Porter with the 1968 and the 
exact same results.  I thought the Irish Ale should have finished lower, but 
is is within White Labs parameters.  

So I think once again for Ales there is lots of margin for error, but for 
lagers these poor starters had an effect.  I thought the octoberfest should 
have finshed drier.  I am happy with the length of fermentation though, so 
perhaps it is just my mash schedule and recipe.

Therefore, I may be a little overly critical, but I still expect an active 
starter and cannot except this situation.

Comments and suggestions are very welcome.

Thanks in advance,

Cheers,

Jim Dunlap     


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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 22:27:33 -0500
From: "Keith Royster" <keith at homebrewadventures.com>
Subject: U.S.Open 2000 Competition

Hello fellow homebrewers!  It's been a really long time since I've posted
here.  I used to read every word of this wonderful digest, but that was
before having twins, changing jobs, and buying into a homebrew shop.  Time
is a little tighter now, so I haven't been able to keep up with the quantity
of email this forum generates, much less contribute.  Anyway, the main
reason I popped back in here was for the usual homebrew competiton plug.  So
here it is....

The Carolina Brewmaster US Open X is being held April 15, 2000 in Charlotte,
NC.  Entries are due 4/10/00 and are $6 first entry, $4 after that.
Additional details can be found at our website - http://www.hbd.org/cbm - or
by contacting our competion coordinator, Laura Barrowman (704-366-7625
LBarrowman at aol.com)

It is AHA sanctioned of course. George Fix and Charlie Papazian will be in
town that weekend and we are currently trying to squeeze a little time out
of their busy schedules to get them to drop by during the competition.  Hope
you can join us!

Keith Royster
keith at homebrewadventures.com
http://www.homebrew.com




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Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 23:49:07 EST
From: RBoland at aol.com
Subject: Final MCAB Agenda

Here's the final agenda.  We can still squeeze a few more in.  Register at 
www.stlbrews.org if you want to join us.  We're gonna have a great time.

MCAB II Final Agenda

Friday, March 24 
6:15PM - Pub Crawl Begins 
7:00PM - 9:00PM Preliminary Round Judging 
7:30PM - 11:00PM - Hospitality Suite for Late 
Arrivers/Judges/Stewards 
11:00PM - All Gather At St. Louis Brewery and 
Taproom - End of Pub Crawl 

Saturday, March 25 
8:30AM - Check In 
9:00AM - 11:45AM - Second Round Judging 
9:00 AM - 10:00AM - "A History of Brewing in 
St. Louis" - Henry Herbst 
10:00AM - 10:45AM - "High Gravity Brewing for 
the Homebrewer" - Steve Michalak of Anheuser-Busch 
Specialty Brewing 
10:45AM - 15 minute break 
11:00AM - 11:45AM - "The Art Beyond the Science" - 
Technical Q&A Forum with George Fix and Dave Logsdon(homebrewers), 
Dave Miller (pub brewers) and Steve Michalak (megabrewers) 
11:45AM - Lunch provided 
12:30PM - 4:15PM - Third Round of Judging (if necessary) 
12:30PM - 1:30PM - "Optimal Yeast Propagation for 
Homebrewers" with Dr. George Fix 
1:30PM - 2:30PM - Yeast Q&A Forum with Dave Logsdon 
of Wyeast and Chris White of White Labs 
2:30 PM - 15 minute break 
2:45PM - 3:45PM - General Q&A Forum - "Reflections on 
Homebrewing and the Craft as We Move Into the Millenium" 
with Dave Miller, Byron Burch, George Fix, Pat Baker and 
Alberta Rager 
3:45PM - 4:15PM - Presentation on Real Ale, Cellarmanship 
and How to Make a Beer Engine, Technical Q&A - Keith Reding 
of the St. Louis Brews 
4:15PM - 5:00PM - Real Ale Tasting & Notes Followup 
5:00PM - 6:15PM - Happy Hour with Homebrewed MCAB Beers 
6:15PM - Move to St. Louis Brewery and Taproom for Dinner 
and Awards Ceremony 
7:00PM - 8:00PM - Dinner 
8:00PM - 9:00PM - Awards Ceremony, Prizes and Raffle 
9:00PM - ???? - Free Socialization and MCAB and 
Homebrew beer sampling 

Sunday, March 26 11:00AM - 12:30PM - VIP Tour of the 
Anheuser-Busch Pilot Brewery 



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