FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Rob Gardner, Digest Janitor


Contents:
  Starting first batch of #1821 (Mutsuo Hoshido)
  Re: Grape Beer?//a labelling story (Carl Etnier)
  What's under the LID?/Clean CF (CHARLIE SCANDRETT)
  RTP Yeast/Hops Plugs, flowers in Big D (GeepMaley)
  Re: Hops will not infect beer (Jeff Renner)
  Labels (Rich Hampo)
  RINGWOOD YEAST (Anthony Migliore)
  Re: Alt Yeast (Gary McCarthy)
  wort chiller design ? ("Frederick L. Pauly")
  Homey Home Brew... (Aesoph, Michael)
  easy-to-remove labels (CGEDEN)
  Labels (TPuskar)
  yeast starters (Alex Sessions)
  Re-Bottling (SCHWAB_BRYAN)
  Nitrogen Purge (THaby)
  First all-grain/Hop removal (Tim J. Ihde)
  Prime Time. (Russell Mast)
  Homebrew supply stores (Michael A. Genito)
  YASQ (Yet another stupid question) - Dual Coil Immersion Chillers ("Olson, Greger J - CIV/911-2")
  Gott cooler size... (Dave Riedel)
  Re:Priming bottles (Jack Stafford)
  Mini keg fun, Chimay dregs (Earl the Pearl)
  Lots O' things (Aubrey Howe)
  Yeast Washing (John DeCarlo              )
  Transylvania Style Ale - was - Airborne yeast/Mini-still (Steve Alexander)
  Priming bottles (HomeBrewer)
  re:hops and infection (HOMEBRE973)
  re:Homebrew Digest #1823 (September 05, 1995) ("Matthew W. Bryson")



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


Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 13:22:13 JST
From: hoshido at gman.rme.sony.co.jp (Mutsuo Hoshido)
Subject: Starting first batch of #1821

Re:Starting a first batch on HBD #1821 by Mr.Alex R.N.Wetmore

I well remembered my first batch three years ago.
Mr.Chris Smith from Boulder Colorado who had been working in 
the same office in Japan almost four years and now returned to
Boulder office brought his beers at the hot spring pick-nick which our 
family planned.I was very much surprised the home  made beer form 
which I had been thinking that only machines can produce. Also the 
taste was very good,much better than commercial beers,like the taste of 
the beers in Germany which I tasted ten years ago. I had a desire to 
make beers by myself.Fortunately two weeks later, he showed  me 
how to prepare homebrewing.It seemed very simple and easy to do 
with very good smell, just like cooking.He never used thermometer, 
hydrometer and other complicated tools.He just added tap water into 
the one hour boiled malt solution,later I got the word "wort".
He just touched the outside of US made plastic container to roughly 
measure the temperature.I did the same and noticed that a little bit lower 
than the temperature of my hot bath.Then he scattered dry yeast on the 
wort , closed the container lid and set the  air lock.
He always insisted the cleanliness and sanitation of the tools and other 
related things.I did not have any chance to see his bottling procedure.
 A month later,he gave me two bottles of new beers.They were very 
nice taste.
In Japan, as you know, homebrew is,strictly speaking, illegal.
Fermentation equipments were not available.We had to privately import 
them from USA.Available canned malt is very expensive, almost three 
to four time compared to the US price including surface shipping cost.
At that time,two pounds malt kit was $30.Capper and 100caps were $50.
I paid $90.for them including transportation expense.
In this field,Japan,one of the most advanced countries ,is very 
underdeveloping.I had to use every kitchen equipment.I used a  deep 
enamelware to boil my wort,added tap water to cool it down and pitched
yeast without measuring temperature,it was not hot.I just placed the 
pot-lid on the cook pot to prevent dust and other unfavorable germs. 
 I used 70% ethylalcohl to sanitize equipments and my hands.
Next morning,I opened the lid.Already bubbling,fermentation started.
Smells were very good.It was exciting.
(Before opening the lid,I sprayed the 70% ethylalcohol around the container.)
A week later,I open the lid after the alcohol spray and found the wort has no
form.I spooned some and tasted.It was already beer taste and very tasty.
Later,almost every two days,I tasted,rather drank it.I noticed that the taste
is getting better and better day by day.And only one gal wort disappeared 
before bottling.This was my first batch. I realized the necessity of patience.
At that time, I was successful in importing materials and equipments 
from USA.Since then I bottled more than 500 half litter bottles,
with the similar simple method.Every bottle tasted very good.
I tried to use commercial bottled waters.I could not find any taste differences.
The difference was only more expensiveness.
Recently I imported a carboy and air locks from USA and started 
to use them (already three batches).I could not find any taste difference by the
changes of the fermenter. Only the advantage of carboy is that I can see 
the inside.I can always watch  and enjoy the process of fermentation.
I am now conducting the continuous fermentations without washed out
the used yeast.I am now using the yeast continuously over ten batches
from the plastic container for Japanese pickles to the present carboy.
Always I could get good beers.I could not find any affect of so called
dead yeast in the US yeast book,I would rather call them active yeast.
Very wild fermentation starts within an hour after I poured prepared 
wort (warm) into my carboy (previously plastic container) with 
the yeast trub at the bottom. Recently I drank a beer bottled about 8 
month ago.I drank the beer together with yeast accumulated on the 
bottom.The taste was excellent.I could not find any bad taste of dead yeast.
For bottling,different from Chris's method,I used a sugar stick for 
coffee (In Japan 3g,4g and 6g cleanly prepared sugar sticks for coffee
are available.).I mainly use 3g sugar sticks for Grolsch bottles.
Once I tried to use bleach in the bath tub like Chris,it was not suitable
for me.Smell made me uncomfortable.I mainly use 70% ethlyalcohol.
The spay of the alcohol smells very good.I am also producing ethlyalcohol
by fermentation.I am planning to bottle the latest batch this week end.
This batch passed through very hot days over 33 degree C(91F).
I did not use air conditioner.But it looks very nice.I am expecting good taste.
This is my homebrew story from my first batch to the present batch.
I hope this will helpful for you.



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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 09:18:37 +0200 (MET DST)
From: Carl Etnier <Carl.Etnier at abc.se>
Subject: Re: Grape Beer?//a labelling story

Mark Schmitt wrote:

>Has anyone ever made a
>grape wheat or a grape mead or anything along those lines?

"Grape mead" is called pyment. I bottled my first batch in March and
think it is one of the two best drinks on the wine side of the
fermented spectrum I have made. Charlie P. tasted it in late May and
murmured something vaguely approving before saying it would get even
better with age. So, the rest of the bottles are put away until next
year and the next batch is almost ready to bottle.

In Sweden we have good grape juice concentrate available for
winemaking, 20-25 l of juice concentrated down to 5 l in a process
similar to making malt extract syrup. Dr. Kardac's and Rulle's are
the two brands I have had good results with (usual disclaimers); I
don't know how widely available they are outside of Sweden.

I can't tell you how to make grape juice, but just follow the 
following procedure and substitute 10 l of grape juice for the
concentrate:

What I do: Bring 2 kg of honey to a boil in 4-6 l water and skim off
the foam. I pour this into my primary, add a bunch of cold water, 2
1/2 l Bordeaux or Merlot grape juice concentrate, and top off with
cold water to make 20 l. Then I add wine yeast and proceed as if
making wine (many good books available on this art).

Good luck!
- --------------------

Victor Hugo has started a labelling thread. Here is a story about
commercial labels that the AI Bot may squint disapprovingly at, but
it could be of interest to some readers.

Just toured a winery near Zurich, not to learn about wine and
winemaking but as part of a search for case studies for an upcoming
conference on ecological engineering for wastewater treatment. About
2/3 of the bottles they use are returned returnables. The labels have
to be removed and the wine residues rinsed out, since wine drinkers
don't rinse their bottles after use as homebrewers do. They use 20 m3
of a lye bath (pH 12) at about 60 C, soaking the bottles in it and
then spraying jets of very hot, neutral water up into them. (Kids,
don't try this at home!)

One of their wastewater problems comes from this lye bath, whose
strength gets used up so that it must be replaced 2-3 times a year.
Meanwhile, it has become contaminated with heavy metals from the
removed labels--zinc, copper, and lead. The copper is the "gold"
color you see on a lot of wine labels here, the zinc is from ink,
apparently, and they were puzzled about where the lead comes from.
(Lead cork covers have been outlawed here for many years.)

This winery has modified its labels and glues so they are
environmentally friendly, according to the manager, but many of the
used bottles are from other manufacturers. Switzerland has standard
sizes and shapes for wine bottles and plastic cases, so it is quite
common not to get one's own bottles back.

I won't go into the details of how to handle the wastewater, but I
thought it was interesting both to see how they got the labels off
and what new problem they ended up with.

I asked about removing the residues inside with a rotating wire brush
and water, BTW, as I've seen in small-scale beer bottling operations
such as Drei Fonteinen in Belgium. The manager said that was much
more effective, but required more labor and was uneconomical in high-
wage Switzerland.

Carl Etnier
A Yankee in Sweden (now on assignment in Switzerland, a different
country)
Number of days since last snowfall: 1 (down to ca 1500 m)

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 20:36:38 +1000
From: CHARLIE SCANDRETT <merino at ozemail.com.au>
Subject: What's under the LID?/Clean CF

A couple of Digests ago Jim Busch wrote

>>Id also point out that the "whole point of a vigorous boil" is a lot more
than merely trub formation.  There are a lot of kettle reactions that 
occur during boiling and the cover should never be on the pot for the last
30 minutes of the boil (ideally one has a strong enough burner to leave
the lid off for the full 90 minute boil period). <<

Can anyone tell me why?

As I understand we boil because the desired reactions are endothermic and need 
the heat to isomerise etc etc
The mechanical vibration of fluid convection helps the hot break floculate.
Also gases are formed and carried away by the boil removing byproducts we don't 
want, like DMS.
At pressure more of these gases would stay in solution, but a lid would only 
cause <1/100 th of an atmosphere backpressure, surely not enough to make a 
difference? 

The lid would slow down losses of heat through convection before boiling point 
was reached thus expediting it, (conservation of sensible heat) but at that 
point lids become essentially irrelevant to temperature or solubility as the 
steam is exiting anyway unless it is a pressure cooker. (Lids would continue to 
conserve energy spent on latent heat but surely this is an economic issue only?)

The increase in wort pH (0.3) would be due to reactions and not evaporative  
increase in concentration of wort, as pH is a base 10 logarithmic scale (pH4 is 
10 times more H ions tham pH5) and a 25% reduction in volume is about max for a 
boil. Again the lid would speed up fluid loss by conserving energy for latent 
heat.

I can see that some byproducts might condense on the lid and drop back into 
solution, but this would be only a few seconds worth of the 90 mins of removal 
as they would soon be re-expelled.

This interests me as I have built a 115L pressure cooker to 5 atmospheres/142C 
to kill all bacteria spores. I intend to boil at 5 atmos  pressure for 20 
minutes and then at 1atmos. The "and then" is yet to be calculated, as I don't 
know if the reactions are linear in their temperature relations or not? Any 
info on this? .

 The necessity of 140C is the spores, they have survived a 2 year trip to the 
moon in a NASA camera and 100C+ in New Zealand gysers, they are tough little 
buggers and I am a beer stability fanatic.

Speaking of rolling boils, modern brew kettles have an inverted cone bottom to 
create a vigourous boil without wasting lots of energy on latent heat. (i.e. 
creating steam) It takes 31,425 kjoules of sensible energy to heat 100 litres 
of water from 25C to 100C, and 33,855 kJoules of latent energy to evaporate 15% 
of it. It makes sense to sparge closer to your desired volume and achieve the 
mechanical vigour of the boil with geometry rather than massive vapourisation. 
The cone is not the whole bottom but a bit like a champagne bottle bottom. You 
heating elements/burners don't have to be as big.

Cleaning Counterflows
Just pop down to your local gun shop and buy a rifle pullthrough. Attach it to 
a long nylon /polyester cord and a fishing sinker. Drop the sinker down the 
counterflow tube and pull an appropriate ammount of rag and cleaner through. 
You can shine it if you want!

Charlie ( from Brisbane)

 ."All of science is just organized common sense" Einstein














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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 08:26:35 -0400
From: GeepMaley at aol.com
Subject: RTP Yeast/Hops Plugs, flowers in Big D

All this talk lately about RTP yeast has peaked my interest.  Any more info
on how to get some outside Mass? Also, I will be in Massachusetts in October
and would like to know of any shops in the area that might have a stash of
RTP. (Lowell area or Cape Cod area)

Also, Anyone know of any good sources of whole hops or hops splugs in the
North Dallas area???

TIA
Geep
Plano, TX

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 08:45:52 -0400
From: Jeff Renner <nerenner at umich.edu>
Subject: Re: Hops will not infect beer

In Homebrew Digest #1823 (September 05, 1995), Roger Deschner said

>   Andy Kligerman homebre973 at aol.com said:
>   >Someone wondered about having cold wort flow thru a bed
>   of hops to add
>   >hop aroma/flavor.  The main problem with this is that
>   it would be
>   >likely to infect the wort unless a very good yeast
>   starter was used.
>   
>   Nope. Hops are a natural disinfectant, and have been
>   used in beer through the ages as much to prevent
>   infection as to add flavor. There are beers which are
>   dry-hopped in the secondary fermenter. <snip>

I disagree (and agree with Andy).  The "natural disinfectant" of hops is
the isomerized soluble portion that acts as an inhibitor to some
lactobacillus infections.  This will not be isomerized and solublized by
passing *cold* wort through the hops.  While hops are sulfured in the
drying process and thereby somewhat sanitized, they are still
essentially just dried flowers.  After all the trouble I go to to make a
sterile starter and sterile wort, I wouldn't risk it.  Wort is a very
hospitible place for all manner of critters to grow.

Dry hopping beer is a different matter.  Beer is far less hospitible
than wort for at least two reasons: 1) The wort sugars and other
nutrients are largely consumed, and 2) the alcohol will inhibit many
spoilage bacteria.  I successfully dry hop beers all the time.

Jeff Renner in Ann Arbor, Michigan c/o nerenner at umich.edu


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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 08:51:38 -0400
From: rhampo at ford.com (Rich Hampo)
Subject: Labels

Hi All,

Wow, it looks like people jump through a lot of hoops
to label the beer bottles. Avery stick ons? Sheesh. Those 
things won't come off even with a jackhammer! 
Just use your favorite drawing software (computer, pencil,
or crayon, if you wish) print on regular paper,
buy a can of $ 0.99 spray adhesive (krylon  at  k-mart)
and spray the backs lightly. I put the labels
face down on newspaper (after cutting them apart)
and then spray them all at once lightly.
No problem removing them.

If you really want to use the stick-on type labels, do what
my brew-buddy Dave Bradley does - flick a little flour on the
back of the label - it lessens the hold of the glue.

Brew on!

Richard Hampo
Ford Research lab
H&H Brewing Ltd



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Date: Tue, 05 Sep 1995 09:53:10 -0400
From: Anthony Migliore <MIGLIORE at novell.nadn.navy.miL>
Subject:  RINGWOOD YEAST

Where can we get Ringwood yeast to brew at home?  This yeast is
usually used at breweries set up by Alan Pugsley.  This ale is always
good, although never much different than the others who use the yeast. I
have traveled around tasting beer at brewpubs and can ID the yeast
after one sip.  Some of the many brewers who use the English yeast
are, Wild Goose, Shipyard, Salty Dog, and Gritty Mcduffs all in the North
East.

When touring Wild Goose, I asked a worker for a cup which he gladly
tapped off the bottom of a fermenter.  Fine for a few batches but I never
was one for good yeast handling and propagation.  This yeast is
HEARTY and makes a GREAT IPA.  The guy at Wild Goose said he had
repitched it over 60 times!!

Anyway, Why no reproduction by Wyeast?  Any other mass productions
to be found out there for the home brewer?

Anthony


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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 07:50:06 -0700
From: gmccarthy at dayna.com (Gary McCarthy)
Subject: Re: Alt Yeast

Jim Busch <busch at eosdev2.gsfc.nasa.gov> (in HBD 1821) writes:

<<Altbier snipped from Miller
<snip 
<<Yeast - Brewers Choice - Belgian Ale
<Ah yes, thats *so* authentic!  (I can see the Germans rolling over in their
graves.....)
<Jim Busch

Is the point that this is the "wrong" yeast?  Okay, I can concede I may have
used the wrong yeast.  Big Deal!!  My Brew!  Tasted great to me!  :-)

My apologises to Miller (even though I haven't looked), I'm sure he didn't
recommend the usage of a wrong yeast.  I used potatoes also, but I left that
out!!!!  Nyah, Nyah, Nyah!!! (Well actually I can't remember if I used
potatoes because I don't have my recipe book in front of me, but I have used
them in other recipes). 

PS  I am an EE, so I need a reference to remember anything!

Gary McCarthy                              The Salt Lake Buzz(baseball) drew
650,000.
gmccarthy at dayna.com                   They start the playoffs Wed. in
Vancouver.

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 10:07:44 -0400
From: "Frederick L. Pauly" <flp2m at galen.med.virginia.edu>
Subject: wort chiller design ?

fellow brewers,
I'm going to get a 60 foot coil of 3/8 or 1/2 inch copper and
make an immersion wort chiller. I want one coil for a pre-chiller
in ice water and the other coil for the kettle. My current tap
water temp. is 78 F. 
The question is what would be the best length for both coils for
maximum chilling effect in a 10 gallon brew?
TIA
Rick Pauly

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Date: 30 Aug 95 12:37:37 EDT
From: aesoph%ncemt.ctc.com at ctcga.ctc.com (Aesoph, Michael)
Subject: Homey Home Brew...

Dear Collective:

	Does anyone out ther know of a brew that's made using all basic home 
cooking type ingredients?  Some of the ingredients might be oatmeal, 
cooking flour, molasses, honey, syrup, brown sugar, plain sugar, 
etc......  Anything cheap and readily available.  Does not have to make 
the "perfect" brew....

				Michael D. Aesoph
				aesoph at ctc.com

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Date:         Tue, 05 Sep 95 10:45:02 EDT
From: CGEDEN at NERVM.NERDC.UFL.EDU
Subject:      easy-to-remove labels

Here's another $0.02 worth on the topic of removing commercial beer labels.
Some brewer's labels are simply easier to remove than others.  Anchor's
labels fall off if you point them in the direction of warm water.  Young's
labels also come off very easily.  IMO, third place for ease of removal
would be Boston Beer Co. (TM), although the little labels around the neck
can be a pain.  Anything with foil around the neck like Becks is a royal
PITA and practically requires a sandblaster to clean up.

Chris Geden
Gainesville, FL

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 10:26:13 -0400
From: TPuskar at aol.com
Subject: Labels

Thought I'd add my 2 cents worth on labels.  I use regular copy/laser printer
paper and a glue stick (don't know the brand name) which is available at
Staples, Office depot or any stationary supply store.  It soaks off in
minutes and if you just put it on the edges, it can be pulled off without
soaking.  I like it because you can just rub it on and no waste or brushes to
rinse out.

Concerning beer label software, I'm risking violating the sacred "no selling"
precepts of the digest, but I do know of a package that is available which
contains clip art and formatting specifically for beer labels.  Private post
for more info.

Tom Puskar

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Date: Tue, 05 Sep 1995 11:14:15 -0500
From: Alex Sessions <ALEXS at RIZZO.COM>
Subject:  yeast starters

For the HBD collective wisdom from a diehard lurker:

Here is a somewhat philosophical question on the subject of using
yeast starters that I have been wondering about for some time now,
and since the HBD has been a little light lately. . .put on your
smoking jackets and get out your philosophizing caps.

As I understand it, the main reason for using a yeast starter is to
increase the number and activity of yeast organisms when pitching, so
that the desired yeasts will ferment sugars in the wort much more
quickly than the inevitable few microbrial contaminants, minimizing
the off-flavors contributed by those bad bugs (OK so far? other
reasons for yeast starters?).

So my question is:  when you make a yeast starter, aren't you
culturing those background bad organisms, as well as the desired
yeast?  In other words, when you make a yeast starter to increase the
number of good yeasts, aren't you also increasing the number of bad
microbes which you add to the beer?  Do the bad organisms increase
more quickly or more slowly than the good ones?  Although this is all
based on an incredible number of (probably) poor assumptions, it
seems to me that you are really only doing yourself a favor if the
sanitation involved in preparing the yeast starter is *significantly
better* than that used in preparing the wort and fermenter. (I
currently sanitize my yeast starter and main fermentation the same
way:  boil the liquid, bleach the glass.) Otherwise, you are just
pitching a larger amount of yeast and bad bugs, but in the same
proportion as if no starter was prepared.

I kind of like making yeast starters (playing with Erlenmyer flasks
and stuff), so I encourage you to poke large, smoking, gaping holes
in my reasoning.

Alex Sessions
Alexs at rizzo.com


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Date: Tue, 05 Sep 95 11:07:04 CDT
From: SCHWAB_BRYAN at ccmail.ncsc.navy.mil
Subject: Re-Bottling

     
     I need assistance, and whom better to ask, but those of you "experts" 
     out there!
     
     Situation is this, I have several Grolsh type bottles of , in my 
     humble opinion, an excellant Barleywine.  I need to transfer some of 
     these little beauties from the Grolsh type bottles into regular 12 
     oz'rs for entry into an up-coming contest.
     
     Can this be acheived without carbonation loss?
     
     What I think about doing is;
      adding 1 tsp of corn sugar to the new bottle and racking directly 
     from bottle to bottle.
     
     Or, put a chill on Grolsh bottle and slowly pouring the contents from 
     the Grolsh bottle to the new bottle?
     
     Any suggestions from those of you who might have had to do this very 
     same thing, or simply know the proper method?
     
     Thanks
     
     Bryan    Schwab_Bryan at CCMAIL.NCSC.NAVY.MIL


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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 9:05:52 CDT
From: THaby at swri.edu
Subject: Nitrogen Purge

 Hello All,
Due to breaking the only 5 gal. corbouy I had I was fortunate enough to find
a good supply of 7 gal corbouys at a salvage yard near San Antonio.  What I
would like to know is, How is the air space in one of these 7 gal containers
going to effect the brew of a 5 gal batch, and has anyone ever purged the air
space with nitrogen to remove the oxygen? Just wondering.
 
Tim Haby
Southwest Research 
thaby at swri.edu
 
N5YEB

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 12:52:08 -0400 (EDT)
From: tim at novell.com (Tim J. Ihde)
Subject: First all-grain/Hop removal


After several reasonably successful partial mashes, I attempted my
first all-grain batch over the Labor Day weekend.

For the most part, things went very well . . . I ended up with about
80% efficiency, which is a little better than I had been getting in
the partials.  This was also my first use of my new Cache Cooker and
keg-kettle, and for the most part I was very pleased with this as
well.

Where I ran into trouble was in getting the wort out of the pot after
chilling with my immersion chiller.  I had built a copper ring
manifold for inside the pot, and the cuts I had made in the bottom of
the ring promptly got gummed up with hop petals . . . to the point
where there was no flow from the boiler at all.  I ended up using a
grain bag to strain the wort into the fermenter.  (Here I had been
worried about a stuck mash, and I ended up with a stuck boiler!)

What did I do wrong here?  I was sure I had spoken to people who use
this type of manifold to strain out whole hops.  Do I need more cuts,
or maybe thinner cuts?  Or is this a bad idea and I should try using
a scrubbing pad as recently described for removing break material?

	tim

- -- 
Tim J. Ihde                                  | Novell Unix Systems Group
tim at novell.com                (201) 443-5571 | ISV Engineering

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 11:57:02 -0500
From: Russell Mast <rmast at fnbc.com>
Subject: Prime Time.


> From: Brent Irvine <brenirvi at village.ca>
> Subject: Priming bottles

> Common practice seems to be to prime with about 3/4 cup of sugar which will
> give a somewhat carbonated beer at cool drinking temperatures. However, there
> are times I would like to have a cold brew out of my fridge. If I prime with
> this amount of sugar, then these coldies are closer to flat, of course.

Of course?  Of course, nothing.  What size batches are you using?  When I 
prime a 5-gallon batch with 3/4 cup corn sugar, I have plenty of carbonation.
Easily as gassy as Budweasel.

Some new brewers I spoke with recently were complaining of their beer being 
"flat".  After some really confusing discussion, I realized that they meant 
it had no _head_.  It was plenty carbonated.  I'm not saying Brent here is 
making the same mistake, but maybe someone else is.  More sugar will not give
you more head.

> How
> much sugar can I use to prime in order to give a good carbonation, yet not be
> too sweet, or worse yet, explode? Currently I am using 500 ml and 600 ml PET
> bottles, so at least there would not be glass shrapnel in these 'experimental
> stages'. Perhaps prime with 1 cup? 1.25? 1.5? How much? Anybody tried?

You won't get it too sweet until quite awhile after they explode, unless you've
got incredibly alcoholic brew.  (You might...)  I've spoken with someone who
used 2 cups / 5 gallons, and it was way overcarb'd, but the only bottles that
exploded were the "non-returnable" beer bottles.  The champagne bottles and 
reusable beer bottles held fine.  (Gushed like crazy when you opened them, but
didn't open themselves.)

> Another priming question. How much honey would be equivalent to 1 cup oc corn
> sugar? I think it might lead to an intersting brew. I have already made beer
> which called for honey (TNJOHB) and was quite pleased.

Honey has about double the sugar per volume, maybe a little less.  Priming with
honey will make very little difference in the flavor, ditto with priming with
dry malt.  The only primer I've used that affected flavor was molasses.  

Good rule of thumb - if you're using something to prime that wouldn't change
the flavor by putting that quantity in the boil, it won't do much in the prime.

Anyway, I usually use slightly under 3/4 cup to prime 5 gallons, and my beer 
is never flat, even when ice cold.  Not sure what we're doing differently,
but we're doing something differently.

 -R

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 14:29:05 -0400
From: genitom at nyslgti.gen.ny.us (Michael A. Genito)
Subject: Homebrew supply stores

Does anyone know where there is a homebrew supply store in the area of
Rockland County, NY and/or Bergen County, NJ? There used to be a shop in
Spring Valley NY but they apparently went out of business. I've been buying
mail order or when visiting out of the area, but prefer a local shop I can
walk into when I just need an item or two. TIA.
Michael A. Genito, Director of Finance, Town of Ramapo
237 Route 59, Suffern, NY 10901
TEL:  914-357-5100 x214   FAX: 914-357-7209


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Date: Tue, 05 Sep 95 09:40:00 PDT
From: "Olson, Greger J - CIV/911-2" <gjolson at bpa.gov>
Subject: YASQ (Yet another stupid question) - Dual Coil Immersion Chillers


I have seen a number of references to dual coil immersion chillers.  Are 
they constructed with a single length of copper tubing (coiling down on the 
outside loop and up on the inside) or do they have a "Tee's" at the inflow 
and outflow so that the water circulates in the same direction through both 
loops?  Any comparisons in efficiency with CF chillers?  Thanks.

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Date: Tue, 05 Sep 1995 09:45:18 -0700 (PDT)
From: Dave Riedel <RIEDEL at ios.bc.ca>
Subject: Gott cooler size...


It seems that I have decided to take the plunge into all-grain.  This fact
came clear to me, when I found that I was skipping over the extract recipes
in Cats Meow.  Strange.  It seems my subconscious mind decided to all-grain
before my conscious.  Anyway... I think I'll be going with the Gott cooler,
Mash/Lauter tun set-up.  My question is:  Is the 5 gallon size ok?  I'd like
to minimize the cost and the space requirements.  Will the 5 gallon size
greatly limit the beer types I wish to make (i.e. will high gravity brews
be impossible?)  BTW, I brew 5 gallon batches.

Dave Riedel

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 12:08:24 PDT
From: stafford at alcor.hac.com (Jack Stafford)
Subject: Re:Priming bottles

On Sun, 3 Sep, Brent Irvine <brenirvi at village.ca> asks:
>Common practice seems to be to prime with about 3/4 cup of sugar which will
>give a somewhat carbonated beer at cool drinking temperatures. However, there
>are times I would like to have a cold brew out of my fridge. If I prime with
>this amount of sugar, then these coldies are closer to flat, of course. How
>much sugar can I use to prime in order to give a good carbonation, yet not be
>too sweet, or worse yet, explode? Currently I am using 500 ml and 600 ml PET
>bottles, so at least there would not be glass shrapnel in these 'experimental
>stages'. Perhaps prime with 1 cup? 1.25? 1.5? How much? Anybody tried?

I used 1 C. corn sugar to prime a 5 gallon batch of cherry kriek (Brewferm).
The batch was bottled into 16 oz. 'swing top' bottles.  The kriek is nicely
carbonated, even when consumed ice-cold.  I wouldn't exceed 1 Cup/5 Gallons
for fear of exploding bottles.  The swing tops open with a Champagne-like
P-O-P!  :)

>Another priming question. How much honey would be equivalent to 1 cup oc corn
>sugar? I think it might lead to an intersting brew. I have already made beer
>which called for honey (TNJOHB) and was quite pleased.

A conversion table for priming keg/bottles is in Papazian's second book.
Honey, malt extract, sugar, etc are listed. Sorry, I left the book at home.


Jack  stafford at alcor.hac.com
Costa Mesa, CA

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 13:06:58 -0400
From: joep at informix.com (Earl the Pearl)
Subject: Mini keg fun, Chimay dregs


<snip>

 harry>         4) If its worthwhile trying to use this yeast, got any
 harry> good Chimay-clone recipes to go with it?

You'll be able to make Chimay-clones with this yeast.  I have just made
a Chimay Blue label clone that is very close to Chimay.  I used Wyeast
Belgian Abbey (1214).

Here's the recipe:

Grains:
7# Begian Pale Malt
3# Belgian Cara-Pils
1# Crystal Malt
0.5# Special B
1 oz Chocolate Malt

1# Belgian Candy sugar


Hops:
4.3%AA Fuggles (1 oz for 90 minutes)
3.1%AA Saaz (1 oz for 90 minutes)
3.1%AA Saaz (1 oz for 5 minutes)

2 t Irish Moss (for 20 minutes)

OG:  1.075  FG: 1.010
6 days in primary, 27 days in secondary

 harry> harry

 harry> (new e-mail address, same old jerk!)

joe.

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Joe Pearl, Sr. Sales Engineer, Informix Software, Inc.                      |
| 8675 Hidden River Parkway, Tampa, FL, 33637 813-615-0616                    |
| For PGP key: send me email w/subject "send me pgp key"                      |
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| There's no use being a damned fool about it. William Claude Dunkenfield     |
| ("W. C. Fields")(1880-1946)                                                 |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 12:02 PDT
From: howe at shemp.appmag.com (Aubrey Howe)
Subject: Lots O' things

Greetings, 

  A couple -- ok, many -- of items:
  LABELS:
    I use a glue stick on mine.  They come off after being in water
for five seconds.  The obvious disadvantage is that when I chill them
in a bucket of ice, the melted ice (now water) takes the labels off.
does this happen when you (I forgot your name -- Sorry!) use milk on
them? 

  HOPBACK:
    For this, I dump the spent grains out on my compost pile during
the boil, and re-clean the bucket that has the false bottom in it,
then use the whole shebang all over again to strain out the hops.  The
still hot, hoppless wort then goes back into my boiling kettle that
has the IM chiller running already.  (I was thinking just now that
I could make the CF move really easily now, couldn't I?)

  WATER:
    Sure, this is kind of a long time ago, but I don't remember seeing
Portland Oregon water in the list.  Hey, Water man, Is it forthcoming?

  XINGU:
    Please post any recipes for this, as I too would like to make a
good black beer to.  Without knowing their process for sure, and
tasting this great beer, I would guess that there is a sour mash
somewhere in it.

  ZINC:
    I use a Zinc every batch for cleanup.  I use one every day for 
that matter.  I brush my teeth in my Zinc, I shave in a Zinc.  I hate
it when there are too many dishes in my Zinc... That means I have to
wash them! 

 Now for my two questions:
  WARM FERMENT: 
    My last batch (still fermenting) is a honey spice beer (See below,
too).  I put a pound of Raw honey in it for the last fifteen minutes
of the boil.  Nothing new, except I have never used RAW honey --
always cooked.  The weird thing is this: On morning two of vigorous
fermentation, I found the carboy warm to the touch!  I did not take an
actual temperature reaading, but I would guess it was around 80 to 85
degrees F.  I have a very bad feeling about this. IMBR? or will I
just have fusels and esters in my beer?  I don't mind Ester: I know a
woman named Ester, and she is nice.  

  SPICE ADDITION:
    We're still on the same batch above now, and as I was adding the
yeast, I realised that I had forgotten to add the cinamon to the beer.
I usually add it with the finishing hops, and boil for no more that 3
minutes.  I think the boiling gives me more "extraction" than
dry-cinamoning will in the secondary.  My question is how many sticks
should I add? Should I crush them first? Should I use ground cinamon?
I was going to use one tsp ground cinamon in the boil.


      I wish the Hockey season would hurry up and get here! 
      --Aubrey Howe, III
        Santa Barbara, Ca.


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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 16:22:36 EST
From: John DeCarlo <jdecarlo at homebrew.mitre.org>
Subject: Yeast Washing

ajdel at interramp.com (A. J. deLange) writes:
>John DeCarlo asked about yeast washing with carbonic acid, or more
>particularly with selzer tablets. 

Thanks for the info on the pH of carbonic acid and desired pH for acid 
washing yeast.

However, before this gets out of hand, I was referring to "seltzer", which 
is carbonated water, not the "alka selzer" type of tablets.  Sorry I wasn't 
clear in the first place.

John DeCarlo, MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA--My views are my own
Fidonet:  1:109/131  Internet:  jdecarlo at mitre.org


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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 12:53:55 -0400
From: Steve Alexander <stevea at clv.mcd.mot.com>
Subject: Transylvania Style Ale - was - Airborne yeast/Mini-still


In Homebrew Digest #1821 (September 02, 1995) Michael Swan writes:

>From: "Michael R. Swan" <mswan at fdic.gov>
>Subject: Airborne yeast/Mini-still
>
>	The Dallas papers recently reported a story involving the 
>fermentation of blood sugar by airborne yeast.  I am posting this to find out 
>if there is any truth to the theory or whether this is just another case of a 
>slick lawyer confusing a jury.
>
>	According to court records, a driver accused of intoxication 
>manslaughter had a blood-alcohol content 2 1/2 times the legal limit and a 
>history of drunken driving.  However, his lawyer persuaded jurors to acquit 
>his client of the charges in the death of a police officer by producing a 
>forensics expert who told jurors that the vial that contained the driver's 
>blood actually had become a "mini-still" in which airborne yeast produced the 
>alcohol in the sample.
>
>	Authorities said that the driver had a blood-alcohol level of at 
>least .25 percent; the legal limit is .10 percent.  The prosecution's 
>forensics expert witness testified that the driver would have had to have 
>consumed 28 to 30 10-ounce glasses of beer during his six hours at the bar to 
>have that much alcohol in his blood at the time of the collision. 
>
>	But the defendant's expert testified that officials who drew the 
>driver's blood contaminated it by exposing it to air, allowing yeast to enter 
>the sample and ferment the blood sugar into alcohol during the sixteen hours 
>before the alcohol level was tested.
>
>	Given the problems many of us seem to have with wort aeration and 
>long lag times, is this theory scientifically possible?
>
>Mike Swan 
>Dallas, Texas 
>mswan at fdic.gov 
>("The views expressed above do not in 
>way represent those of my employer.")

My wife is a diabetic so I know a bit about blood sugar.

A textbook normal blood sugar reading is 100 mg/deciliter. Figures
from 80 to 125 are typical, and 200 mg/dl is about the maximum you
could ever realistically see in a person with a normal pancreas and
that's a stretch.  An uncontrolled diabetic might be several times
higher tho'.  Blood sugar is all glucose BTW.

100mg/dl is 1gm/liter or .00835 pounds/gallon of glucose.  Lets assume
this guy just snacked out on cookies and cake and has the flu to boot
yielding a BSL of 200mg/dl so his blood glucose concentration would
be 0.0167 pounds of glucose per gallon and at 45 pts/pound/gallon
this would give a 'blood OG' of 1.00075, which with a really good
yeast might get you 0.08% alcohol.  Of course the defense would
provide evidence that the defendant might well be an out of control
diabetic with a blood sugar reading of 700 or greater which would be
necessary to create enough alcohol by fermentation.

Conclusion - it's VERY VERY improbably that he could have had enough
glucose in his blood to produce a .25% figure, or even to have added 
the .15% to bring it up to .25% from the legal limit.  If he did
have this much glucose in his blood sugar it would indicate untreated
diabetes which would be easy to check.  Another problem with this story
is that blood is quite saline, which inhibits yeast growth. Fermenting
to near completion from a few airborne yeast cells within 16 hours is
a stretch as well - serious underpitching here. 

The defense doesn't know what distillation is, doesn't believe the
fermenting blood story any more than I do, and is just trying to raise
'reasonable doubt'.  Raising reasonable doubt is unfortunately too
easy to do by addressing a technical issue before most juries.

My suggestion for brewing your own is that you pre-boil the blood-wort
to contentrate sugars and coagulate excess proteins, rack, cool and
find some means of de-ionizing - then try a much higher pitching rate
than indicated above ;^)

>("The views expressed above do not in 
>way represent those of my employer.")
Nor mine,
Steve Alexander


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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 12:25:34 -0400
From: joep at informix.com (HomeBrewer)
Subject: Priming bottles

>>>>> On Sun, 3 Sep 95 10:53:03 EDT, Brent Irvine <brenirvi at village.ca> said:

 Brent> There has been a topic that I seem to be unable to find a great
 Brent> deal of information about. That is - priming. I know there is
 Brent> some discussion in both the HBC and NCJOHB, but these discuss
 Brent> the 'right' way. Well, as always I would like to tread another
 Brent> path. But before I do, I would like to ask everyone out there.

 Brent> Common practice seems to be to prime with about 3/4 cup of sugar
 Brent> which will give a somewhat carbonated beer at cool drinking
 Brent> temperatures. However, there are times I would like to have a
 Brent> cold brew out of my fridge. If I prime with this amount of
 Brent> sugar, then these coldies are closer to flat, of course. How
 Brent> much sugar can I use to prime in order to give a good
 Brent> carbonation, yet not be too sweet, or worse yet, explode?
 Brent> Currently I am using 500 ml and 600 ml PET bottles, so at least
 Brent> there would not be glass shrapnel in these 'experimental
 Brent> stages'. Perhaps prime with 1 cup? 1.25? 1.5? How much? Anybody
 Brent> tried?

I prime with about 1 C of corn sugar for 5 gallons and then bottle (in
glass).  No problems with that and the beer is nicely carbonated.  I've
heard the PET bottles can withstand 200 psi pressure and come with the
soda at about 40 psi.  I don't think explosions would be a problem.

<snip>

joe.
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Joe Pearl, Sr. Sales Engineer, Informix Software, Inc.                      |
| 8675 Hidden River Parkway, Tampa, FL, 33637 813-615-0616                    |
| Life is a series of trade-offs.                                             |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| We have reason to be afraid. This is a terrible place. - John Berryman      |
| (1914-1972)                                                                 |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 12:28:26 -0400
From: HOMEBRE973 at aol.com
Subject: re:hops and infection

Roger Deschner wrote:
>Nope. Hops are a natural disinfectant, and have been used in 
>beer through
>the ages as much to prevent infection as to add flavor. There are >beers
>which are dry-hopped in the secondary fermenter. Watch out, >though, if
>you find a grassy flavor unpleasant, because that can happen >with
>uncooked hops. Hops away! The more the better.

In response to my statement that adding hops to unfermented wort (hop back
with cold wort) can cause infection unless a good starter is used.  I will
stand by my statement and respectfully but stongly disagree with his
statement. Hops are not a true disenfectent but can inhibit some bacterial
growth.  That is one reason why they are used in the boil or to dry hop after
fermentation is about complete. Beer has not always been bottled thru the
ages and I doubt it wass the quality product with beautiful clarity we drink
today.  However,  bacteria are not the only organism that can infect beer;
 wild yeast can be more of a problem, more than likely being the chief cause
of gushers. 
Andy Kligerman
homebre973 at aol.com  



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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 95 18:03:09 EDT
From: "Matthew W. Bryson" <MWBryson at LANMAIL.RMC.COM>
Subject: re:Homebrew Digest #1823 (September 05, 1995)

  I know that everyone requests recipes via the HBD. However, I am going 
to ask for one anyway. Does anyone know of extract/partial mash recipe 
emulating Sierra Nevada's Bigfoot barleywine?

   TIA,

    Matthew Bryson

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End of HOMEBREW Digest #1824, 09/06/95