---

	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:
  0.1N NaOH (JohanNico)" <JohanNico.Aikema at akzonobel.com>
  My Mash Mixer experience (Jack Schmidling)
  lid on boil pot (Mark Tumarkin)
  0.1 N NaOH recipe (David Whitman)
  0.1N NaOH (AJ)
  Disappointment with results of first time all grain ("Sieben, Richard")
  Yeast Stuff ("Jeffrey M. Kenton")
  Poor Extraction (Dan Listermann)
  Re: degermination (Jeff Renner)
  Oil film (Mysti)
  Foreign Tap water,all grain efficiency, Maillard, 0.1N NaOH, (Dave Burley)
  Eric's Beer Page has moved! (Eric Wooten)
  re:Disappointment with results of first time all grain. (Michael A. Owings)
  Flocculation (Dave Humes)
  re: 1st all-grainer; black stout (Lou.Heavner)
  RE: converting kegs (LaBorde, Ronald)
  Thanks to everyone for their responce (Edward Seymour)
  Re:First time all-grain ("Philip J Wilcox")
  RE: Stirrer Motor, Another possibility (John Wilkinson)
  HD#3063: Subject: converting kegs (Badger Roullett)
  Muotrichstraum Weizen (stencil)
  Warsteiner (Dan Listermann)
  Many thanks! (Harlan Bauer)


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

* 2000 MCAB Qualifier: Buzz-Off! Competition 6/26/99 
* (http://www.voicenet.com/~rpmattie/buzzoff)

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


Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 07:10:50 +0200
From: "Aikema, J.N. (JohanNico)" <JohanNico.Aikema at akzonobel.com>
Subject: 0.1N NaOH

Hi Harlan,
A 0.1 N NaOH solution contains 0.1*molecular weight of NaOH dissolved to 1
liter. So dissolve 0.1*(23+16+1)=4 grams NaOH (100 %) in a small amount of
destilled water (carefully, it gets hot, wear glasses) and dilute it up to 1
liter in your flask.
Greetings from Holland, Hans Aikema
http://www.cybercomm.nl/~aikema/index.html







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Date: Mon, 21 Jun 1999 22:38:48 -0700
From: Jack Schmidling <arf at mc.net>
Subject: My Mash Mixer experience

RobertJ <pbsys at pbsbeer.com>
 
"Jack, the original poster never mentioned using a false bottom or 
scorching as a problem.

A. I beg to differ with you but it's not worth hunting down the
quote.

B.  So what?  That makes it no less a problem.

"Without "rational control of heat" during temperature raises (fast
temperature raise), a false bottom may cause jumps in overall mash
temperature, but not scorching....

That is a mind boggling statement and I suspect I am not the only
one who would argue with you.

My point is that water under a false bottom can turn to steam 
and create burps.  Pressure can build up faster than it can escape 
through the FB and scorching is as easy as turning the knob on 
the burner.  This is not possible with the EM although scorching
is possible, it is more forginging.

js

- -- 
     Visit our web site:  http://user.mc.net/arf
  ASTROPHOTO OF THE WEEK:  http://user.mc.net/arf/weekly.htm



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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 07:33:51 -0400
From: Mark Tumarkin <mark_t at ix.netcom.com>
Subject: lid on boil pot

Keith Menefy writes:
"I use a big (200 litre) container for the boil.
It is posible to put a lid on with just an inch pipe outlet for the
steam.
If I restrict this outlet a bit more would it increase the temperature
at
all, and by how much. Is the steam coming off the same temp as the water

being boiled?"

Aside from the question of steam temps it is not a good idea to cover
your boil pot with a lid. One of the reasons for boiling is to drive off
chemicals that can cause taste problems, such as DMS. If you cover the
boil these are not driven off, or they can condense on the lid and drip
back into the wort. So covering the boil is not a good idea.

He also writes:
"I am after the Maillard reaction for colouring/carmelising the sugars.
How do Guinness achieve their black colour? I have never got better than
a
dark brown even with using burnt barley."

Try beginning your boil after you have collected a reasonable amount of
the first runnings rather than waiting till later. This is commonly done
for Scotch Ales. Boiling the smaller volume of wort will give you a
darkening of the color and also the carmelisation you are looking for.

I have gotten a fair number of responses to my post about meeting at the
AHA convention in KC. Several people have told me that they do give out
name badges, so write HBD under your name so we can recognize each other
more easily. I'll be at the judging on Thursday and then at the Beer
Without Borders homebrew event on Thursday evening.

looking forward to meeting y'all,

Mark Tumarkin
Gainesville, FL




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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 07:55:08 -0500
From: David Whitman <dwhitman at rohmhaas.com>
Subject: 0.1 N NaOH recipe


Harlan Bauer asks:

>I need to make a 0.1N solution of sodium hydroxide (NaOH). What would be
>the recipe? I have a scale and volumetric flasks. 

Weigh out 4.00 g of NaOH, put it in a 1 liter volumetric flask, add about
200 ml of water, swirl until the pellets/flakes dissolve.  Add water to
bring the level up to the line, then invert the flask about 10 times to mix.

The resulting solution will be ABOUT 0.1 N.  NaOH readily picks up moisture
from the air, so that it's hard to know exactly how much you need to weigh
out. 

The solution will gradually loose strength by reacting with CO2 from the
air (= carbonic acid), but you can minimize this by keeping it in a sealed
container.


Return to table of contents


Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 12:40:31 +0000
From: AJ <ajdel at mindspring.com>
Subject: 0.1N NaOH

Harlan Bauer asks about making up 0.1 N NaOH solution. The math is
pretty simple. The formula weight of NaOH is 40 so 1 equivalent is 40
grams and 0.1 equivalent is 4 grams. Thus to make a 0.1 N solution weigh
out 4 grams of NaOH, place in a 1 liter volumetric flask add distilled
or otherwise DI water to dissolve, allow to cool (NaOH gives off heat
when it dissolves) and  add water to the mark. Mix thoroughly.
Obviously you can scale down (e.g. 1 gram in 250 mL) or up as needed. Be
very careful with NaOH. It's nasty stuff. Especially protect the eyes as
NaOH anaesthesizes the corneas as it digests them so that you don't know
what's happening.

Now there is a catch. NaOH is pretty hygroscopic (in the 20 minutes it's
taken me to write this a 104 mg pellet has picked up 7.4 mg of
moisture). If you need approximately 0.1 N lye the procedure I gave
above will do. If you need 0.100 N lye (for titratable acidity for
example) you really should dry the lye for a couple of hours at 103 C
then cool in a dessicator before weighing. Another problem with lye is
that it is often sold as pellets which weigh about a tenth of a gram.
This makes it difficult to measure small quantities precisely. Crushing
the pellets releases dangerous dust and increases the rate at which
moisture is picked up. Because of this a better approach might be to
make up an approximately 0.1 N solution and then standardize it by
titration against an acid of known strength. My personal advice, if
accurate strength is required, would be to buy prepared 0.100N sodium
hydroxide solution from a reputable source (e.g. Hach Company, Cat
191-53). Bear in mind that a sodium hydroxide solution, from whatever
source  _will_  pick up carbon dioxide from the air (changing its
strength) and should, therefore, be kept tightly closed, used fairly
quickly, replaced often etc.

- --
A. J. deLange
Numquam in dubio, saepe in errore.




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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 07:54:13 -0500
From: "Sieben, Richard" <SIER1 at aerial1.com>
Subject: Disappointment with results of first time all grain

Ed I plugged you recipe into Suds v. 4.0 (no affiliation) and it indicates
an efficiency of 55%.  You are right, that is poor extraction.  I don't know
what shape your malt was in (may have been subjected to high humidity before
you got it) but I will assume that it was fine.  I would venture to guess
your problem is that you denatured the alpha and beta amylaze enzymes with
your strike water of 180 degrees because you indicated that you needed to
cool it to get back down to 155 degrees.  Next time, bring your malt up to
155 degrees more slowly, adding a little water at a time and stirring it in
thouroughly.  Once the enzymes are destroyed by heat, they are gone and
there is nothing to convert the starches into sugars.  Step infusion mashing
is superior to single infusion and I find decoction mashing superior to that
because it allows me to control the temperature steps in my picnic cooler
mash tun.  Single infusion mashing should get you 75% efficiency, but when I
was making 5 gallon batches I was able to get 83 to 85% efficiency with
decoction mashing. (get Noonan's book on brewing lager beer for complete
discussion on how to do decoction mashing).  When I went to 10 gallon
batches, my efficiency went up to 90 to 93%!  I think the lesson I learned
here was that the larger mash volume slowed the speed with which I could
change the temperatures, so I wasn't killing my enzymes prematurely. 
	 As an experiment, I made a beer via a step infusion last weekend
and I still got 85% efficiency (ten gallon batch and oh yeah, I did have to
cheat a little and do a small decoction of 4 quarts of mash to hit my
temperature steps without over diluting the mash).  In all, this step mash
procedure only saved me 1/2 hour of mash time, so I have pretty much decided
that infusion mashing is a waste of time with my setup, may as well do the
full decoction mash.  I know, it is not always 'true to style' for some
beers, but it makes better beer for me and I think that's what it is all
about anyway.  As usual YMMV.  Others will argue that they would just rather
infusion mash with more grain to make up for it.  That is your call, but you
may be limited by your mash tun size.

Rich Sieben

Hey Jethro, the more I know about beer, the more I know about beer!


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 07:59:10 -0500
From: "Jeffrey M. Kenton" <jkenton at iastate.edu>
Subject: Yeast Stuff

I'd personally like to think Ian Smith for sharing his method for stepping
up yeast. It is frightfully easy with the proper equipment, and boy, does
it yield greatly!!!!

If you are interested, his methodology appears in the 8 June 1999 HBD. It
really works well, and I'd suggest it to anyone with a stirplate or shaker
bath.

When I'm not trying to step up my self-selected pure cultures (a
fascination of mine), I proudly admit to all who will listen that I use dry
yeast. In all my beers. I must scratch my head when I see comments from
folks who don't get rapid starts when using Lallemand products, however. I
simply follow the directions on the pack to the letter. The only "cheat"
that I must admit to is using two packs instead of one. Moreover, in the
entire year of 1998, and so far this year, I have never had a lag time of
more than 8 hours using these yeasts, with the procedure listed on the back
of the packets. (Am I concerned that I have just jinxed myself? No.
Superstition is for simps.)

So, now I will slink back to my dry yeast "purgatory." But, I'll still be
making great beer. Swing by sometime and I'll prove it.

Jeff


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 09:49:41 -0400
From: Dan Listermann <72723.1707 at compuserve.com>
Subject: Poor Extraction

Ed Seymore (eseymore at yahoo.com) writes that he had a rather poor 
extraction
from his first all grain batch.

5.5 gallons of 40 gravity wort from 11.75 lbs. of grain is an extraction
rate of only 18.7 points per pound per gal. ( 5.5 * 40 / 11.75 = 18.7 
).  A
good extraction is around 30 points.  I am willing to bet that he 
followed
the old dictum of "just crack the grains" that was meant to be applied to

corona mills ( which would probably max out at 25 points before producing

flour ).  He should adjust his mill tighter.  If the ends of the corns 
are
not cracked open, the water will only have access to the "base" of the
"cone" that is the end of the corns.  There is a lot of starch locked in
these "cones."  


Dan Listermann           dan at listermann.com           
72723.1707 at compusurve

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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 10:10:14 -0400
From: Jeff Renner <nerenner at umich.edu>
Subject: Re: degermination

"Keith Menefy" <kmenefy at ihug.co.nz> wrote:
>The maize I used is stock feed quality maize, very dusty.

You should be able to wash the maize and get rid of the dust, etc.  I wash
such dirty grain in a bucket with a hose and let the dust and debris float
out over top.  You don't have to dry it if you're going to mill it and mash
right away.  This won't help your other problems, though.

>I never noticed any off flavours at all, just bland.
 Corn is a pretty neutral flavored brain - subtle, shall we say.

>Would it be possible to boil the maize prior to brew day and skim the oil
>off when it has cooled down a bit?

I don't think so - I think in bourbon it is the fermentation that separates
the oil and floats it to th top.


>I use a decoction system for brewing, the maize goes in when the first
>decoction is just coming to the boil, and is boiled for about 30 mins. I had
>expected heading problems, and was curious if there would be any other
>effects from the oil content.

Try a separate cereal mash with 30% as much malt as maize - mash at mid
60'sC, then boil for 30-45 minutes, then return this to the main mash which
you have had resting at a chosen temperature and time.  Choose this based
on the needs of your malt.  If it can use a protein rest, then do that
before adding the cereal mash.  You could do this with your decoction.

I am suspicious that the oil may not be the problem with heading (although
I think you wrote that you haven't checked out the final beer), but rather
proteins.  This is a murky subject, and especially with malt that I know
nothing about.  Remember that maize was originally used to ameliorate the
high protein (12%+) of N. American 6-row barley malt.  It can be done with
lower protein malt, but you may need to modify mash procedures.

Good luck.

Jeff

(PS - I'm going to be doing field research the next two weeks on the
indigeneous fermented and/or distilled beverages of Ireland and the
facilities in which they are consumed.  See you all later.)

 -=-=-=-=-
Jeff Renner in Ann Arbor, Michigan USA, c/o nerenner at umich.edu
"One never knows, do one?"  Fats Waller, American Musician, 1904-1943. 




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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 10:59:15 -0400
From: Mysti <mystiSPAMFREE at starmail.com>
Subject: Oil film

I'm very new at this and have a carboy of Ginger Beer that's still
fermenting. There is a slight oily film on the surface. Is this normal
due to the ginger? Or did I do something terribly wrong. I don't know if
I should continue and bottle this brew or dump it down the drain. :-(
Please give advice, I sorely need it.
Thanks,
Mysti



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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 10:55:00 -0400
From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley at compuserve.com>
Subject: Foreign Tap water,all grain efficiency, Maillard, 0.1N NaOH,

Brewsters:

Joe Gibbens wants to know about using bottled
water to make beer.  Generally, bottled water is
just someone else's tap water. Unless you have
serious problems, like iron, in your water, I would
use your own water.  It is a falsehood that bottled
water is somehow purer, safer and whatever
else than your own water. As far as I know, there
are no government standards on bottled water.

Some of the European waters have excessive
mineralization ( I mean they do call it
"aqua minerale" for a good reason) and may
not be suitable for some styles of beer. I presume
the same could be true for some US waters.

Bottled waters often do not have chlorine in them
which is a plus. Most US water bottlers use
ozonation which is fine for a bottled water, but
highly dangerous for a municipality, despite a
recent trend in that direction, IMHO.  Re-infection of
non-chlorine containing water during pipe
transmission to your home is a real possibility.
Also, be careful to not infect the bottle supply as
it will not have any residual anti-bacterial activity.

Use of a carbon filter which has some silver 

treatment to prevent bacterial growth is a 

good idea for home brewing use , since it
removes chlorine to a large extent and
potentially bad tasting organics. Your
water supplier will provide you with a typical
analysis of the mineral content.

I have a well and I use a water softener to
remove iron and other minerals
and a reverse osmosis (RO) filter to remove
the remaining sodium for my drinking and
beer making. Since this water is virtually
mineraless, I take dolomite pills and Caltrate
to replace the necessary calcium and
magnesium in my diet.

Also, Joe, you should adjust your mash to 

around 5.4 or so at room temperature as
the pH will fall upon heating. The first time,
I would just go with your tap water, treated to
remove any chlorine and organics by
passing it over a carbon filter, skip any pH
adjustment and see what happens to the pH.
Chances are good it will be just fine without
a lot of excessive adjustment. You may
wish to pre-boil your mash water to remove
any dissolved carbon dioxide which may
affect the mash pH.

More importantly, especially if you have
temporary hard water,  is to adjust your
sparge pH, keeping it in the lower end of
the 6s at a maximum ( 5.6 is better), near
the end of the sparge to prevent extraction
of tannins and silicates and other
substances which can affect the taste
and clarity of the beer. 

- ---------------------------
Ed Seymour describes his first all grain
Father's Day brew and ponders the poor
efficiency  of the extract.  Most often, Ed,
the best way to get better efficiency is to
improve your milling. "Serf" the HBD archives
on this much discussed topic and check out
my suggested double pass method.

Another thing to consider is the possibility of
channelling in your sparger. Substantial work
and even computer modelling has gone into
this subject. Check the HBD archives.

Experimentally, you can taste the
grain at various parts of this vessel or check it
with a Cl**t*** at various places to evaluate
the possibility of remaining sugar there.
Excessive variations will indicate channelling
and are indicative that you need a sparger
design change or a  change in the sparging
rate is in order. BTW take at least 45 minutes
to an hour to sparge. This will improve your
extraction in most instances.

The thing that amazes me most about your
discussion is that your spousal unit knew
*exactly* what to buy you. {8^)
- ---------------------------
Keith Menefy asks about the Maillard
reaction and how to get it. Check out
the HBD archives about using a pressure
cooker to get the Maillard reaction.  Do not
restrict your boiler exit and note the method
used to prevent the clogging of the pressure
cooker by the grain.

As I suggested, I would use a known
de-germed source for maize and not
animal feed, at least at first. 

- -------------------------
Harlan Bauer asks how to make 0.1N
sodium hydroxide.  The gram MW for
sodium hydroxide is (Na = 23, O = 16,
H= 1 total = 40g/mole).

Not having access to laboratory supply,
I use lye from the food store and weigh
out 4 grams (0.1 moles) into a 1 liter
plastic soda [pop] (soft drink) bottle using
cool, boiled ( to remove CO2)
demineralized water. Distilled water is
readily available for use in irons and
for people on low sodium diets.  Be 

sure to boil it as the carbon dioxide
can make end point determination with
phenolphthalein difficult.

I then standardize this solution using an
acid. In the case of wine, I weigh out tartaric
acid and standardize the above solution.
Amazingly, it is incredibly close to the
correct value of 0.1N. 


I suggest you use extreme care when using 

dry lye or sodium hydroxide as it is extremely
destructive to human tissue, especially the eye.

Always wear safety glasses and wash your 

hands. I wear rubber gloves when I am dealing
with strong acids and bases.


Keep on Brewin'

Dave Burley

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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 10:08:04 -0500
From: Eric Wooten <wooten at uthscsa.edu>
Subject: Eric's Beer Page has moved!

Eric's Beer Page, one of the oldest beer pages on the net, has moved to this
strangely appropriate URL:

http://ericsbeerpage.com/

The new location still sports micro, brewpub, and fine bar listings and
reviews from all 50 states, Canada, and various other countries. Also on the
site is a homebrew label gallery, and homebrew recipes, plus a smattering of
commercial beer reviews and a calendar of upcoming brew-events.

Please update any links you maintain (and don't forget to update your
browser's bookmarks!)

Thanks,
Eric.

- ------------------------------------------------
Eric Wooten
wooten at uthscsa.edu
http://ericsbeerpage.com
- ------------------------------------------------


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 15:09:50 GMT
From: mikey at swampgas.com (Michael A. Owings)
Subject: re:Disappointment with results of first time all grain.

> After several trips to Home Depot (no affiliation), I
> built my three tiered all grain brewery.  This consists of a 5 gal.
> plastic HLT with two 1500 watt elements to heat the water.  A 5 gal.
> round cooler with a home-made stop-sign manifold that I slotted 1/2 way
> thru the 1/2 inch copper pipe in 1/2 inch intervals with a Dremal tool
> (no affiliation) plumbed into the bottom (slots facing down).  A 12
> gal. boiler with two 1500 watt elements and a braided stainless steel
> manifold. All electricity runs thru GFI protected circuits.

WOW! My hat's off to you for really jumping in with both feet. My
first all grain was just with an 8.5 gal canning pot, EasyMasher, and
a borrowed propane burner. 

> I strucked  (turned valve)  4 gal.
> of water and mixed (temp. 180deg.).  I stirred like mad, and added soda
> pop plastic containers filled with ice until the temp. went down to 155
> deg.

A strike temp of 180F is _really_ high. I often mash in a 10 Gal GOTT
cooler these days. With the cooler pre-heated with a quart of boiling
water and 10 LBS grain at room temp, I usually mash in  with 4 gals
strike water at about about 167F to hit 154F. There are a number of
popular equations available for figuring strike temp -- check the web.
I use the calculator include with the ProMash software package (no
affiliation, just a satisfied customer, yadayada).

> I then sparged with 5 gal. of 170deg water until boiler
> had 7.75 gal. collected (was this too much water?)
Since it boiled down to your target of 5.5 gallons, it was probably
exactly the right amount of water. I wouldn't worry about leaving "too
much" sugar behind in the grains. Use more grain next time -- it's
cheap. Lot's of folks around here don't even sparge, or "batch
sparge", assuming that this actually provides a better malt flavor. I
myself usually conduct a very brief sparge, and just use more grain to
make up for the extract loss.

> The specific gravity reading at this point was 1.040 at 70 deg., total wort
> collected into fermenter was 5 1/2 gal.

This reading seems way low (about 57% efficiency). I don't know why
you got such a low figure, maybe the initial overheating of the mash?
Also, consider verifying your hydrometer for accuracy. I use an
EasyMasher type arrangement as a manifold in my 10 Gal Gott. With a
regular sparge I can get 85% efficiency. Of course, I usually do only
a very short or batch sparge -- I rank mash efficiency pretty low on
my list of brewing priorities.

Others might be able to better comment on the extract issue than
myself. In any case, I wouldn't be shy about adding a couple of pounds
of DME to boost the extract, if required. 1.5 pounds DME would take
you up to 1.053 or so, and I frankly doubt this amount would have a
discernable effect on the beer.

Sound's like you have a good setup. The only thing I might do
differently would be to go with a larger capacity mash-tun -- 10 gals
instead of 5. Gives you a little more room when doing higher-gravity
brews or larger batches.

Best of luck on your next all-grain -- mikey


***********************************
Go ahead ... try the sauce. The sauce is good. The sauce 
will make you YOUNG again...


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 11:14:44 -0400
From: Dave Humes <humesdg1 at earthlink.net>
Subject: Flocculation

Greetings,

Here's a few questions for the microbiologists.  I've been wondering
what happens when yeast flocculate.  Why do they start sticking
together when the food supply is running out?  I have a starter going
now for an ESB strain that is very flocculent.  The flocs are quite
large.  Virorous stirring/shaking breaks them up to some extent, but
I'm sure at the microscopic level, there's still  lots of cells stuck
together.  What happens when the flocced yeast are exposed to a fresh
food and O2 supply?  Do they "defloc"?  Do some cells remain bound to
each other?  If so, does this affect their subsequent ability to
support fermentation?  Do highly flocculent strains require higher
pitching rates?  

- --Dave


Dave Humes                             >>humesdg1 at earthlink.net<<




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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 09:43:54 -0500
From: Lou.Heavner at frco.com
Subject: re: 1st all-grainer; black stout

     Greetings,

     Ed Seymour was disappointed with the low OG on his first all-grainer.
     Being lazy, I won't do the calculations to answer the many specific
     questins.  You didn't say how long you took to lauter the mash.  If
     you collect the wort too quickly, the rinsing effect will be
     diminished and you will leave more sugars behind.  You are also more
     likely to develop channelling.  The geometry of your lauter system and
     the quality of your crush are the most influential factors, but are
     often the most difficult to modify.  If your drain ring is too large
     in diameter (too close to the walls of the cooler) then you will be
     more likely to get channelling down the side walls of the cooler.  In
     any case, slowing the drain flow should help some.  If you took more
     than an hour to lauter, then I'd be more suspicious of the crush.

     Keith Menefy asks about getting a "blacker" stout.  *QDA* I think many
     brewers tend to overlook the affect of haze contributors in darker
     beers.  After all, you can't see the haze in a stout, right?  However,
     I notice that the clearer a dark beer is, whether porter, stout, brown
     ale, etc, the more pleasing the color.  The clearest beers can really
     look the blackest or show some of the finest shades of garnet.  Any
     haze whether yeast or starch or anything else tends too wash out the
     color giving it "muddier" chocolate brown character. It doesn't take
     much.  You could try fining or filtering or "lagering" to try and
     clarify your black beers and see if it helps. *end QDA*

     Cheers!

     Lou Heavner - Austin, TX


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 13:13:12 -0500
From: rlabor at lsumc.edu (LaBorde, Ronald)
Subject: RE: converting kegs

From: jgibbens at umr.edu

>..... I've done some 
>cutting with a dremel tool and also with an 8" abrasive cut-off blade for 
>a circular saw.  A plasma torch was also used for a few of the cuts.  The 
>best results were with the 8" abrasive wheel.  It was over 10X faster 
>than using a dremel tool and the cut was much smoother than the plasma 
>torch cut........

The Dremel tool works for me, takes about half an hour to cut out the top.
Although I must say I have never used the 8" abrasive wheel, I would be
willing to guess that the Dremel is also 10 times safer, 10 times quieter,
and 10 times easier.

>Does anyone have any advice on the best (cheepest is also good) way to 
>install a dial thermometer into a mash tun? 

I installed one by using a brass (de-leaded ala John Palmer) 1/2 inch female
NPT to 3/8 compression fitting.  Just drill a hole to pass the threads on
the smaller 3/8 compression end, which is inserted through the keg wall. You
then screw the 3/8 compression nut minus the ferrule (not needed).  On the
flat end of the 1/2 female threaded part, there is a nice shoulder which
takes an "O" ring.  This faces the outside keg wall, and is compressed when
you tighten the 3/8 nut.  The thermometers come as 1/2 inch NPT male and
just screw into the female fitting that you have created in the keg's side.
The stem just goes through the 3/8 end with room to spare.  

If you want to protect the probe stem, you could solder a piece of copper
tube to the 3/8 compression nut and drill several holes in it for
circulation, and you now have a probe protector. ('cheepest').

Have fun

Ron

Ronald La Borde - Metairie, Louisiana - rlabor at lsumc.edu



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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 11:28:06 -0700 (PDT)
From: Edward Seymour <eseymour at yahoo.com>
Subject: Thanks to everyone for their responce

To all at the HBD
      Some of the things that I omitted in my post (HBD#3063 June 22,
Disappointment with . . . ), and answers to Questions emailed to me:

1) The basic recipe came from the May issue of Brew your own (pg17) 
"American Amber 1" (they should know what the're doing) with some
substitutions necessitated by the local home brew store stocking policy
(they like to keep only a small stock, as they want to make sure that
the customer receives the freshest ingredients).

2) The grains are stored in 5 gallon buckets with sealed tops. Grains
were crushed in the store by yours truly using the stores Valley Mill
(no affiliation) that was adjusted by the sales person to produce the
"perfect" crush.  This was done on Saturday, the day before brew day.

3) Mash temp was 180 deg. the water that I used (poured on top of the
grain) was 212 deg. I figured this one all by myself.
  Grain at basement temp 65 deg.
  target temp 150 deg   
65 deg   +  150 deg   =   215 deg   
water boils at 212 deg  -  - -  close enough.
BIG surprise when the mash temp was 180 deg.
Ice and stirring for about 20 - 25 minutes to bring grain bed to 155

4) Did not perform a mash out (what ever that is).

5) Sparge time 15 - 20 minutes.  It looked so nice just "flowing" into
the boiling pot. With everyone cautioning about stuck mashes I thought
that inflow matched outflow, and everything flowed so nice together
that I should leave it alone.  I did make sure that the tube going into
the Boiler curved around the bottom, not splashing, to cause the
dreaded hot side aeration (AAAAH I said the word)

6) PH level test.  No, I did not take a ph test or make any adjustments
to the water.  Maybe I should do this after all, I do it to the
swimming pool.   Maybe I could use the same kit?   (just a thought)

7) Iodine test.  No, I did not do this either. The recipe stated that
60 minutes would be all that was needed for starch conversion.  I used
90 minutes ( the Redsoxs  were playing, and Nomar was at the plate). 

8) Yeast starter.  Yes, I popped the packet at the store (dated may,
1999) at 10:00am, and around midnight it was bulging out (remember
store policy only the freshest).  I made a 2 qt starter to pitched the
yeast into, and shuck the liven daylight out of it(can I do that at
midnight?). Put the airlock on and went to bed.  Next morning tiny
bubbles in the airlock.

Next batch, I will make sure that I do the following:

1) Use the same recipe, that way I will have something to base my
progress on.

2) Use a spreadsheet that calculates the correct striking water
temperature. 

3) Add the water to the cooler first, then slowly add and mix the grain
into the water to avoid clumping in the mash. 

4) Perform a mash out (what ever that is)

5) Purchase or make a manifold for sparging.

6) Take MUCH longer to sparge. (at least 1 hour)   

7) Purchase an iodine and ph testing kits, and learn how to use them. 

8) Add more grain to bill if I get to worried about SG.

9) Start earlier in the morning to have more time with the spousal unit
( someone suggested to put the HLT on a timer, that way the water will
be warm enough when I wake up much like a coffee pot). 

10) Have fun. 

        Many, many thanks to all of the people at HBD who have sent me
email with suggestions and support of my all-grain efforts.  I couldn't
believe all of the responses that I received. It appears that a lot of
people had problems in their first all-grain endeavor, but persevered
to make exceptional quality brew.   Don't worry, I won't give up, even
if I get evicted from this place   (my daughter yesterday:  "Mom, why
do the clothes that came out of the dryer have that funny smell?")   :
0

Regards,
Ed Seymour
Brewer, bottle washer.
Hamden, CT.  (only a click away from anywhere in the world)


_________________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get your free  at yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com



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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 14:48:33 -0400
From: "Philip J Wilcox" <pjwilcox at cmsenergy.com>
Subject: Re:First time all-grain

Ed the Downtrodden,

Very nice write-up of your brew session. You did excellent for your first
all-grain. Outstanding when you factor in its the 3rd brew overall! Chemist,
Schemist--If you can figure out all of this in 3 brews you'll be manking great
beers in no time.

Things to look out for:
Bad crush--how or where did you crush your malt? This will greatly effect your
extract. Which was a dismal 50% (I usually get 87-9%) BTW. My system is a 2-tier
keg based manual RIMS, so don't get too caught up in compareing the numbers.

Doughing in--I have never been comfortable with adding water to the grain. To
much opportunity for making doughballs, which will wreck your efficiency. Try
adding the water to the cooler first then stir in the malt. A pair of Wok
paddles with 3/8" holes in them are the best mash paddles i've seen off the
rack. I made my own...

Sparge Speed--Slow it down. You didn't mention how fast you sparged. my guess is
under a 1/2 hr. To achieve 85% you'll need to sparge for an hour. But if your SO
is time concious, just buy more malt and live with the 50%. You just need to
compensate for it in the malt bill. Malt is cheap, time is precious.

Measuring the runnings--Measuring the first runnings isn't worth that much.
Meauring the final runnings is somewhat usefull, though I never bother. Now,
measuring the SG of all the sparged wort, now that is usefull. Be sure to stir
very well before taking the sample. In your most recent brew this would have
measured 1.030.  Converted to points = 30, * 6.5 gal divided by 5.2 final
gallons yields 40 or 1.040 final gravity . You can then decide before boiling
wether or not you want to add extrat malt to the kettle to adjust the gravity.
Dry Male Extract is worth 1.0088 point in the final 5 gallons per pound. So a
little under 3 lbs would have gotten you back to the 1.064 you were looking for.

Timing--Remember you can flip the burner on the kettle before you are done
sparging. You just need to keep an eye on it.  Once you learn to trust your HLT
you can put it on a timer and have it come on 45 min or what ever before you
wake up on sat/sun to brew.
Chilling--move that chiller around. My experience says that 18 minutes chiledl
the wort directly around the chiller but not the whole mass. Rock the chiller
back and forth a bit or stir gently to get rid of any convection currents. I
recirculate my kettle also for this reason.

Yeast--Alot of folks spend weeks and month putting their system together, spend
days putting together a recipe, fret for hours about temps while brewing only to
totally blow it in the end by not pitching enough yeast. IT THE MOST IMPORTANT
PART OF HOMEBREWING! Wyeast smacked packs need to be stepped up Twice for normal
beer, Three times for high gravity Ales and Lagers--Even more for high gravity
lagers. Attemperation of dry yeast and Airation of the wort are all important
steps not to be overlooked. 2 packet minimum for dry yeast, 3 isn't overkill.


Best of luck to ya, your doing great so far!

Phil Wilcox
Poison Frog Home Brewer
Warden-Prison City Brewers
In Jackson, MI 32 Mi. West of Jeff Renner





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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 14:30:15 -0500
From: John.Wilkinson at aud.alcatel.com (John Wilkinson)
Subject: RE: Stirrer Motor, Another possibility

Pete Calinski wrote:

>Has anyone ever considered using part of an ice cream maker?  I haven't
>been around one in a long time but I seem to remember it consists of a
>motor mounted to the cover of the bucket.  It includes a "paddle" of sort
>that scrapes the sides of an inner container.  I believe it is designed to
>run until the ice cream get thick enough to stall the motor.  

I tried that without much success.  I found upon examination of the ice cream
freezer I had that the paddle is stationary and the container is turned.  The
drive for the container is (in my case) octagonal.  I tried pinning a large
square nut to the mash stirrer shaft and engaging that with the ice cream
freezer motor.  That might have worked but the damn thing ran a lot faster
than I wanted.  I had tried gas grill spit motor before that but it wouldn't
take the load for long before crapping out.  Perhaps if I had used a thinner
mash.  My last attempt was with a motor I bought from someone on HBD (don't
remember whom) and it worked OK if the mash was not too thick.  However, I
was getting lots of stuck runoffs which quit after I quit using the mash
stirrer.  Now mind that I was stirring in a cylindrical cooler and not a
kettle mash tun.  I decided the stirrer wasn't even necessary in my mash tun
and abandoned the project.  Now I use RIMS.

John Wilkinson - Grapevine, Texas


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 14:58:56 -0700
From: Badger Roullett <branderr at microsoft.com>
Subject: HD#3063: Subject: converting kegs

>Date: Mon, 21 Jun 1999 00:21:52 -0500 (CDT)
>From: jgibbens at umr.edu
>Subject: converting kegs
>Just wanted to share some of my experiences with converting 15 gallon 
>kegs into mash tuns, brewing pots, and fermenters.  I've done some 
>cutting with a dremel tool and also with an 8" abrasive cut-off blade for 
>a circular saw.  A plasma torch was also used for a few of the cuts.  The 
>best results were with the 8" abrasive wheel.  It was over 10X faster 
>than using a dremel tool and the cut was much smoother than the plasma 
>torch cut.

I would like to hear your step by step of this one.. I am going to be making
a mash tun soonish. and I have a circular saw..  what type of blade?   how
did you get the cuts even?  what depth., etc..  

Also, a Question for the HBD...  Best type of (cheap too) Burner for a mash
tun?  and how to keep it from scorching the grains?

(private emails are ok)

badger


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Date: Wed, 23 Jun 1999 00:57:48 GMT
From: stencil at bcn.net (stencil)
Subject: Muotrichstraum Weizen 

This is as close as memory lets me get to the Maxlrainer and Auerbraeu
weizens that were my first introduction to the type, and that impelled
me to homebrewing.  The unexpectedly high ABV (felix culpa!) is the
result of the finer (for me) crush and the two-yeast regime.  My
single prior experience with the Brewtek CL920 had led me to bottle
too early and so to sufffer many cracked Grolsch bottles (no bursting,
just a quiet separation of the botttom of the bottle and a cellar
filled with the aroma of baking bread.)

Grain - 6# Briess 2-row Pale Malt crushed (Valley Mill)
0.065-0.035-0.025"
        4# Briess Wheat Malt crushed 0.35"
        All let to steep overnight in 6qt plain tapwater  at  55F; mash
pH 5.9.
Water - pH7.3, 58ppm Ca as CaCO3, 90ppm alkalinity.  6+ gal brought to
pH5.7 w/ ca 2ml phosphoric acid. 
Hops -  First-wort: 25gm Northern Brewer 6.3%; finishing 1.5oz
Hallertauer pellets AA(?)
Mashed-in w/ 6qt 160F treated water;  struck at 100F;  rest 30min.
         10min heating to 120F;  rest 30min.
         20min heating to 155F;  rest ca 90min
         90 min heating to mashout and sparging: 7-1/4gal SG1040 wort.
         Boiled 90min, finishing hops after flame-out.  30min to cool
to 180F, then immersion-cooled to pitching temp 65F.  Yield 5+gal,
SG1058; ca 29 pt-gal/lb.  Wort very clear, dense persistent foam.
Yeast - Primary Brewtek CL920 Bavarian Weizen from slant to ca 900mL
starter;  last feeding 0800 brewday, high kraeusen ca 1500.
      - Secondary:  on day 8 racked SG1032 beer into just-vacated
carboy with yeastcake of Brewtek CL640 EastEuro Lager.

In secondary  at  60-65F for seven weeks.  Final SG1008.
Force-carbonated in cornelius keg, 30psi  at  35F.

Despite the low FG it has a very substantial mouthfeel and persistent
rocky head.  I will do it again.


===========
Bill Gates has done more for me than Janet Reno ever thought of trying.
===========


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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 21:59:24 -0400
From: Dan Listermann <72723.1707 at compuserve.com>
Subject: Warsteiner

I have never particularly cared for the taste of Warsteiner, but I have
reason to believe that it has become much worse.  I had to buy a 5l can 
for
research purposes and found that the beer had a skunkiness to it.  This 
was
odd for a can.  The next weekend I had some on tap at Cincinnati's annual

German Day and it had the same taste.  Has Warsteiner intentionally 
skunked
the beer they send to the States to give it that "import" flavor?

Dan Listermann        dan at listermann.com          

72723.1707 at compuserve.com

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Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 22:31:44 -0500
From: Harlan Bauer <blacksab at midwest.net>
Subject: Many thanks!

Many thanks to all who answered my question on making a 0.1N NaOH
solution. The answer was: 4g/L NaOH/dH2O. 

Most days this group really shines!

Thanks again,
Harlan.


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