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	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:
  re gm (Robin Griller)
  sparkler heads and nitro mix with light bodied beers (JPullum127)
  reusing Co2 fire extinguishers (Kurt Goodwin)
  Lack of krausen on starters ... ok? ("Brian Dixon")
  Anyone like Aspirin? ("Brian Dixon")
  Feelings on early racking? ("Brian Dixon")
  Re: Oxygen Thread Correction ("Brian Dixon")
  Sauerkraut and Y2K problems ("Alan McKay")
  stuck porter follow up (BsmntBrewr)


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Date: Sun, 02 Jan 2000 09:19:07 -0500
From: Robin Griller <rgriller at chass.utoronto.ca>
Subject: re gm

Hi all,

Re gm foods/barley etc., would I use gm? Not until they have been
*demonstrated* safe. They haven't been adequately researched, until then
I'd like to avoid using them. Like the milk thing Dave B. mentions (and
yes there is research saying the milk thing can be dangerous at least to
the cows, if I remember right), it seems to me insane to start putting
things in our mouths and stomachs, and particularly in our children's
mouths (food, not beer of course :)), when we just don't know if they're
safe or not. I don't see how 'demonstrating dangerous' matters so much
here; with food, the question is 'demonstrating safe'. Hasn't been done.

Regarding arguments in favour of gm foods: the 'increased production'
argument is interesting. Given that the world already produces more than
enough food to feed everybody, who does the increased production
benefit? The problem of starvation is a product of the market-- if you
can't afford to buy the food then we don't sell it to you, if we don't
sell it to you we simply stockpile and destroy it and you starve-- not a
product of insufficient production. So who does the increased
productivity benefit? Not the starving, they still can't afford it.
Strangely enough, not the farmers; the first farmer benefits for a year
or two, but then, once all the other farmers start producing the same
crop, you have the same number of farmers producing more food for a
market with no more demand than before, the prices drop some, the gm
seeds, etc., are much more expensive, and, bingo, the farmers are making
less money (unless of course, like american and european farmers, they
are hugely subsidised). So, prices drop, more farmers go bankrupt,
production declines again, prices go back up. Who benefits? Big
corporate farming and monsanto. Not my two favourites, personally. Dave
B. asks us to look at whose interest is being served: gm foods serve the
interests of big corporate seed companies and big corporate farming to
*no* benefit to the starving, we regular consumers, or farmers. I guess
all those who love gm, want to serve our corporate masters. Good luck to
'em.

Robin

p.s. Re cars: as a committed anti-car person who does not and will not
own a car if I can avoid it, I can say that, while I wouldn't want to go
back to horses, Dave's choice (cars or horses) is what's known as a
false dichotomy: if it isn't A (cars) it must be B (horses). Of course,
there are other alternatives. I.e. public transit (whether that be the
bus, the streetcar/tram, or the subway). Personally, I live in a city
with excellent public transit that can get me just about everywhere
quickly. The evils of cars (traffic congestion, pollution, public
nastiness and aggression, increased asthma rates among urban children,
an economy grossly dependent on an environmentally destructive form of
transport, etc, etc, etc) outweigh their benefits hugely when the
alternatives are set out sensibly. Dave B. makes a typical manoeuvre for
those who support all and any technological development: set up the
alternatives as accept or go back to 'primitive' technologies, so that
the new form looks good. The alternatives are always much more complex
than that. If anyone calls me a 'luddite', I will say thank you: the
luddites, after all, were not so much *anti* technology as concerned
about how technology impacted on peoples' lives, which is, of course,
what we should be concerned with. The luddites have simply been libelled
by history. Sorry for taking up so much space.


Return to table of contents


Date: Sun, 2 Jan 2000 09:43:03 EST
From: JPullum127 at aol.com
Subject: sparkler heads and nitro mix with light bodied beers

i have a friend who owns a basic young people's dance bar(guys night $1.00 
bottle of bud lite kind of place) his taps are bud lite and michelob amber 
bock.i know i talked him into trying both bass ale  and guiness but they just 
didn't sell to his crowd, which dissapointed both of us. anyway he really 
likes the creamy head of draft guiness using a sparkler head and nitrogen/co2 
mix  and wants to buy a system to put the amber bock on.   will it really 
make a difference with a beer so much lighter than a stout? are there factors 
not being considered here?. i found an ad for a 5 hole sparkler from williams 
brewing for $79.00 and switching from straight co2 to nitrogen mix shouldn't 
be a problem to obtain.    thanks   


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Date: Sun, 02 Jan 2000 11:50:08 -0500
From: kurt at greennet.net (Kurt Goodwin)
Subject: reusing Co2 fire extinguishers

From: "Bruce Garner" 

"My tank is a reused extinguisher tank. It works fine. You may need a
hydro
test. I believe that extinguishers and tanks for beer and soda are
filled
from the same C02 source. The fittings are different."


Bruce

I'm ashamed to say I never thought of this.  I have an old fire
extinguisher that' about the size of a 20 lb C02 bottle.  How different
are the fittings?  Did you need anything special to adapt it?  Hydro
test soujnds like a good idea.

Kurt Goodwin


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Date: Sun, 2 Jan 2000 09:23:39 -0800
From: "Brian Dixon" <briandixon at home.com>
Subject: Lack of krausen on starters ... ok?

I've been brewing for about 5 years, and live in a small town.  I've always
built my starters using Munton's dry malt extract because that's all the
local brew suppliers carried.  My starters have always formed a nice krausen
on the starter during fermentation.  Recently however, I picked up a bag of
Laaglanders dry malt extract in a neighboring (big) city.  So here's my
question: This starter is going to be a big one (1 1/2 gallons) so it's
being doubled a few times ... the first couple of runs were 'fed' with
Munton's and had a nice krausen, the last 'feed' used a gallon of wort made
from the new Laaglander extract.  It was added to the first 1/2 gallon and
is not forming any krausen at all.  It's got a very very thin sprinkling of
very tiny bubbles on the surface, and is happily perking right along at
about 1 perk per second or second and a half ... but no krausen (other than
the very very tiny bubbles previously mentioned).  Is this normal?  Anything
to worry about?  This starter is going to run long enough to settle out most
of the yeast and the slurry is going into a very big beer (OG 1.125), which
costs twice as much to brew, so I don't want to brew it unless the starter
is perfect.  All signs seem normal except for the lack of krausen, which
corresponds to the change to Laaglanders ... what do you suggest?

Brian




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Date: Sun, 2 Jan 2000 09:29:16 -0800
From: "Brian Dixon" <briandixon at home.com>
Subject: Anyone like Aspirin?

My last batch had what I describe as a _very slight_ aspirin bitter note to
it.  Friends think the beer is fine, but I detect this 'other' bitterness
that doesn't seem right.  The first 1/2 a beer seems ok to me, then by the
time I drink the second half, I don't feel like finishing it.  Anyone know
what might cause an 'aspirin' bitterness?  Hops were a blend of Fuggles and
Goldings, a blend I use very often, and I do not believe that had anything
to do with it.  The funky bitter does seem to be aging out to some degree,
but since I tasted it once, I am familiar with it and can still detect it.
I'm wondering about an infection...

Brian




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Date: Sun, 2 Jan 2000 09:35:56 -0800
From: "Brian Dixon" <briandixon at home.com>
Subject: Feelings on early racking?

I've often considered racking after about 8 to 24 hours into a primary
ferment to take the wort off the bulk of the trub, but hesitate because I've
read that the fatty acids in the trub are beneficial to the yeast.  It just
seems 'good' that the primary would only be exposed to good clean yeast
sediment once the growth period of the yeast is over, and I believe (if
memory serves) that the fatty acids are only helpful up through the finish
of the growth period.  Thoughts?  If I want to try a first racking that is
to take place as soon as exposure to the trub (non-yeast sediment portion of
it) is not helpful anymore, then when should it take place?  Is this a good
idea, or a bad idea?  Why?

Brian




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Date: Sun, 2 Jan 2000 09:41:52 -0800
From: "Brian Dixon" <briandixon at home.com>
Subject: Re: Oxygen Thread Correction

> From: Mark_Ohrstrom/Humphrey_Products at humphreypc.com
>
> Buddy LeSage corrected my post on Oxygen regulator threads.  They have
> right-hand threads.   It's the fuel side that's got the odd twist.  Should
> have climbed out of my Y2K bunker long enough to look at the ox/acetylene
> torch in the garage!
>
> Mark (Y2K Defiant) in Kalamazoo

Might have been covered already, but I'll just add this note: The threads on
the little red (1.4 oz) bottles of oxygen for the small hardware-store type
of oxy-acetylene torches and for the white (1.4 oz) Oxynator bottles have
left-hand threads, as does the regulator/valve assembly for both the torch
and the Oxynator.  Isn't it funny how they both use the same regulator
(apparently) and oxygen bottles with exactly the same amount in them?  I'd
bet money that these components come from similar manufactures, and that the
only difference in the oxygen bottles is the color of the paint ... anyone
know for sure if the red bottles have 'dirtier' oxygen as compared to the
Oxynator (Liquid Bread) bottles?

Brian




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Date: Mon, 3 Jan 2000 00:00:01 -0500
From: "Alan McKay" <amckay at ottawa.com>
Subject: Sauerkraut and Y2K problems


He folks,

Just to let y'all know there's a new sauerkraut group at :
http://www.egroups.com/group/rec-crafts-sauerkraut/

Oh, and I see the janitors have the little y2k "boo-boo"
cleaned up.  Fast work!

cheers,
 -Alan

- --
Alan McKay
amckay at ottawa.com
http://www.bodensatz.com/
What's a bodensatz? http://www.bodensatz.com/bodensatz.html





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Date: Mon, 3 Jan 2000 00:06:18 EST
From: BsmntBrewr at aol.com
Subject: stuck porter follow up

Brewers,

First I'd like to thank those that responded to my earlier post regarding my 
stuck porter.  Thanks.

The majority of responses leaned towards 1020 not being all that high an FG 
for a porter.  Having 10% crystal in my bill also seemed to be an indicator 
to some that I had some unfermentables lingering about raising my SG.

Others suspected the Windsor dry yeast, which can reportedly drop out early.

I was faced with unfermentables or a yeast just pooping out.  The brew tasted 
a bit to sweet for what I was shooting for so as a last ditch effort to lower 
the SG, I pitched a rehydrated pack of champagne yeast.  With in ten minutes 
I was seeing signifcant activity  in the airlock.  For the next few days 
there were bubbles every seven seconds.  After just about two weeks activity 
ceased in the airlock and I bottled it earlier tonight.
FG 1012.  

I couldn't really tell if the champagne yeast did much of anything to the 
flavor profile except eliminate the sweetness that I was catching before. 
Overall I'd have to say that the brew after the yeast addition is much closer 
to what I wanted.

Thanks again HBD.

On another note,  I've got a batch going using White Labs WLP380- Hefeweizen 
IV Ale Yeast.  Talk about sulfur production!  Its churning away at about 60*F 
and threatening to take over my basement.  White Labs reports that the 
optimum fermentation temperature is  66-70*F.  Should I consider raising the 
temps? Anyone else have any experience with this yeast?  

Happy New Year
Bob Bratcher
Roanoke, VA
Star City Brewers Guild
http://hbd.org/starcity


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