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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: Digital Thermometer ("J. Kish")
  more plastic fun... (Scott Morgan - Sun On-Line Telesales Representative)
  Low Fermentation Temps (Ant Hayes)
  re: racking from a mash ("Stephen Alexander")
  Re: Digital therm. for brewing ("Peter J. Calinski")
  AJ's & Dave"s questions ("Nathaniel P. Lansing")
  Re: Hillbilly Parties (Jeff Renner)
  Plastic Balls (BRADLEY_DAVID_A)
  Calcium Sulfate (Gypsum) ("Aaron Sepanski")
  RE: Invite to the Hilton ("Brian Lundeen")
  New and Improved Cleaning Products (Charley Burns)
  Foster's recipe wanted (Bill.X.Wible)
  Czech pils hops ("John S Thompson")
  floor malting (Elizabeth Blades)
  Bubblewrap (Dave Burley)
  Hops disease ("G. M. Remake")
  Re: To suck or not to suck, that is my question. ("Frank J. Russo")


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Date: Sat, 29 May 1999 21:29:11 -0700
From: "J. Kish" <jjkish at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Re: Digital Thermometer

Hi All,
    I hear there is a digital thermometer 
available from a place called LOWES.
 So, I went to www.LOWES.com and they
never heard of a thermometer,or digital,
or even a garden.

 Does anybody have the Web Address of the
right place where they sell this thing?
 Help!     Joe Kish


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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 14:47:43 +1000 (EST)
From: Scott Morgan - Sun On-Line Telesales Representative <Scott.Morgan at Aus.Sun.COM>
Subject: more plastic fun...

Reflecting my usual cognitive rate, I have finally remembered, thru a haze (no 
french school girls involved unfortuntely this time Graham), Carlton United 
Breweries does mass produce beers in plastic bottles.

CUB produces Carlton Cold in Plastic Bottles. These are primarily found at 
sporting functions where the natives get a little rowdy. I have tried out these 
bottles on several people myself and it was just not the same, no blood came 
from persons forehead. 

I think the first time I regretfully had the beer was at a function with my 
previous employer at Luna Park. It was infact a wise chioce, considering that 
whilst overlooking Sydney Harbour, the room was full rugby mad Sth Africans, 
Kiwi's and Aussies and near the World Cup. 

Funny thing was though, regardless of the packaging the beer is as crap in 
plastic as glass. Therefore I dont think plastic makes a difference. Just the 
quality of the beer that goes in.

I am coming to the conclusion that glass is a security thing...esp if you are a 
lone wallaby supporter in a sea of black....at least for a couple of seconds 
anyway...

Scotty




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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 08:40:31 +0200
From: Ant Hayes <Ant.Hayes at FifthQuadrant.co.za>
Subject: Low Fermentation Temps

I am fermenting an ale at ambient temperatures. During the day, indoor air
sits at about 18C, but at night it goes down to about 4C or so.

I have insulated my fermenter, so that the fermenting wort temperature does
not go below 12C, and does not fluctuate too much.

Question: For the last two days, in the morning, a sulphur odour emanates
from the air lock, but at night everything smells normal. Is sulphur odour a
sign of fermenting at too low a temperature?

Ant Hayes


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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 00:47:28 -0400
From: "Stephen Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: re: racking from a mash

Israel Christie writes ...

>I was wondering if anyone has used an "easymasher" type gadget
>or, what I'd really like to do, actually submerged some kind of
>manifold into the tun when your ready to sparge (or batch-sparge,
>or no-sparge as the case may be...)

I had used an easymasher type unit on my boiler for several years.  Works
well, whole hops only of course.  Pellets will clog a screen.

I have over the past year started using the same immersion manifold in my
boiler as in my mash tun.  It's 1/2" OD flex copper tubing formed into an
~6" diam circle and slotted by hacksaw.  Not beautiful, but the performance
of this manifold is truly charming.   The manifold is attached by flex
tubing to a pump.  Yes, starting the flow thru the pump (and CFC chiller) is
an issue but I use a vacuum pump.

>this seems like a good idea on paper.

It works well in practice.  I push the manifold to the bottom of the mash
tun, *slowly* vorlauf the wort till quite clear, then pump to the boiler.
After the sparge is handled, I rinse the manifold, attach my CFC to the
outboard side of my pump and recirculate iodophor soln.  I also recirc at
boiler temp for about a minute; the 180F+ should sanitize any residuals.
After the sanitation recirc, you can drop your boiled wort temp (and so
prevent DMS formation) by starting water flow thru your CFC and
recirculate/cool for a couple minutes.

Use reinforced tubing to prevent tubing collapse at temperature.  Stabilize
the position of the manifold, as even small movements of the manifold
increase turbidity esp in the mash/sparge stage.  A pair of woodworkers
spring clamps can be used at the top of a sanke to stabilize tubing and
attached manifold.

>The biggest challenge I can foresee is starting the siphon of the sweet
>wort from the tun; I don't relish the idea of burning my lips.

A  vacuum pump may help, but the idea of getting wort down the intake of a
pump isn't so great either.  One of those venturi effect faucet attachments
should work too.

Steve




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Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 12:53:54 -0400
From: "Peter J. Calinski" <PCalinski at iname.com>
Subject: Re: Digital therm. for brewing

Just a word of caution.  I have a similar unit.  The probe can be ruined if
not treated correctly.  The point were the braid meets the probe body must
never get wet.  Moisture will get in and the thermometer will read
incorrectly.  It can be dried out by putting the probe in the oven at 300F
and waiting for the thermometer to read correctly. 

Unfortunately, I must have done this one too many times because I could no
longer get it to "dry out".  The company stood by their product and
replaced the probe under warranty

One note. I tried sealing it with some food grade 400F silicone sealant but
it didn't work.  

Another note, $12.00 is a good price.  Normally they are $20.00 to $25.00.

Pete Calinski
East Amherst NY
Near Buffalo NY



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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 08:53:29 -0400
From: "Nathaniel P. Lansing" <delbrew at compuserve.com>
Subject: AJ's & Dave"s questions

>>. Could this be a double typo or is that really
what was measured?<<
  That is what was measured, and that is why I repeated the experiment.
At first I had thought some fines from dark malt had been in the knurl of
the mill.
>>I'd be skeptical of an 0.3 rise in pH in cooling from
mash temp to room temp. In my experience it's more like 0.15 - 0.2<<
   The 0.3 is what I got from a chart some years ago, it showed the offsets
of about 6 different acids in soft/medium/hard water; it also showed the
offsets of a pale malt mash in soft/medium/hard water. The figure that
really applied to our medium hard water was actually 0.32, but I like 
round numbers. Though even using the offset of 0.2 the resultant pHs
would be in proper range for a mash; which was the point of the
experiment. Steve had said a congress mash of 25 g malt in 100 ml
distilled water with 150ppm Ca++ was not pH adjusted; it obviously is.
I used 4x the amounts to minimize weighing accuracy problems.

>>his results
purportedly shows a pH= 4.78 for distilled water and 5.68 for 150 ppm
calcium in wort. This is backwards to what one would expect.<<
  Yeah, that is why I repeated the experiment! Another puzzlement is
why have I never measured 7 pH in distilled water? even after heating
and cooling to dispel any CO2.
>>Try adding the calcium sulfate overnight to distilled water with stirring
and comparing the wort from this solution with a wort from distilled
water.<<
  I'm not sure that would affect the results much; after I stirred the
calcium
sulphate into the mash the pH change was rather immediate, maybe 2
minutes before I drew the sample. 


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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 09:44:08 -0400
From: Jeff Renner <nerenner at umich.edu>
Subject: Re: Hillbilly Parties

Phil Yates invited Brian Lundeen:
>Come on over Brian.

Watch out, Brian.  It's an empty invitation.  Take it from me, I speak from
hard experience - you arrive at the Burradoo train station after an
exhausting trans-Pacific flight with an unwelcome traveling companion and
ring up Phil for a ride to the estate and he's flying around on the other
side of the continent.  Or what passes for a continent down there.  Damned
inhospitible if you ask me.  You don't want to stay at the Hilton, either.
It'll probably be Phil and his mates on the balcony.

I tried to find Whitsunday Island on my maps and couldn't.  However, I
would guess it's about 40 days' sail from Easter Island, and about four or
five months from Christmas Island.  Capt. Cook wasn't very inventive in his
naming.

Jeff

 -=-=-=-=-
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, 30 May 2000 09:41:06 -0500
From: BRADLEY_DAVID_A at Lilly.com
Subject: Plastic Balls

US Plastics sells hollow plastic balls suitable for boiling wort.
They do not describe them as food grade however, just non-toxic.
Polypropylene is the material, available hollow or solid.
(0.75" to 4" diam avail, $30 for the 0.75" pack of 1000.)

They also sell solid balls, and they list the specific gravities as:
Polypro: 0.9-0.91 ($63 for 1000 at 0.75" diam)
Linear polyethylene: 0.94-0.965
Polystyrene: 1.04-1.065
Acrylic: 1.17-1.20
Nylon: 1.09-1.14
Teflon: 2.13-2.22

Hope this helps.  US Plastics is simply a trusted vendor to me, and they
have a www page but I've never been to it: www.usplastics.com.

Dave in Indy
Wishing he was brewing 1/10th as much as Pat.



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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 9:47:12 -0700
From: "Aaron Sepanski" <madaarjul at earthlink.net>
Subject: Calcium Sulfate (Gypsum)

Releasing Divalent calcium in solution should lower mash pH.  The sulfate
drops off (being water soluble), and the calcium reacts with free carbonate
and precipitates out.  With less carbonate, there is more free hydronium,
therefore a lower pH.



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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 10:18:56 -0500
From: "Brian Lundeen" <blundeen at rrc.mb.ca>
Subject: RE: Invite to the Hilton


> Date: Mon, 29 May 2000 23:24:23 +1000
> From: "Phil & Jill Yates" <yates at acenet.com.au>
> Subject: Mailing Yeast  And Hillbilly Parties
>
> Now I see in the HBD a guy who is just going to fit in fine
> and dandy with
> our Burradoo parties. Brian Lundeen, the one with the two
> teeth which he
> cleans in the porcelain convenience. Now here is a guy with a sense of
> humour and surely will be "life of the party" at the Burradoo
> Hilton. Come
> on over Brian.
>

Nice to see someone appreciates my off-centred humour. Doesn't seem to go
over so well in places like, mmmm, St Louis. ;-)

Thanks for the invite, Phil. Should the wife and I ever find ourselves with
several thousand spare Loonies (as we affectionately call our 65 cent coin),
can find someone willing to put up with two foul-tempered budgerigars for a
month or so, and I can find enough tranquilizers and/or muscle relaxants to
get me through two days of air travel, then we would love to pop out to the
ranch as part of our down under experience.

Although I must confess the prospect of an evening around the billiard table
with the famous ladies is a bit daunting. Nothing a couple of those rice
lagers couldn't fix, but the poor wife is a painfully shy, timid creature
when removed from her natural environment. No power on earth would get lager
past her lips, although she is receptive to a little Kriek, or any wine with
enough residual sugar to stun a diabetic from one sip.

Cheers

Brian



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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 08:24:20 -0700
From: Charley Burns <cburns99 at pacbell.net>
Subject: New and Improved Cleaning Products

Not having brewed very often lately, I decided to use my left over
dopplebock yeast (Wyeast 2308) to make a steam beer yesterday. So on Sunday
I pulled the old yeast out of the fridge (been under boiled distilled water
after a distilled water rinse for a couple of months) and mixed up about 8
ounces of slurry with a quart of wort and set it aside.

Then I pulled out a dusty 6.5 gallon glass bottle and grabbed the wife's
clorox. Much to my chagrine the lable says "New and Improved". Why can't
they just leave well enough alone? Seems the new stuff has an "additive" to
make it "thicker" so it won't splash and splatter when you pour it. Hmmm. So
I put about 6 gallons of water into my primary and then dump about a cup of
this new improved clorox in and proceed to fill it to the top with water. Uh
oh, there's suds coming out of the carboy now. Its not the same old stuff
and now apparently has "SOAP" in it.

This is just after visiting my local hardware store who no longer carries
TSP. They have something called TSP, but again, its new and improved and
contains NO PHOSPHATES! How can you call something TSP and not have
phosphates in it. Marketing... It too foams up like there's soap in it.

What are you guys using for cleansing things these days that doesn't cost an
arm and a leg?

BTW - the steam beer appears to be doing well. It came in at 1.065 OG (we're
calling this BIG steam). Beautiful copper color, about 50 ibu's, fermenting
at 74F now. I was reading a book while mashing and sparging and for the
first time had a sparge run 1 hour and 20 minutes. Must have increased my
efficiency by about 10%.

Charley
- ------------
Watch closely, I'm only going to show you this once...

    Kamakazee flight instructor...



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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 11:53:58 -0400
From: Bill.X.Wible at QuestDiagnostics.com
Subject: Foster's recipe wanted




Does anybody have a lager recipe that is similar to Foster's?

A friend of mine has asked me to make this.  I'm thinking standard
North American lager grain bill, i.e. mostly lager malt, with maybe a
pound of cara-pils.  Some recipes I've seen for Foster's include
cane or turbinado sugar, or rice solids.

What should the hops be?  Does anybody know whether they really
use Pride of Ringwood hops?   If so, are they used for both bittering
and flavor, or just bittering?

And what about yeast?  Is the Wyeast 2272 North American acceptable,
or is there a better yeast for this beer?  Possible the lager blend?

Thanks in advance for your input

Bill




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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 08:21:50 -0500
From: "John S Thompson" <jthomp6 at lsu.edu>
Subject: Czech pils hops

Other than the proverbial Saaz, are there some other hop varieties for this
style of beer? Is Pilsner Urquell made *entirely* with Saaz? I just can't
seem to replicate the hop flavor and aroma in PU. (For that matter, I can't
seem to get much flavor or aroma out of East Kent Goldings either. I think
these hops are just not as fresh as they ought to be, plus they don't store
very well...)

Thanks.
John



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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 18:04:08 +0100
From: numberone at freedombird.net (Elizabeth Blades)
Subject: floor malting


in hbd#3338
 "Aaron Sepanski" said 
on theSubject: Marris Otter

"Beeston is the only company that floor malts its grains, at least until a
year ago (based on their circular). "


This is not true,Muntons have been doing it for years.Beestons may be the 
only ones in Nottingham though,which is what they told me a few weeks ago 
when i went there.

Cheers

E

- --
"Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will
piss on your computer." --Bruce Graham












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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 13:39:17 -0400
From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley at compuserve.com>
Subject: Bubblewrap

Brewsters:

SteveA agonizes over ( or at least thinks about)  the non-availability of
FDA approved bubble wrap and suggests that maple floats.  OK

As far as I know,  bubble wrap is unpigmented and  made from polyethylene
and likely not to have any plasticizers, if that is the concern. This
should be just fine for mashing and the extremely thin film should not
contain inordinate amounts of anything undesirable.

As far as maple is concerned, are you suggesting a wooden plate or
something? Or wooden balls which likely have a high enough density to float
deeper? I would think these large balls would absorb a lot  of wort and be
difficult to keep clean ( and unmoldy ) unless coated with something also
not FDA approved.

Keep on Brewin'

Dave Burley


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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 11:53:29 -0600
From: "G. M. Remake" <gremake at gsbpop.uchicago.edu>
Subject: Hops disease

Hello all,

"Ben" has posted this photo to the Brewery's bulletin board: 

http://hbd.org/brewery/wwwboard/messages/57265.html

Unfortunately, my Northern Brewer hops bine appeared to have had the same
problem last year, and this year is beginning to exhibit the same symptoms.
 If you cannot access the link, I'll try to describe the condition.  The
leaves develop dried edges, and some have dried patches elsewhere on the
leaf, along with a blistered appearance.  Some of the dried patches have
holes in the middle.  Many leaves start to curl and shrivel, and last year
many started yellowing, although that may have been due to drought.

My plant is now four years old, and otherwise seems very healthy, having
climbed 20 feet high already.  Last year the problem started slowly on the
lower leaves but soon spread to most of the plant, and most of the
resulting hops flowers had some or mostly brown and dead petals.  Oddly,
toward fall there was some new growth that flowered on the same bines, and
neither the leaves nor flowers of the new growth exhibited any problems.  A
Willamette bine planted about 20 feet away in similar soil and drainage
also developed these symptoms last year, but not until the end of the
season and I was able to harvest a good crop.

I use composted mulch for fertilizing, although I'll use chemical
fertilizers if need be.  There are no signs of insect infestation, mildew
or other growths or parasites.  Of the replies to the bulletin board
posting, one that suggested wilt seemed the most appropriate.  Anyone care
to guess a cause and/or cure? 

Cheers!

Greg


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Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 14:41:37 -0400
From: "Frank J. Russo" <FJRusso at coastalnet.com>
Subject: Re: To suck or not to suck, that is my question.

Jay,

    There is no reason to start gargling sanitizer.  What I do is I insert a
smaller piece of tubing, sanitized of course, into the end of my siphon tube
and suck on it.  Once I get the main tube filled with liquid I remove the
smaller piece.  No problems.

Frank Russo
Havelock, NC



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