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	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Digest Janitor: pbabcock at hbd.org


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Contents:
  Excel Solver ("Mike Sharp")
  re: pump ideas ("Mike Sharp")
  Neutralising Chlorine (le Man)
  Re; Pump Ideas (Fred L Johnson)
  Re: Excel Solver ("A.J deLange")
  Pump Ideas ("Lawrence H. Smith")
  Solver II ("A.J deLange")
  MCAB Information ("Stock, Curtis")


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Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 21:59:08 -0800
From: "Mike Sharp" <rdcpro at hotmail.com>
Subject: Excel Solver

A.J. Laments:

"Many people don't seem to know about the Excel Solver but 
it is (or was) such an incredibly useful and powerful tool that 
Microsoft decided to take it out of recent releases."

Actually, it's still there, but the add-ins menu is a bit hard to locate in
Excel 2007.  Click the "office button" (that round thing at the top left
corner) and then click Excel Options, which is a button at the extreme lower
right edge of the menu.  Then select Add-ins from the left nav.  Solver is
at the bottom of the list.

Regards,
Mike Sharp 

Kent, WA (about 25 miles from the center of the Excel Universe)
[1891.3, 294deg] AR






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Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 22:25:27 -0800
From: "Mike Sharp" <rdcpro at hotmail.com>
Subject: re: pump ideas

Matt discusses Pump ideas:

"I'm looking for just the right pump to move wort/beer to/from a
few 60G oak barrels, and have found the following options:"

A lot of the wineries I used to work with use a sanitary Jabsco flexible
impeller pump powered by a dc motor and a variable speed drive.  They're low
shear (important for wine), self priming, and disassemble completely for
cleaning and sanitizing.  They're kinda pricey new, but you see them every
so often used.  They always come on a little cart so you can roll it around
the cellar.  They'll lift a fair height, too.  I'm not sure of the exact
spec, but I think shutoff head is about 1 bar.  Most common in a winery for
filling barrels and whatnot are the one inch and larger (one inch inlet).
You can get small ones from the hardware store, but I don't think they'll be
very sanitary.  But it's worth searching for.  Unless you're pumping a huge
amount (like, to a blending tank), a Jabsco is the bomb.

Diaphragm pumps are used too, though less commonly, in my experience.
They're nice because you can use a valve at the barrel, and just shut off
the flow.  I wouldn't worry too much about clogging with debris.  Bigger
ones will pump marbles. They'll have a rating based on spherical solids of
up to a certain size. Some years back I installed a set at a wastewater
plant that pumped lime slurry.  Sludge from fermentation is nothing to these
pumps.  If you can find a nice 1" Warren Rupp in polypropylene or something,
you'll have a good pump that can run forever in a wet environment (no
electricity), and it will run from zero to probably 25 gpm.  You do need
compressed air, of course.

Sanitary centrifugal pumps often have low-shear impellers, and I've seen
them for sale cheap at times.  But they're not self priming, if that's
really an issue. 

Regards,
Mike Sharp



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Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2008 07:10:01 +0000
From: le Man <hbd at thebarnsleys.co.uk>
Subject: Neutralising Chlorine

Hi All,

Sometime ago AJ posted about treating water with metabisulphite (campden 
Tablets). I've since been unable to find the post. What I'm looking for 
is the actual reaction(s) that take place, and if anyone can give the 
amount by which the sodium/potassium levels are increased that would be 
really useful.

Regards

Aleman
Mashing in Blackpool. Lancashire, UK



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Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2008 06:43:16 -0500
From: Fred L Johnson <FLJohnson52 at nc.rr.com>
Subject: Re; Pump Ideas

Matt is looking for ideas for a pump for moving wort or beer between  
60 gallon oak barrels. He's considered March centrifugal, diaphragm  
pumps, and a self priming centrifugal. Being self-priming is  
important to him.

Matt: You should look into Masterflex peristaltic tubing pumps. They  
are self priming and the only thing the beer comes in contact with is  
the tubing, which you can replace every time. You can peruse the huge  
selection of these from Cole-Parmer.  (coleparmer.com) I've used  
these pumps for almost 30 years for many different applications.

Fred L Johnson
Apex, North Carolina, USA



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Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2008 07:43:37 -0500
From: "A.J deLange" <ajdel at cox.net>
Subject: Re: Excel Solver

For Mike:

While Solver  may still be there in the 2007 version of Excel you will, 
alas, find it gone in 2008. This is beacause it was VBA based and VBA is 
no longer supported as it represents a considerable security risk. You 
can get some details on this by clicking on the Help Menu and letting it 
lead you to the user forums on the Microsoft server. You will find a 
number of posts which deal with this.

Solver is the product of a company called Frontline Systems. They have a 
free download for Excel 2008 for Mac on their website and apparantly 
sell plugins for PC. As most will be using systems with versions of 
Excel earlier than 2008 they will still be OK and even with 2008 if you 
are on a Mac you can solve away to your heart's content.

A.J.


Mike Sharp wrote:

>A.J. Laments:
>
>"Many people don't seem to know about the Excel Solver but 
>it is (or was) such an incredibly useful and powerful tool that 
>Microsoft decided to take it out of recent releases."
>
>Actually, it's still there, but the add-ins menu is a bit hard to locate in
>Excel 2007.  Click the "office button" (that round thing at the top left
>corner) and then click Excel Options, which is a button at the extreme lower
>right edge of the menu.  Then select Add-ins from the left nav.  Solver is
>at the bottom of the list.
>
>Regards,
>Mike Sharp 
>
>Kent, WA (about 25 miles from the center of the Excel Universe)
>[1891.3, 294deg] AR
>
>
>
>
>
>  
>


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Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2008 08:29:26 -0500
From: "Lawrence H. Smith" <lsmith at sover.net>
Subject: Pump Ideas

Peristaltic.

Self-priming, the fluid only contacts the tube. Pumps gas, fluid and 
slurries. Food-grade tubes which can be pressure-cooked to sterilize 
them are available (norprene food-grade or silicone). The tubing 
lacks the hard-to-clean spots that other types of pumps have. Size 18 
tube happens to fit standard racking canes very nicely.

Finding one that is a good fit for brewing is a bit challenging, 
particularly with a budget - but patience and eb*y (and frequent 
reference to manufacturer's data so you know what you are getting 
into at eb*y) will get you there - as will creative bodging with 
roller-skate wheels and plywood (or plastic, or aluminum), if that's 
more your scene.

After years of moderate to severe annoyance with the imperfections of 
siphoning once there was dissolved gas involved (ie, anytime past 
wort) I finally applied my wallet crowbar and got a nice peristaltic 
 - variable speed, works with "size 18" (5/16 x 7/16) tubing, can pump 
as fast as 2300ml/min (over half a gallon). For 5 gallon batches this 
is fine.

Bigger (tubing-size) pumps with faster rates are available, but they 
get expensive fast, and are less useful for general brewing tasks (a 
ganged, two-tube peristaltic makes for a perfect fly-sparge, for 
instance.) Of course, if you get a multi-tube head, you can then run 
both tubes in parallel when you want to pump faster. Since you regard 
3 GPM as irritatingly slow, I guess you'd have to look at the big 
ones. New you can get anything you want, if you have the money - used 
it's a bit harder to find the big ones. Working with 5 gallon batches 
I rarely exceed 1 quart a minute pumping rate, so I don't regard 3 
GPM for 60 gallons as painfully slow. You'll likely need something 
slower to make handling the beer manageable once it has fermented, 
unless you are just serving from the cask/barrel - I suspect you 
might have a bit of a foaming problem stuffing 3 GPM or more into a 5 
gallon corny...less of an issue if you're putting it in a 300 gallon 
tank, of course.

Got mine for a bit over $100 with some careful shopping and patience. 
There's a 2hp 35 GPM pump on there now, but it's $2500 plus freight. 
Another at 9 GPM is listed for $1250 - seems not to have a motor.

 -Lawrence


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Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2008 09:38:34 -0500
From: "A.J deLange" <ajdel at cox.net>
Subject: Solver II

I should make clear that what I am describing with respect to Solver is 
based on my knowledge of Mac. In the PC world, with which I am, happily, 
largely unfamiliar, the situation may be different, in particular, the 
Solver may be alive and well in PC versions of Excel 2008. To see if you 
have it, in either case, look under the Tools menu. If it isn't there 
check the Addins.

A.J.


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Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2008 15:36:02 -0600
From: "Stock, Curtis" <Curtis.Stock at state.mn.us>
Subject: MCAB Information

New MCAB XI Information:

First, I would like to introduce the new MCAB Director, John Peed.  John
is a long time brewer and has been a great contributor during my term as
MCAB Director.  John has many great ideas for the MCAB circuit and will
do a great job making sure MCAB survives.  It's a lot of work but I'm
sure John can count on the support from the Qualifying Events and
Brewers.  

You may contact John at the following address:
mailto:jpeed at elotouch.com

The MCAB XI Competition will be held in St. Paul, MN once again.  An
exact date will be posted as soon as I can find a date with the fewest
conflicts with other competitions.  It will take place sometime between
mid February and early March.  That should narrow down the date enough
for qualifying brewers to plan their brewing calendar.  The list of
Qualifying Brewers will be posted on the MCAB site soon.  We are still
gathering information from the Qualifying Events that have been
completed.

We are still looking for Qualifying Brewer information from the
following events:
KCBM
Spirit of Free Beer
Aurora Brewing Challenge
Boston Homebrew Competition

If you are an organizer of one of these events please contact John or
myself.  If you have already submitted the information I've missed it
and apologize for the inconvenience.  We would appreciate it if we could
get the information as soon as possible.  

Please check the website for periodic updates and competition info.

http://www.masterhomebrewer.org/home

Thank you for supporting MCAB.

Curt Stock
Former MCAB Director
 



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