HOMEBREW Digest #3695 Mon 30 July 2001

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	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
  Re.: stir plates ("Sean Richens")
  St Arnold (Ant Hayes)
  water question (leavitdg)
  Free Hops - NH Seacoast ("Christopher Tkach")
  Re: Using bread yeast for bottling (h.stearns.laseur)
  RE: Pittsburgh Brewpubs ("Dennis Lewis")
  RE: electric brewing (EdgeAle)
  stir plates ("Wayne Love")
  Home Improvement and Other Priorities (Richard Foote)
  Diacetyl (Gene Collins)
  Bruheat Boiler (Alexandre Enkerli)
  Priorities? (Beaverplt)
  The Jethro Gump Report ("Rob Moline")
  Five Star Chemicals (nlkanous)
  Re: stir plates & yeast damage (Mike Lemons)
  Re: RIMS thermostat + electric brewing ("C.D. Pritchard")
  Southwestern Va/Upper-east Tn/Eastern Ky homebrew suppliers? ("Audie Kennedy")

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---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2001 21:32:19 -0500 From: "Sean Richens" <srichens at sprint.ca> Subject: Re.: stir plates I wouldn't worry too much about hurting yeast cells with the usual teflon (sorry, Teflon) coated stir bar. Yeast are pretty tough, so I'd give it a try once or twice because the cheapo stir bars are a lot cheaper than the fancy ones. If you find there is something wrong that might be caused by damaged yeast, there are variations on magnetic stir bars that have a thickened middle so that most of the bar is off the bottom of the flask. Get a lab supply catalogue, on-line or on paper, and look through the many types of stir bars for the magic words "cell culture". People do use these for growing mammalian cells, which have no cell wall and are way, way more delicate than any single-celled organism. Sean Richens srichens.spamsucks at sprint.ca Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 08:41:43 +0200 From: Ant Hayes <Ant.Hayes at FifthQuadrant.co.za> Subject: St Arnold I presume most of you have read story of St Arnold putting his crucifix into a wort kettle, and instructing peasants to drink beer and not water - thereby ending the plague. I told this story at a dinner party a few months ago and a doctor present said that the plague was air and not waterborne. Does anyone know better? Ant Hayes Gauteng; South Africa Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 05:13:02 -0400 (EDT) From: leavitdg at plattsburgh.edu Subject: water question I brew a lot...but have paid little attention to water analysis. Recently I stopped by a place that filters town water...and re-sells it. I asked them what minerals, carbonates, etc were in the water and the fellow wrote the following on the back of his business card: " 7 grains hard 7.3 PH 110 T.D.S. .1 Iron " Now, I have read just enough to wonder (Palmer says the main ions for brewing are: Calcium, Magnesium, Bicarbonate, Sulfate, Sodium, and Chloride). My question is this: What can I make of the above 'water analysis' in view of Palmer's identification of the "principle ions" that we shoud consider in our brew water? My guess is that ....well...I'm not going to guess.... ..Darrell <water-analysis-challenged> Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 09:36:08 -0400 From: "Christopher Tkach" <tkach at mediaone.net> Subject: Free Hops - NH Seacoast Hi All- I have several ounces of hops that have been eating up freezer space for way too long. I'd like to pass these off to someone who will actually use them. Below is what I got... '97 Centennial (13.5% AA) ~ 1 oz '97 Chinook (11.0% AA) ~ 2 oz '99 Tettnanger (7.5% AA) ~ 4 oz '99 Galena (14.4% AA) ~ 2 oz '99 Cascade (6.5% AA) ~ 2 oz All of the hops were purchased from HopTech, the Chinook and Centennial back in Christmas of '98, the others in Christmas of '99. The Centennial and Chinook are sealed in plastic containers. The remainder are in opened barrier bags that have been tightly rolled closed and tightly stuffed into a sealed ziplock freezer bag together. All of the hops have been living in the freezer since I got them. I just took a wiff of all 5 hops, and they still smell!! :-) I'd like to give these away to a good home instead of tossing them, so if you live in or near the seacoast of NH, and want some free hops they're all yours. - Chris Portsmouth, NH Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 08:41:10 -0500 From: h.stearns.laseur at exxonmobil.com Subject: Re: Using bread yeast for bottling I'm not sure if Bill is talking about repitching with bread yeast or starting a new batch with bread yeast. I've brewed with bread yeast and have come up with some different tastes. Not bad mind you, just a little different. What I did notice, is that if one reuses the yeast to make another and another batch and so on, the bread yeast evolves into beer yeast. After several batches, you have a mutated British ale or what ever you guided your yeast to be. This also works for wine, by the way. Cheers from a Texican Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 09:49:25 -0400 From: "Dennis Lewis" <dblewis at lewisdevelopment.com> Subject: RE: Pittsburgh Brewpubs Micah, I can give you a few really good ones. I live about 90 minutes away, so I don't get to frequent them as much as possible... I'll be brief, in case you get better info from the locals. Here's two of the best. I like the German food at Penn better than the regular pub fare at Church, IMO. Penn Brewing http://www.pennbrew.com 800 Vinial St. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15212 Phone: (412) 237-9402 World Class. Try them all. Their weissbier won Gold at the 2000 GABF. Church Brew Works http://www.churchbrew.com 3525 Liberty Ave. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15201 Phone: (412) 688-8282 You have to go, just to see the place. Pious Monk dunkel is really good. They have a wit and saison seasonally that is excellent too. Others: Foundry AleWorks Company http://www.foundryaleworks.com 2816 Smallman St Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15222 Phone: (412) 338-9050 Great beer, usually have something on handpump. Make a great ESB. It's in a converted warehouse and has large black leather couches for lounging. Better than home! Valhalla http://valhallamicrobrewery.citysearch.com 1150 Smallman Street Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15219 Phone: (412) 434-0208 Liked Valhalla, haven't been in a while. Very techno modern place with concrete and steel. Sharp Edge Beer Emporium http://sharpedgebeer.com 302 S. Saint Clair St. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15206 Phone: (412) 661-3537 Sharp Edge has real ale, tapped on Wednesday. A bar, not brewpub. Excellent (and I mean it) beer selection. Check the website. 'Tis a shame I don't live closer, or I'd offer to go with! ;-) Dennis "I'm allergic to grass. Hey, it could be worse, I could be allergic to beer." --Golfer Greg Norman Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 11:35:57 EDT From: EdgeAle at cs.com Subject: RE: electric brewing Joe Gerteis wants experiences with electric brewing... >>The use of electric elements in mashing systems is becoming more and more common with the spread of interest in RIMS systems in the world of homebrew. A quick search of the web shows that many people have figured out the benefits of using immersible electric elements, sometimes coupled to temperature controllers, in the hot liquor tank. But the use of such elements in the kettle is still quite rare, and consequently the possibility of putting together an all-electric 5 to 10 gallon (~ 20 to 40 l.) system remains for the most part unexplored. << I used electric heating elements in my HLT and Brew kettle (BK) (both 1/2 barrel kegs)for a few years while I lived in a condo. As I didn't have a driveway, I had to brew inside my garage and couldn't use propoane in there for safety reasons (and HOA regulations). BK: to avoid scorching I used low-heat density "water wizard" elements from chromalox. The 3500W at 240V (=875W at 120V) elements are the biggest that will fit horizontally in a keg. I used two of them for 1750W total with pretty much maxed out my 15A circuit in my garage. No scorching was ever noted even in the lightest beers. Boils were very strong for 5 gals but not very strong for 10 gal batches. If I were to do 10 gal regularly with this system I might add another element (which in my case would require it runing off a second circuit or a larger amp circuit). HLT: more complicated. As wort scorching isn't an issue, I used regular water heater elements. The heater was connected to a surplus hot-tub heater timer. this allowed me to begin heating the water (which takes a long time with only one heater element) before I woke up (It was also filled by a cheap solenoid valve, Mr. Coffee timer and level control switch). The heaters were also connected to a 3way switch and 3 probe thermostats (type used inside control cord of electric grills etc. form Am. Sci & Surplus). The thermostats could be "experimentally" set for any temp desirde for mashing/brewing but I wouldbn't trust them to maintain an accurate setting (metal strips in workings can deform). A single thermostat would have been sufficient as a manual control to maintain a setting. A 25ft copper coil (3/8"od) inside the HLT allowed me to perform a Heat Exchange type RIMS mash. Worked fine with my smallish pump. Given more money I would reccommend 1/2" tubing and a bigger pump). Oh, both HLT and BK also used a float switch to control 24VDC relays which then controlled the heating elements. This prevented the heaters from working unless they were covered by liquid to avoid burn-out. Although, I have accidentally run the BK low-heat-density elements dry w/o burnout for several minutes. Later on I added a second heater element to the HLT, not on the timer, to decrease heating times when I didn't plan ahead (well over an hr for 10 gals). I had a friend (who workds for homebrew) drop a 20A line into my garage. This also prevented circuit-breaker tripping as my BK maxed things out and the circuit would trip when something else was turned on., such as my garage beer fridge kicking in cuz I forgot to set tghe timer I had to turn it off during brewing, or more importantly my wife turned something on in the Master bedroom which was on the same circuit. Which two circuits, my HLT heating times were cut in half and I could begin heating the sparged wort in the BK while still maintaining HLT temps. Heating times can also be reduced by adding a small stirrer to the HLT to keep a little convection going but I hadtrouble finding a good small motor and stirrer combo. Also insulate the HLT & BK with water heater insultation etc. advantages: no propane, easy temp control, timer start disadvantages: time to boil (can be as much as 2 hours w/ single element & full 15 gals), CA electricity prices I now live in a house with a 2&1/2 car brewery and wide driveway so I have switched back to propane for the BK. The change back was to decrease boil times as I was going to be doing mostly 10gal batches (having twins has cut down on my brewing time. AlK I feel your pain). Also, the skyrocketing California electricity prices encouraged me greatly! I still, however, use electricity to maintain my HLT and HE-RIMS mash temps. Initial HLT water is heated in the BY and pumped to the HLT. That's a quick description of my former electric brewery. feel free to contact me if you have more questions. Dana NOTE: I recommend electrically grounding the metal kegs AND using a GFI protected circuit. This is the reason for using 120V instead of 240V as 240 GFI's cost way too much for me. - ------------------------------------------ Dana Edgell Edge Ale Brewery, Oceanside CA http://ourworld.cs.com/EdgeAle Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 12:41:13 -0300 From: "Wayne Love" <wlove at atsonline.com> Subject: stir plates I have been following the threads the last couple days concerning stir plates. Where is a good source to buy them and what qualities should I be looking for in evaluating them? Thanks Wayne Love Rothesay, NB. Canada wlove at atsonline.com Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 12:15:32 -0400 From: Richard Foote <rfoote at mindspring.com> Subject: Home Improvement and Other Priorities Darryl writes regarding Alan's recent post: >Maybe you have a priority problem Alan - washer and dryer do not come >before the brewery! Maybe the solution is to incorporate your brewing >system into the new kitchen, your wife seems like a nice reasonable and >understanding women, I'm sure she'd undertand that you need a built in >100, 000 BTU burner in the kitchen. Okay, this got me to thinking, which is dangerous I know. I once shared an apartment with a PE and brewing partner. We had a cold room set up in the basement of this duplex where we lagered our beer under natural refrigeration. Overhead, in the kitchen of this apartment, there was a sink with an extra hole for who knows what. Well, being men and brewers we got to thinking of some ideas for a higher purpose for that extra hole. We joked about drilling a hole up through the floor, running beer lines and hooking up a water faucet through which beer would pour forth. We never followed through on this "brainstorm" but, imagine it if you will... Let's say you put in one of those single lever kitchen faucets. A push of the lever to the cold side and out comes a bright pilsner. A flick to the hot and you've got a robust porter. Just ponder the convenience! Drips from the faucet after a pour--nooo problem. Washes right down the sink. Cleaning the beer lines? No need to run for a saucepan or other container to catch the cleaning solution. Yep, goes right down the drain. Spoiled batch disposal? You got the picture, easy as pie. Discuss... Rick Foote Whistle Pig Brewing Murrayville, GA Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 14:21:58 -0500 From: Gene Collins <GCollins at cranecarrier.com> Subject: Diacetyl Last Saturday, I brewed an ESB and transferred to the secondary last night. My fermenting temperature was a bit too high. I tasted the brew and there is a minimal diacetyl taste. While this is allowable in the BJCP guidelines, I don't like it's flavor. I had this problem before and cold aged the batch. It seemed I read somewhere that the yeast will re-absorb it when cold. Fact or fiction? Gene Collins Broken Arrow, OK Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 14:30:44 -0500 (EST) From: Alexandre Enkerli <aenkerli at indiana.edu> Subject: Bruheat Boiler Hello to all! I recently received a Bruheat boiler as a gift and have been looking for some info about it. First off, does anyone has any indication about wiring it to a dryer extension? The Bruheat has blue, black, and green/white wires while the dryer thing has black, red, white, and ground wires. Then, can anyone offer some help about calibrating the thermostat? Also, I read something in the HBD archives about possible adjustments to the thermostat. Does anyone have any information about this? Thanks in advance for your help! Alex Enkerli 6009 de Chateaubriand Montreal Qc H2S 2N3 Canada (514)277-0715 Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 12:45:48 -0700 (PDT) From: Beaverplt <beaverplt at yahoo.com> Subject: Priorities? Darryl Newbury believes that Alan McKay has a priority problem. Don't believe him Alan! Every successful homebrewer knows that keeping SWMBO happy is always high on the priority list. Your priorities are fine, Alan, but the solution eludes you. Fortunately, you have named one thing that can take care of two priorities (Keeping SWMBO happy and having a good brewing system). My solution to your dilema lays in your comment about remodeling the kitchen of your new home. There is one item that you can buy for your remodeled kitchen that will make SWMBO extremely happy and give you a great heat source for brewing. That item is a commercial stove. I bought a used 6 burner Vulcan stove from a restaurant supply company. The BTU output of just one of it's burners is more than enough to handle the average 5 gallon brew. If I step up to 10 gallon batches I'm sure two burners will more than do the job. My advice is you shouldn't mention the beer brewing benefits of this stove to your wife. Make her think that you want to help her step up her culinary skills by being willing to upgrade to a commercial stove. Then, after you have it in place you can "discover" that it helps your brewing. This could be the ultimate 2fer. You can get more husband points and improve your brewing system in one swell foop. Or is that fell swoop? Sometimes I'm just too devious. ===== Jerry "Beaver" Pelt That's my story and I'm sticking to it Return to table of contents
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 23:01:43 -0500 From: "Rob Moline" <jethrogump at home.com> Subject: The Jethro Gump Report The Jethro Gump Report An abbreviated report...though nonetheless vital. Dr. Clayton Cone, a fan and supporter of the HBD, has recently undergone a hospitalization, surgical procedure, and is currently recovering at home. While he was very ill, he is now on the road to full recovery...I pray. I would ask a personal favor....that all that have benefited from Dr. Cone's gracious and generous past participation with the HBD send a message of "Get Well Soon" to him. Please send a message to getwelldrcone at home.com and they shall be forwarded to him. I know it will mean a great deal to him. Thank you, Jethro Gump Rob Moline Return to table of contents
Date: Sat, 28 Jul 2001 22:33:56 -0400 From: nlkanous at netscape.net Subject: Five Star Chemicals Is Five Star Chemicals still out there? I tried their website and nothing is there. Any help would be appreciated. nathan in madison, wi Return to table of contents
Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2001 00:54:39 -0700 From: Mike Lemons <ndcent at hotmail.com> Subject: Re: stir plates & yeast damage In a recent digest, Alan Meeker says, >Yeast are terribly resilient and, in fact, it is a pain in the butt >when we want to open them up in the laboratory to liberate the >"goodies" inside the yeast cells. Their cell walls are quite tough so >the yeast cells can handle a lot of stress without breaking open. Of >course, this is not necessarily true for unhealthy, starved, or >otherwise stressed yeast. However, since we are talking about >*starters* here, there is no problem whatsoever. It seems that everyone was talking about starters except me. I was talking about intermittent stirring during secondary fermentation. I am going to try some high gravity ales when the weather cools off in the fall. I realize that the idea of building a magnetic stirrer is really out there, but I keep hearing Captain Kirk's voice in my head saying, "High gravity fermentation . . . The final frontier." The stirring would not be for purposes of aeration, but rather for rousing the yeast. With a cylindro-conical fermentor, you can just blow in some CO2 from the bottom; It's going to be a bit trickier with a glass carboy. So, the yeast would be somewhat stressed in this situation. From high alcohol if nothing else. Do you still think that it would be OK to knock them around a bit? I appreciate the information about the bottom thickness decoupling the magnets. Obviously a problem. I've read the book _Barley_Wine_ by Allen and Cantwell from the Classic Beer Series. It didn't contain very much useful information. What would be a good yeast to use? I've heard the Scottish ale yeast mentioned, but I've never liked Scottish ale, so I would rather use something else. Return to table of contents
Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2001 07:31:45 From: "C.D. Pritchard" <cdp at chattanooga.net> Subject: Re: RIMS thermostat + electric brewing Rob Dewhirst posted that the best place for the RIMS thermostat temp. probe is downstream of the heating chamber because of the long lag if it's located upstream of the heater and that it'll shut off the heater if the flow gets plugged. Rob's right. My first RIMS had only one probe located upstream of the heater. During one stickly mash, the temp. upstream of the heater reached something like 20 degF above the desired mash temp. Also, the lag Rob mentions with only an upstream probe will result in the mash temp. overshooting the desired rest temp. in roughly inverse proporation to the flow. The main disavantage of a downstream probe location is that boost times between rests will be much longer. OTOH, one upstream can better measure mash temp. I use a controller that has two temp. sensors located 1) downstream of the heater and 2) in the wort-out line immediately downstream of the tun. The controller turns the heater on only if [temp. at 2 < desired mash temp.] AND [temp. at 1 is <= the desired temp. + 2 degF]. It yeilds decent temp. boosts rates and reduces the likelihood of scorching and grossly overheating the wort. The controller uses a 'puter, but two simple thermostats type affairs could be used to provide the same function by "ANDing" their outputs. - ------------- Someone asked about electic wort boilers... I currently use a Sankey keg with a long 4.5kW low watt density water heater element stuck thru its side. No scorching but I've not boiled any high gravity brews with it. I'd hate like hell to go back to boiling with propane and SWMBO decreed the kitchen stove off limits for brewing after I created an "wort volcano" on its top. Replacing the wort-soaked oven insulation was a real bitch too! Details on the boiler, a older one and the RIMS are via recently fixed links at either URL below. c.d. pritchard cdp at chattanooga.net http://hbd.org/cdp/ http://chattanooga.net/~cdp/ Return to table of contents
Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2001 12:51:09 -0400 From: "Audie Kennedy" <audie at mounet.com> Subject: Southwestern Va/Upper-east Tn/Eastern Ky homebrew suppliers? I live in Wise Co. Va. and have only found one homebrew supply store in my area, in Abingdon. Are there any more? I would like to find one with a little more inventory. Audie Kennedy Return to table of contents
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