BeerTools Discussion Forum

I just pulled my bottling bucket out of storage, and it appears it still had some moisture in it when I put it away after the last use--I found some mildew growing in the bottom. I normally use an iodophor sanitizer, but figured I should mix up a bleach solution this time to ensure the mildew is kil...

I'm scoping out a Sanyo 4.9 cubic foot refrigerator to do some temperature controlled fermenting and lagering in. I do my primary fermentation in a food grade plastic bucket, which should fit with no problems. Can anyone tell me the typical circumference and height of a 5 gallon glass carboy (I'm ho...

Thanks, James. I can get LME in bulk for $2.29/lb, while DME goes for about $3.95/lb. So, for a batch using the typical 6.6 lbs of LME I'd spend $15.11 whereas if I used DME I would need 5.9 lbs and spend $23.31. Unless I'm missing something, it seems to me that for the same gravity, LME is cheaper ...

Thanks for the tip. By "XL" do you mean "extra light" dry malt extract? If so, what would be the reason for using extra light DME even in cases where the recipe calls for amber or dark, for example? Wouldn't that affect the final product? Finally, how does one know how much DME t...

All, My friend and I are mid-way through our fourth batch of beer (all with good results, I'm happy to say), but we're trying to find a good source for liquid malt extract besides the major/imported brands carried by our local homebrew supplier. We've used Munton and Fison for all four of our batche...

Thanks for the input. I was actually leaning towards a small fridge so I could use it to serve from someday. My only reservation is it seems that a freezer of comparable volume has a bit more height for an airlock/blow-off tube. It may be tight to get a fermenter with either of those two items stick...

Hi all, I've been debating what the best way would be to gain some more control over the temperatures at which I ferment my beers. I live in a condo, so the fermenter is pretty much at whatever the temperature is in the living spaces. This is usually fine (if not on the high end of the range) for Al...

Thanks for the reply. I have since opened and drank several bottles from this batch (including those that had these little "clumps" in the headspace) and noticed no odd tastes or odors. The batch is really quite good. I suppose the most likely explanation is that relating to a small yeast ...

My friend and I have a batch of Brown Ale that's about 2 days away from the end of it's bottle conditioning. In about 8 or 10 of the bottles, I have noticed some little clumps of material that are stuck to the inside of the bottle neck in the headspace above the beer. I almost might think it was yea...

That's what I thought. Is there any real concern that our yeast will be too tired to carbonate during bottle conditioning?

Over the past 3 days, there has been no change in the SG (still at 1.016). At this point, we have transferred to our secondary vessel with the intent of letting it bulk age for 1-2 weeks. Having come up a bit short on the final SG, is there anything to be done for this batch or is the safest thing t...

Thanks for the suggestions--rousing the yeast got the airlock bubbling slowly again, so I'll let it go and check it in another day or two. I'll also calibrate my instruments to make sure they aren't the culprits!

My friend and I have our second-ever batch in the primary fermenter, and have witnessed what we think are some unusual circumstances.

First, we brewed a batch of Brown Ale from Charles Papazian's book (don't remember the name he gave it) as follows:

Crushed UK Crystal Malt

I sorted this one out on my own, so I thought I'd post the answer. Per the above response, it's often best to measure SG after completing the boil but prior to adding make-up water to ensure that the results aren't skewed by stratification of the water and boiled wort. So, using an expansion of &quo...

Thanks for the help. I would guess that to adjust the SG to allow for the added top-off water, one would just multiply the weight percent of the concentrated wort (relative to the final 5 gallon mixture) by the SG of the concentrated wort, then add the weight percent of the top off water (multiplied...