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Going all grain. advice wanted


Corksniffer

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Not everybody needs to make triple batches for all grain to be considered a good use of their time. Your comment basically implies don't bother doing all grain unless you're gonna make 50 or 60 litres or more of wort on one brew day because otherwise it's a waste of time. I can't say I agree with that. It's a horses for courses situation.

 

Personally I wouldn't go for small batches like 10 litres either but I do enjoy the process of a brew day so spending 5 or 6 hours making up 20-25 litres of wort is fine. It's a bit of an escape from other mundane crap, a stress reliever of sorts. It's my thing to do on a Saturday once or twice a month. For that reason I don't mind doing 3 brew days to get the same amount of wort that could be done in one day with a bigger system.

 

Plus I get 3 cubes/kegs of different beers rather than dealing with 60 odd litres of the same wort. tongue I know you give a lot away but not all of us do so making huge batches isn't necessary for that reason either.

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I also enjoy varying my brews...making different styles, but don't forget you can also make blends with multiple cubes too! as yet I havnt tried blending cubes but its always a realistic option

 

I wont be upgrading anytime soon my system is a budget set up... an upgrade from my set up will be costly and pointless

 

I thinks my setup is quite realistic

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Not suggesting it's unrealistic, just saying not everyone needs to brew 60 or 70 litres at a time to feel like their time is worth doing all grain. tongue Of course you can blend cubes, but it's a bit hard to get one cube each of pilsner, pale ale and ESB or red ale out of 70L of the same wort.

 

Everyone does what suits them. Personally having 3 kegs of pale ale on tap at once, even if they are hopped differently and fermented with different yeasts, doesn't really appeal to me, so the 21/25 litre batches I brew works much better for me. cool

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What's the minimum I need to make my first? Brew in a bag was recommended to me but I know nothing about this eitherThanks

 

Hey mate' date=' I switched to all-grain after a few kit brews. If you have a half decent gas cook-top, you can always go the kettle route. I put this 40 litre kettle together for under $170. I had a 30 litre cube I used for camping, and the only other thing I added was the bag. All up, less than $200 and I had a BIAB setup.

 

I don't reckon it would work so well on an electric cook-top though. Might struggle to get ~30 litres of wort to the boil...

 

I order my grains pre-mixed and milled. Pretty straightforward and suits me fine.

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Irrespective of the yeast used I have found that unless the beer has a lot of hops or a lot of malt then it almost always has that 'home brew' twang to it.

 

Lusty makes extract and Kit beers and these easily rival anything else. I have drunk a few of his beers of both types and all have been impressive

 

Fair call Ben - Ive not done much in the way of extract and no partial mash, might try that a bit more. I have looked at Lusty's recipes and agree they look great.

 

Agree with Kelsey aswell - 23 litres is plenty and lasts me months, usually as I have several brews on the go at any one time. But its just be drinking and mainly on weekends - 60 litres would be a ridiculous amount for my needs.

 

Not every brew has it - but many kit brews Ive done have some odd taste, light a slight chemical aftertaste that is noticeable. I sanitise everything fully, always use fresh ingredients and control temp in a fridge - so the 'triangle' is covered. Its not that bad that its undrinkable but does detract form the enjoyment of the beer. Without any other explanation I can only put it down to kits. I will try another extract and then partial mash and see how that goes.....but Im probably going to get an urn and go AG anyway at some point

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What's your water like ?

Water makes up 90+% of your beer and some of the chemicals used in mains treatment can leave a foul taste , here in Radelaide I pre boil all my brewing water to vent chlorine and make small adjustments with brewing salts or dilute with distilled water .

This time of year many councils will be dosing water storage to combat algal blooms and I sure as hell don't want that in my hand crafted brews

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BIAB was how I intended to start my adventure into all grain using CUB keggles!

 

I was influenced to go 3V budget HERMS setup and have never looked back...

Sharing beer is fun and it also receives feedback those who drink the beer...positive and negative response's are a true guide to becoming better brewers

60 litre batches arnt big I know other home brewers making much bigger batches!

 

Even if I keep my favourite batches all to myself I cube the wort in varying cube sizes and the wort can be stored for months to allow for variations of beer on tap

 

If I didn't store cubes Ide just simple chill my wort and ferment it all at once... but this dosnt suit me

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What's your water like ?

Water makes up 90+% of your beer and some of the chemicals used in mains treatment can leave a foul taste ' date=' here in Radelaide I pre boil all my brewing water to vent chlorine and make small adjustments with brewing salts or dilute with distilled water .

This time of year many councils will be dosing water storage to combat algal blooms and I sure as hell don't want that in my hand crafted brews [/quote']

 

That's one I have wondered about as Ive never tried to alter it - I live in Melbourne and just use tap water. Ive seen in recipes different chemicals added to adjust the water - but don't know where to even start!.....what do I do?

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Water would be the only thing I haven't mucked with. I did, however buy Campden tablets for the last 2x brews with no detectable difference. These only remove chlorines and choramines though (far as I'm aware)

 

 

I'm having a draught kit I bottled 30th of last month where I used US -05 and dry hopped with Nelson just before bottling (hop tea stirred in) it's noticeably better than anything I've made before and pretty 'good' but still slightly 'twangy' I don't think it's water but can't be sure. I notice a little freshness from the hop tea but still it's a tadd confused and nothing tastes seperate. I could imagine an AG batch made like this might be 'great'. It actually smells a cross between a pale and a hefe. Although, this was dry hopped with whole pellets for a few days and got a little grassy. Last time I ever do that.

 

I'm kinda coming to the conclusion that pre-hopped kits just aren't as versatile and you can't get the freshness because they're already bitter enough with no real hop aroma and additional hopping drives them into IPA territory with only so much aroma available on tap. I can't get enough hop taste or aroma without it being 60,000 IBU. Secondly, there's the malt taste. It's not 100% 'fresh' like a great quality micro brew. It lacks that creaminess and ability to seperate itself from the hop taste. I liken the difference to drinking instant coffee then having a good freshly ground and brewed Coffee.

 

I think kits have their place in: They're an excellent way to hone brewing skill. They taste ok. They're easy to make and take little time. But lets put it this way, Sierra Navada aint' using kits to make their beer

 

Saying that, I have a Bootmaker pale that has NOT been dry hopped which I've just steeped 50g of Nelson and Mosaic in a stocking for 20 mins. Tipping in and stirring now, bottling tomorrow so very interested to see the result in a few weeks. US-05

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The so called 'twang' was the reason I went AG and glad I did. Fermenting a couple of FWK's confirmed it for me and my first brew which I'm drinking now confirmed it as well. The beers I did with kits and bits were good beers and my mates all agreed but there was that twang which I wanted to remove. Give a FWK a go and see how it performs.

 

cheers

 

Greg

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That's one I have wondered about as Ive never tried to alter it - I live in Melbourne and just use tap water. Ive seen in recipes different chemicals added to adjust the water - but don't know where to even start!.....what do I do?

The simple answer is do nothing at this stage. Brew a few batches of AG whenever you get to doing it, just with normal tap water. Get your basic processes down pat first. If for some reason they taste off and the water is the reason why then start looking at it, but I'd think it unlikely to be a problem in Melbourne.

 

Melbourne water is very soft so it's excellent for pilsner type beers. Beers like pale ales would probably benefit from a 10g calcium sulphate (gypsum) addition and maybe 2-3g calcium chloride addition. The sulphate levels being higher than the chloride will bring out the hops more. Before you do anything like that though, brew them without the additions, then you can see the difference they do make.

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Beers like pale ales would probably benefit from a 10g calcium sulphate (gypsum) addition and maybe 2-3g calcium chloride addition. The sulphate levels being higher than the chloride will bring out the hops more. Before you do anything like that though' date=' brew them without the additions, then you can see the difference they do make.[/quote']

 

Hey Otto, I know this is probably off topic, but what additions do you make for Brisbane water? I haven't played with water chemistry yet (enough to learn as it is), but my limited understanding is that yeast also benefit from having sufficient calcium in the water. Assuming you were making a fairly standard pale ale, what would do to your Brissie water?

 

As per above, 10g calcium sulphate and 2-3g calcium chloride?

 

Cheers,

 

Karstiron.

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That's one I have wondered about as Ive never tried to alter it - I live in Melbourne and just use tap water. Ive seen in recipes different chemicals added to adjust the water - but don't know where to even start!.....what do I do?

The simple answer is do nothing at this stage. Brew a few batches of AG whenever you get to doing it' date=' just with normal tap water. Get your basic processes down pat first. If for some reason they taste off and the water is the reason why then start looking at it, but I'd think it unlikely to be a problem in Melbourne.

 

Melbourne water is very soft so it's excellent for pilsner type beers. Beers like pale ales would probably benefit from a 10g calcium sulphate (gypsum) addition and maybe 2-3g calcium chloride addition. The sulphate levels being higher than the chloride will bring out the hops more. Before you do anything like that though, brew them without the additions, then you can see the difference they do make.[/quote']

 

How do you test your water?

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The last water report for Brisbane specified sulphates at about 28ppm and chloride at 63ppm. It was from last year, but looking back through previous years reports it doesn't change much. It didn't list calcium and magnesium, but I worked these out from the total hardness figure of 110; they're about 28ppm and 9ppm respectively. That ratio of SO4/Cl isn't very good for hoppy beers, but it works well for maltier styles. I think I mentioned it in more detail in the Brewing Water thread, on the last or second last page.

 

As such, I don't really add any chloride to my water, at least not for APAs. My last one I added 11g gypsum and 2g MgSO4 I think, which brought the calcium up to a bit over 100ppm, and the sulphates up to around 200ppm. Mg came up to the mid teens. This meant the sulphate/chloride ratio was somewhere around 3.5-4. This batch is currently in the fermenter, so I'll see in a week or so how it worked. You could bring the ratio down with 2-3g of CaCl, but it can also be done by lowering the gypsum amount and not adding any CaCl.

 

On the next one I plan to drop the gypsum a little to bring the ratio down lower. 50ppm calcium is the recommended minimum, so it'll still be above that. I'm mainly just mucking around with it at the moment to get it where I want it, but the water report helps to get a rough base of what the water is. It's not precise, but it's close enough for rock n' roll.

 

The only time the minerals are well below recommended levels is in the water I use to brew pilsners. This water is all distilled, and I add very small amounts of mineral salts to it; most of the minerals are single figures in the ppm amounts. However, these beers always turn out very very clean and crisp, much nicer than with straight tap water.

 

Cheers

 

Kelsey

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Best starting of with SMASHES for first 10 batches trialling different base malts by them selves,

Trial various Pale ALe malts and Vienna Malt are all a good start for both Melbourne and tank water!

If making beers with a lot of crystal or dark malts Ph will be to low during the mash... with Melbourne water or tank water you will need a suitable balanced water profile calculated for malty driven beers!

 

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but my limited understanding is that yeast also benefit from having sufficient calcium in the water.

 

Karstiron.

 

Hi Karstiron,

 

it is recommended to have a min of 50ppm Ca or calcium in the water for yeast flocculation.

 

To give you an idea, my Ryde water report from sydney water reckons there is only about 14ppm, waaay under, meaning it takes longer for the yeast to settle out in theory.

 

I have started mucking about with my water chem, took me till batch 40 :-) Up to batch 47 now. Have cal chloride, cal sulfate (gypsum), bicarb, epsom salts and table salt in the nanobrewery now. Do not use iodised salt, the iodine is poisonous for the yeast.

 

I think Beersmith 2 is one of the only packages that will actually suggest how much of what to add for the style you are after (after you have plugged in your local water report or have your water analysed) I have had a play with beersmith but not using it yet, (no time to set up my inventory yet.. too busy with the kids) still using brewcipher sheets, they have a pretty good water calculator sheet in there.

 

If you like dark beers, it's a pretty good idea to use the salts to nail your mash PH. If too acidic, you will make astringent mouth puckering stouts and porters. Dark roast grain is very acidic. This is why steeping the dark grains separate from the mash works well.

 

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...but it can also be done by lowering the gypsum amount and not adding any CaCl.

 

Thanks mate. When I picked up the ingredients for my smoked barley wine and parti-gyle stout, the guy from Craft Brewer sold me a pack of gypsum and said to use about 5 grams - which I did for both brews. Sounds like it was probably about right.

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If you like dark beers' date=' it's a pretty good idea to use the salts to nail your mash PH. If too acidic, you will make astringent mouth puckering stouts and porters. Dark roast grain is very acidic. This is why steeping the dark grains separate from the mash works well.

[/quote']

 

Cool. Thanks - good to know. I steeped the grains in the parti-gyle stout I just made so hopefully it'll turn out okay. Actually just bottled it today and it tastes pretty good so far. I don't have any PH testing gear so just winging it for the moment.

 

 

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I too have started to have a look at water. Just been using straight Sydney tap water at the moment which I have been happy with but obviously you don't know the differences till you try. I do have a rainwater tank at home which I have been tempted to have a go with. While I know it won't be exactly 100% mineral free compared to distilled water is it a good assumption that it will be as close to 0 without using distilled water? Does anyone have any thoughts on how close it will be?

 

I intend to boil it in my urn the night before brew day to make sure it has no nasties in it then add the minerals from there. It is coming off a colourbond roof and into a plastic water tank.

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The last water report for Brisbane specified sulphates at about 28ppm and chloride at 63ppm. It was from last year' date=' but looking back through previous years reports it doesn't change much. It didn't list calcium and magnesium, but I worked these out from the total hardness figure of 110; they're about 28ppm and 9ppm respectively. That ratio of SO4/Cl isn't very good for hoppy beers, but it works well for maltier styles. I think I mentioned it in more detail in the Brewing Water thread, on the last or second last page.

 

As such, I don't really add any chloride to my water, at least not for APAs. My last one I added 11g gypsum and 2g MgSO4 I think, which brought the calcium up to a bit over 100ppm, and the sulphates up to around 200ppm. Mg came up to the mid teens. This meant the sulphate/chloride ratio was somewhere around 3.5-4. This batch is currently in the fermenter, so I'll see in a week or so how it worked. You could bring the ratio down with 2-3g of CaCl, but it can also be done by lowering the gypsum amount and not adding any CaCl.

 

On the next one I plan to drop the gypsum a little to bring the ratio down lower. 50ppm calcium is the recommended minimum, so it'll still be above that. I'm mainly just mucking around with it at the moment to get it where I want it, but the water report helps to get a rough base of what the water is. It's not precise, but it's close enough for rock n' roll.

 

The only time the minerals are well below recommended levels is in the water I use to brew pilsners. This water is all distilled, and I add very small amounts of mineral salts to it; most of the minerals are single figures in the ppm amounts. However, these beers always turn out very very clean and crisp, much nicer than with straight tap water.

 

Cheers

 

Kelsey[/quote']

 

Thanks Kelsey, I was inquiring as I'm on tank water and was just curious as to how it was done. I'm happy with the way my beers are coming out especially the Pilsners.

 

 

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A little off topic but just voicing a thought

 

Making no-boil kit beer isn't as sanitary as an extract or AG boil because, even though we're able to sanitize everything best we can, we still trust that our tap water is free from nasties (I fill with a hose so that's even worse) Plus, boiling at least boils off chlorines too, another hinderance of tap kit beer

 

Food for thought and quite possibly a reason some (apparently) make great kit beer and others can't. Some go to the trouble and cost of using bottled water but I think if you're going to go to that length then one might as well go AG

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Filling from a hose may be part of your problem mate , drink from a garden hose on a warm day and see how foul the water tastes and think that that will make up 90+ % of your beer.

 

The worlds greatest brewer couldn't hide that sort of nasty

with all of my brewing water i pre boil it to vent the chlorine and add salts if/as needed

not suggesting you need to spend a fortune buying filtered water but maybe try boiling kitchen tap water a few litres at a time for 15 mins and putting that aside for brewing rather than dropping $XXX on an AG set up straight away , doubt any of the members here could make a decent beer with crap water without some treatment no matter who did the mashing

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Boiling water will drive off chlorine but it won't get rid of chloramines. You should find out which of those your municipal supply is treated with. You'll need campden tablets to remove chloramines.

 

Greeny is right though, if the water isn't the greatest then AG won't really improve things. I would also find another way to transfer the water than a garden hose. Even filling a bucket from a tap and tipping it into the FV would be better.

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"Hosegaarden" premium :D haha

 

I do use half a Campden but no diff. For what it's worth I run the hose until the hose flavour is 'gone' but hey, I could also be fooling myself too. Either way I'm looking forward to AG brewing and WON'T be using any hoses whatsoever

 

I've also been thinking, the napisan based sanitizer my local sells isn't preferred either. Apparently, bleach based sanitizers can depart bad flavours too. Although I rinse the hell out if it afterwards

 

Just trying to rule everything out (or, in)

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Sodium percarbonate is the active ingredient in Napisan. I use it on its own these days and it's a great cleaner, all it leaves behind is soda ash (sodium carbonate), which is easily rinsed off with a couple of bouts of hot tap water. Equipment is then sprayed with Starsan to sanitise. Simple regimen that has served me very well.

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