Homebrew Beer Howto

TomOnBoard · 29-03-2021 12:06am

pcasso wrote: »

Another update.
I opened the second bottle that I had added sugar and then yeast to before leaving for a week.
here has been a good bit of fermenting in the seven days and the carbonation is decent.
There is little sweetness left so I guess the yeast has used most if not all of the late added sugar.
So can any conclusions be made as to what my original problem?
I am thinking an insufficient amount of yeast left in the beer before bottling but why this would be I have no idea.
Now to decide what to do with the remaining dozen or so bottles.
I guess re priming with sugar and yeast is the best course of action.

As I asked another poster last week who seemed to be having similar issues:

2 Questions in relation to the original bottles:

1. Did you use any 'stabiliser/finishing' additions after fermentation was done?
2. What is the pH of the finished beer? If you dont have pH measurement tools, does it taste on the sweet side or on the sour/tart side?

What conclusions can you draw so far?

1. It does not appear that your original ingredients were to blame.
2. You should use a yeast/sugar combination to prime your bottles for now.
3. Keep good notes/records of your processes.

As a new test, try and ferment a small batch using enough carbonation drops ( not table sugar) in a plastic drinks bottle (well sanitised) with 250ml of cooled boiled water to make a wort around 1.04 measured with a hydrometer. Oxygenate well and add a pinch of yeast. Observe progress. Keep a record of steps. Measure its final gravity and calculate abv. Why? To test your yeast in conjunction with the carbonation drops. In the meantime, use a yeast and sugar combo in half the other bottles, and check progress of each after a further week.

flyingoutside · 29-03-2021 11:39am

Any advice or tips for the water to use? Was planning on using tap water as it's pretty good but worried about the chlorine so have stuff to counter that. Am I over thinking it?

Bogwoppit · 29-03-2021 11:50am

I had some issues with carbonation when I moved house a few years ago, I ended up putting it down to the different water supply.
If using mains tap water it’s a good idea to fill your bucket with all the water you’ll need the night before and add a campden tablet.

[Deleted User] · 29-03-2021 1:01pm

flyingoutside wrote: »

Any advice or tips for the water to use? Was planning on using tap water as it's pretty good but worried about the chlorine so have stuff to counter that. Am I over thinking it?

Yes, the reason beer and wine exists is because of bad water, in times of old you could not store water. If your water has a lot of chemicals fill a fermentation bucket and let it sit overnight and it will evaporate.

pcasso · 29-03-2021 1:14pm

TomOnBoard wrote: »

As I asked another poster last week who seemed to be having similar issues:

2 Questions in relation to the original bottles:

1. Did you use any 'stabiliser/finishing' additions after fermentation was done?
2. What is the pH of the finished beer? If you dont have pH measurement tools, does it taste on the sweet side or on the sour/tart side?

What conclusions can you draw so far?

1. It does not appear that your original ingredients were to blame.
2. You should use a yeast/sugar combination to prime your bottles for now.
3. Keep good notes/records of your processes.

As a new test, try and ferment a small batch using enough carbonation drops ( not table sugar) in a plastic drinks bottle (well sanitised) with 250ml of cooled boiled water to make a wort around 1.04 measured with a hydrometer. Oxygenate well and add a pinch of yeast. Observe progress. Keep a record of steps. Measure its final gravity and calculate abv. Why? To test your yeast in conjunction with the carbonation drops. In the meantime, use a yeast and sugar combo in half the other bottles, and check progress of each after a further week.

Thanks again Tom for all your input and advice I really appreciate it.
Just to clarify I use glucose rather than table sugar for priming.
I might try and see can I source some carbonation drops for priming my latest batch to see if it improves matters.
Also I don't use any other additives other than the priming agent once fermentation is over.
I don't have access to the ph of the finished beer. On taste I would say that all sugars had been used as it didn't taste particularly sweet but neither was it overly sour.
I am terrible at taking notes an am only a casual ad hoc brewer but I will try to keep things tighter in future and see if that helps.

TomOnBoard · 29-03-2021 10:43pm

pcasso wrote: »

Thanks again Tom for all your input and advice I really appreciate it.
Just to clarify I use glucose rather than table sugar for priming.
I might try and see can I source some carbonation drops for priming my latest batch to see if it improves matters.
Also I don't use any other additives other than the priming agent once fermentation is over.
I don't have access to the ph of the finished beer. On taste I would say that all sugars had been used as it didn't taste particularly sweet but neither was it overly sour.
I am terrible at taking notes an am only a casual ad hoc brewer but I will try to keep things tighter in future and see if that helps.

Apologies, Pablo. I thought you were using carb drops. If you were using Glucose, and were putting enough in, the yeast shudda munched its way through it in a flash! I'd refine the conclusions and say that not enough viable yeasts are getting into the earlier bottles.

Get yerself some pH strips at least. Get ones designed for brewing ranges of pH between 4ish and 7 ish. They're cheap as chips. They're like an oil pressure gauge in a car- useful if/when things are out of whack.

Ya gotta take the notes, Man! Otherwise, you're not really going to learn from the process, and won't be able to troubleshoot on the one hand, nor repeat the magical awesome batch on the other.. A couple of lines in a small diary for each brew is all it takes..

TomOnBoard · 29-03-2021 10:48pm

Bogwoppit wrote: »

I had some issues with carbonation when I moved house a few years ago, I ended up putting it down to the different water supply.
If using mains tap water it’s a good idea to fill your bucket with all the water you’ll need the night before and add a campden tablet.

+1.

If yer tap produces muck, you'll pick up 5litre bottles of reasonably well-balanced, un-chlorinated water in Tesco/SuperValu/Lidl for around €1.30 each. That's adding a fiver onto a normal brew for repeatably reliable water. And the empties are great for decanting/temporary storage, as a good squeeze expels all air. I use them all the time for wine storage- basically the same principle as wine in a box!!

29-07-2021 2:10pm

Quick question........do some kits come with the sugars already contained in the wort?

I made a brew recently and bottled it about two weeks ago. At the time, I cleaned out the fermentation bucket and decided, feck it, I'll do another one straight away sure. So I sterilised everything again and started another batch. I've never gone the all-grain method and use kits, and this is my first time using one of these kits: Gozdawa Dunkel Hefewuizen

The 2nd batch has been on the go now for maybe 10-12 days, roughly. The brew has been the quietest I've ever done, with very little bubbling in the airlock and also very little smell of fermenting beer in the room. I thought it might have been the heating belt but that's fine and we've had the best weather in a decade this past while, so that shouldn't be an issue hopefully. I went back over the method I used and was looking for the instructions that came with the kit when it hit me like a bolt of lightning out of the blue that I never put any sugar into the fermentation bucket.

I've re-checked the instructions and there is NO mention of adding sugar before bottling stage. When I searched online, I found this review: https://www.nationalhomebrewclub.ie/forum/index.php?topic=10036.0 and there's no mention of sugar in this one either. However, when making this post, I looked up the kit to link the brew2bottle site above and noticed the following: "Please note an additional 2% ABV can be achieved with the addition of an extra 1kg of Brewing Sugar but fermentation period will be extended by 4-5 day"

So, my first question is this already has a certain amount of sugar in it already, or else there'd be no point to the whole thing, yes? The S.G. started at 1.043 and is currently at 1.010, giving me a % ABV of 4.33% so obviously there's been some fermentation. My second question is, I presume there's no harm in adding the sugar now at this late stage and giving it another 4 days or so to finish it off?.....i.e..there's no such thing as leaving it ferment too long, is there?

BeerNut · 23-08-2021 4:22pm

I missed this post in the site switchover so apologies for the late reply.

The wort you get in a kit is basically all sugar. Some kits (the <2kg ones) expect you to top that up with sugar of your own, and some, like this one, supply all the sugar you need. If there's two cans, you don't need any extra fermentables until you're bottling. This one sounds like it went off perfectly: as always, bubbles and smells are not useful sources of information but the gravity is.

In general, more time will get you a better beer and you should absolutely ensure that the gravity has stopped moving before bottling. I wouldn't be in favour of adding more sugar to boost the strength late in the fermentation process as you lose the control you had with your gravity readings, but you can do it: again just make sure that fermentation is finished before bottling. Good luck trying to calculate the final ABV though.

As regards an upper limit on fermentation time, I would say five or six weeks is where you start running the risk of oxidation and autolysis, and need to get the beer bottled.

Trigger Happy · 01-02-2022 5:38pm

This thread is a bit of a goldmine to the novices amongst us.

But here is a question - you know the yeasty crud that is left over at the bottom of your Fermenting Vessel...is it ok to dump that in to your garden compost bin?

loyatemu · 01-02-2022 6:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118566434#Comment_118566434

I'm sure it is, but I generally just rinse it down the drain.

Muahahaha · 12-02-2022 9:06pm

Am I right to say there is no bricks and mortar brewing shop in Ireland? Do any shops carry brewing bits on bobs, I know some large Tescos used to but havent seen anything in them in several years.

raxy · 12-02-2022 10:14pm

The range have a few bits. I've never been to it but you can go to the homebrew company in Laois.

Homebrewwest you used to be able to but website says its closed to public at the moment,

Muahahaha · 12-02-2022 11:22pm

Cheers thanks raxy, will check out The Range

Supercell · 17-02-2022 11:53am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118622623#Comment_118622623

I went to one in Belfast when i was up there a few months ago (House of Homebrew), seems nuts that a city the size of Dublin in the south cannot apparently sustain one.

loyatemu · 17-02-2022 12:38pm

what are you looking for. GeterBrewed are very quick delivery in my experience.

Don't HomeBrewWest have a physical shop? They certainly used to.

Muahahaha · 17-02-2022 1:18pm

@loyatemu was more asking just in case there are ever small bits and pieces I need, it would be handy to have a bricks and mortar on the east coast somewhere to go to. I think its possible to pick up from Homebrewwests warehouse in Galway but I dont think they have a physical shop anymore. At least their shipping of 6.50 is pretty reasonable and its is quick too via DPD.

Anyone know if you have a homebrew that is on target for 4% ABV is there any formula to how much extra sugar you would add to get it to finish at 5% ABV? Would an extra 20% on top of the recipe do it and do you have to increase the yeast amount to account for it or just expect to ferment longer for the yeast to convert the sugar to alcohol?

loyatemu · 17-02-2022 1:47pm

free recipe builder and calculators here - play around with the recipe to get the ABV you want.

If it's just a kit, yeah add more sugar for more alcohol - shouldn't need more yeast unless you're going for a very high ABV.

500G of sugar into 20L of beer will give you about an extra 1% but it depends on how well the yeast attenuates.

raxy · 17-02-2022 1:56pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118646065#Comment_118646065

You'd want about 440g DME to bring it up 1 % based on a 23L batch.

For the bits & pieces if you go to the nationalhomebrewclub.ie you will find local groups you can join & find other brewers in your area. They'd have their own whats app groups & if your stuck for something someone may be able to sort you out until you can have it delivered.

Muahahaha · 17-02-2022 2:18pm

Thanks lads and will check the national homebrew club out as well, didnt know that was available as a resource.

Muahahaha · 28-02-2022 6:55pm

My brew is pretty much ready for kegging, gravity has remained constant for the last 4 days. Before I keg though I wanted to try to clear the cloudiness of it and believe geletin can do this job. I got some Dr.Oetker geletin from the baking section in Dunnes, it is in 12g sachets and says one sachet will set 570ml of liquid (for making desserts/jelly). Anyone know how much I would use for 22 litres of beer and if it should go in raw or diluted in some hot water first? And how long would it take to clear the beer, is t several days or more like 24-48 hours?

coolhandspan · 09-10-2022 5:23pm

Hi guys really enjoying reading through this thread.

A quick question. I brewed my first ever coopers lager. Followed all of the instructions and bottled it all up.

Left bottles for 2 weeks in House and 10 days in cold shed. Tried a bottle last night and it had a nasty aftertaste.

From reading through this I think it might be Fingal tap water. Might use campden tablets on next go...?

Any advice appreciated. Thanks.

BeerNut · 10-10-2022 2:47pm

It's hard to know with only "nasty" to go on. One way to find out for sure would be to bring a bottle to a meeting of your local homebrew club.

In general, though, "lager" kits rarely produce decent beer no matter what you do.

tommiet · 14-02-2023 5:36pm

Hello, I'm going to give this a go, Coopers 86 Days Pilsner 1.7kg, Coopers Malt Extract Light 1.5kg and 30 grams of Hallertauer Hersbrucker Leaf after 4 days of fermenting. Has anyone tried this before.

tommiet · 22-03-2023 5:22pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120240493#Comment_120240493

just in case anyone is wondering, this beer turned out quite good. I'll definitely brew it again.

MATTYON · 20-04-2023 12:10pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120388438#Comment_120388438

thats interesting,

i considered doing something similar with the coopers 86 day, but the place i buy from had no hops in stock, i went ahead without and although its ok, it is not as good as other pilsners i have brewed

might try that in the future

tommiet · 22-05-2023 5:03pm

Another delicious hack is this combination.

ferment for 20 days. then I kegged it and cooled it down to 1 degree and held it there for a month. very happy.

padre78 · 22-09-2023 12:49pm

Hey Folks,

Looking for some advice please. I am starting with a kit from Muntons and while i know the advice is normally to NOT follow the instructions in these kits, there's something that has me puzzled.

The kit is for a Belgian Style Ale, which sounds good. The instructions go along these lines....."When the gravity is below 1.014 syphon the beer into a sterilised fermenting bin leaving behind the yeast sediment. Add the spraymalt and then scoop half a cup of the yeast lees and pitch into the beer and stir gently. Close the fermenter and continue fermentation until ready to bottle."

So....i only have one fermenting bucket, do I need a second bucket or can I continue to ferment as normal but guessing i just wont get the same results?

Apologies if this is a really obvious, stupid question ☺️

Grimsupanoob · 12-10-2023 8:00am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121142716#Comment_121142716

So they are having you run a secondary fermentation, which is in this case to avoid yeast autolysis (and avoid the off flavors that come with it)

It is up to you thought if you want to follow this step. The more you get passionate about the brewing and want to perfect the beer, the more you will inevitably head down that route.

Aging or clarifying stages in Ale's can take a bit of time, and if you are not using fining agents like Gelatine to clear the floculation for instance, but it is always a great idea to have a second fermenting bucket ;)

Homebrew Beer Howto

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