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HOMEBREW Digest #0449
This file received at Mthvax.CS.Miami.EDU 90/06/28 03:13:11
HOMEBREW Digest #449 Thu 28 June 1990
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Mold?? Drat! (Jason Goldman)
repitching yeast from carboy, Colorado Brewer's Festival (Glenn T. Colon-Bonet)
Re: Homebrew Digest #445 (June 22, 1990) (GIBSON)
Hunter/Builder's Square (Algis R Korzonas +1 708 979 8583)
1990 Conference and Competition (Mike Fertsch)
Sanitation (Bill Crick)
Send submissions to homebrew%hpfcmr@hplabs.hp.com
Send requests to homebrew-request%hpfcmr@hplabs.hp.com
Archives available from netlib@mthvax.cs.miami.edu
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Date: Wed, 27 Jun 90 08:10:26 mdt
From: Jason Goldman <jdg@hp-lsd.cos.hp.com>
Subject: Mold?? Drat!
I'm not worrying or anything, but geez.
My last batch got bottled too soon, so I ended up with some gushing bottles
(no glass grenades yet - thank God for Grolsh bottles ;-). This time, I was
extrodinarily careful to be sanitary and decided to start checking my
specific gravity again (my hydrometer was getting bored, anyway). So,
everything is going great. After about a week, I transferred to the secondary.
In the primary, the beer looked pretty clean on top - just a few bubbles.
After one day in the secondary, my beer has what looks like small colonies
of mold on the top. This is despite the fact that I cleaned the secondary
carefully and siphoned using brand new hoses. Now, I tasted the beer when I
siphoned to the secondary and it tastes great (more filling), so there's
no question of throwing this batch away. It's just frustrating.
Has anybody else seen something similar? The beer is sitting at about 5.5%
alcohol right now, so I'm surprised to be seeing something like this occur.
Especially so quickly.
Regarding my last batch: The best thing about bottling in Grolsh bottles
exclusively is that you can relieve the pressure before the bottles blow.
(I don't want to hear about kegging ;-) After a week or two of relieving
the pressure once or twice a day, the beer is still overcarbonated but
you can pour it.
Jason
jdg@hp-lsd
Brew we must.
-arcane pun
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Date: Wed, 27 Jun 90 09:43:46 MDT
From: Glenn T. Colon-Bonet <gcb@hpfigcb>
Subject: repitching yeast from carboy, Colorado Brewer's Festival
Full-Name: Glenn Colon-Bonet
In Homebrew Digest #446, RussG asks about repitching from the carboy:
I have successfully reused the yeast at the bottom of the
carboy on about 6 batches (2 different yeast strains, 3 generations
each). I never actually turn the carboy over and dump out the
yeast, and I don't really know if that's a bad idea or not. It
just seems to me that since the top of the carboy doesn't remain
in contact with the beer, it doesn't have the protection of the
beer's yeast population or acidity to stop infections from forming.
So, what I typically do is sanitize my siphon hose very thoroughly,
rack the beer off and when the level gets near the bottom, I clamp
off the siphon hose and bring over a sanitized 1 qt starter bottle
with sterile wort in it. I then shake the carboy to suspend some
of the yeast slurry and unclamp the siphon hose. I add about
1/3 of the starter bottle size of the yeast slurry, then attach
a fermentation lock and let the starter go. It's usually active
very quickly. This technique has the disadvantage of making the
yeast go through an extra generation, but it's easy to do and doesn't
import a large amount of autolyzed yeast and old trub into your fresh
beer.
Also, for those that are in the area, Colorado is having its first
Brewer's Festival, featuring all of our *11* breweries! The event
is this weekend in Fort Collins, CO (home of 4 of the breweries)
from 11 AM to 7 PM in Old Town Square (near Mountain and College).
The breweries are Coors, Carver, Durango, Boulder, Breckenridge,
Old Colorado Brewing, Odell's, Coopersmith's, Walnut Brewing Co,
Wynkoop Brewing, and Anheuser Bush. The cost is $.50 per glass
or 11 glasses for $5. I hope you all can attend! And no, I'm not
affiliated with this event, just interested!
-Glenn
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Date: Wed, 27 Jun 90 09:22 MST
From: GIBSON@rvax.ccit.arizona.edu
Subject: Re: Homebrew Digest #445 (June 22, 1990)
Unfortunately, I have to ask you to remove my name from the mailing list, since
I will be moving to Albuquerque and this account will die. I've enjoyed the
reading, although finishing my dissertation has gotten me about 2 weeks behind
on reading it! Good luck, keep it up, and maybe I'll be able to rejoing from
ABQ in a few weeks. Until then....RDWHAHB. Ken Cornett
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Date: Wed, 27 Jun 90 11:44:33 mdt
From: hplabs!hp-lsd.cos.hp.com!ihlpl!korz (Algis R Korzonas +1 708 979 8583)
Subject: Hunter/Builder's Square
Someone recently said they could not find the Hunter thermostat
at their Builder's Square. I have a recent flyer from B.S. and
the page with the Hunter products is marked at the bottom for
limited markets. These are the codes at the bottom of the page:
CHI, AKR, ATL, AUS, CLE, COL, DAY, DET, IND, KCM, MIL, MIN, OKC, PHI,
PIT, RIC, SAN, STL, TOL, TUL
I can tell you that CHI is Chicago (because I got the ad) but you
can guess as well as I can on the other codes. If none of them
are in your area, maybe they can do an inter-store transfer.
What you want is the Hunter AIR STAT (builder's square stock #42205)
and in this flyer the price is $35.
For those of you who don't know what we're talking about, standard
refridgerator thermostats cover a range of about 35F to maybe 50F,
but suppose you wanted to brew at 60 or 70F? With the Hunter AIR
STAT, you plug your fridge into the thermostat, stick the thermostat's
temperature sensor inside the fridge, and program the AIR STAT to
whatever temp you want.
Al.
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Date: Wed, 27 Jun 90 14:38:13 -0400
From: Kevin Muhm <muhm@etl.army.mil>
Please remove me from this mailing list.
Kevin muhm
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Date: Wed, 27 Jun 90 12:42 EDT
From: Mike Fertsch <FERTSCH@adc1.adc.ray.com>
Subject: 1990 Conference and Competition
Now that the 1990 AHA Conference and Competition has come and went, can
someone who attended write up a "trip report" and post it to the net? Was
this year's conference worth it? Will I kick myself for not attending?
Why did I let my employer send me to Florida instead of California?
I might have blinked, but have the official AHA National competition
results been published? I don't subscribe to Compuserve, so I would have
missed any posting there. If anyone has a list of winners, please forward
it to the net or directly to me. Thanks!
Mike Fertsch -- fertsch@adc1.adc.ray.com
------------------------------
Date: 27 Jun 90 20:48:25 GMT
From: bnrgate!bnr-rsc!crick@uunet.UU.NET (Bill Crick)
Subject: Sanitation
For those of you who think they need to autoclave the entire house, and
kick the kids and dog out for a week to make beer, I submit the following
quote from an article about a brewery tour:
"In the [fermentation] warehouse, 1500 30 hectolitre oak barrels
slightly tilted to one side, and raised about six feet off the
ground are used as fermentation vessels. ... Suprisingly, primary
fermentation is completely open and conditions were not nearly
as sanitary as in other breweries I have visited. Even though the
floor was wet, and probably frequently hosed down, dirt was claerly
visible between and on the cobbles [ cobblestone and dirt floor].
.... Ever since the image of those worn barrels in that aging
cobblestone warehouse have made my elaborate attempts at sanitary
closed fermentation seem somewhat pointless."
Sounds like the place makes real swill huh?
The brewery?? Urquell brewery in Czechoslovakia that makes that discustingly
contaminated Pilsener Urquell!!!!
This article has been blatantly quoted from without permission! The source
is Zymurgy Vol. 13 No.2 Summer 1990.
Something I wondered about was the explaination that Urquell meant
"the original source of". My Father-outlaw grew up within 30km
of this brewery, and his explaination of the name was that Urquell
comes from Urqueller which basically means "Old Well", refering
to the brewery's source of Artesion water. Of course he could be wrong,
because at the age of 14 or 15 he left the area to go learn to fly
rocket powered fighter planes, so he learned to apreciate beer away
from home;-)
THe author does mention that low temperature may have helped avoid
contamination, and that got me thinking to some of the reasons that
I might not have seen any contamination problems:
I tend to brew my Lagers in the winter and these are the normal conditions:
Temperature outside is < -25C (IE: Too F***ing cold too do anything outside)
which would tend to keep biology outside fairly inactive.
Temperature in house about 70F, but humidity is low (<15%?).
Furnace regularly takes house air, and heats it to some high temperature
(100F < Tfurnace interior < 200F???) which would tend to reduce biology
as well.
On the other hand, I also brew in the summer when it is 90F outside
with 110% humidity, and the basement is a humid, damp, warm moldy mess,
and I still have no contamination problems????
Brewuis ergo Scum???? Bill Crick
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End of HOMEBREW Digest #449, 06/28/90
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