frederick7 wrote:
Hi Mad Scientist,

I found the post very helpful, but I'm still not sure how to properly apply these techniques/calculations to the BIABacus. The Maxi-BIAB calculator allowed you to specify the number of CMS headspace required during mash and boil, and the calculator indicated how many liters/cms to add at each stage. I was hoping I could do something similar with the BIABacus. Should I just forget about the BIABacus calculator and go back to the MaxiBIAB Calc?

No, hang on and someone else (on this thread) will give you support with the BIABacus using this technique. I was trying to pitch in and help out, but this technique/method of using a 19L pot for a 21L stumps me.

It looks like you do a double sparge and also add top-up water in the fermenter. I don't know the recommended amounts of water to use along the way.

Hi Frederick 7

I have had a quick look at your file, unfortunately I do not think that you will be able to get 21L VIF from a 19L pot. You could certainly give it a go, but I have heard that large dilution rates can be undesirable. But.....I have never Maxi BIABed, so maybe someone with actual hands on experience can advise better.

Oh.. and i am not sure about your kettle headspace negative problem either? I normally just concentrate on mash volume figure. As long as this is lower than your actual kettle volume you should be ok.

If you want to know what I changed on your file;
I added 4.88 Litres to "water added during boil" (this just replaces what gets boiled off), and added 7.5 litres to "water added to fermenter", and 7 Litres added to "water used in a sparge". This will give you a mash volume of 18.7L, and then during boil you will have 16.25 Litres (approx 3L headspace for safety).

I am submitting my guess to 'the experts' for Frederick's question. I read Ralph's write-up as a guide. I would do a single sparge with the 9L, using hot water, as Ralph describes, and then squeeze the bag real good.

Cheers GR

porchfiddler wrote:I hope I am posting this in the correct forum and I am allowed to use the latest Biabacus here.
I want to make this recipe from the current Brew Your Own magazine. I am having trouble with the statement "Sparge slowly with 170 °F (77 °C) water, collecting wort until the pre-boil kettle volume is around 5.9 gallons (22.3 L) and a gravity of 1. 046 (11.5 °P)." the 22.3L seems too much. Can someone look over my spreadsheet and the recipe and see if my entries look o.k?
Thanks, Porchfiddler

Hi there porch,

Posting the file here is perfect and you have done an excellent job .

The critical number when scaling is always the EOBV-A Section D. It is impossible to tell this from the original recipe but I think your entry of 19 L is a good one. It certainly wouldn't be higher so, good on you again!

As for the question re the, "Sparge slowly...", you can ignore all that. They are fly-sparging whereas we are full-volume BIABing. The instructions there are irrelevant to us.

So, you are good to go. Nice job!
PP

Probably porch. I'm running late but will check this later.

Also,

mally wrote:Hi Frederick 7

I have had a quick look at your file, unfortunately I do not think that you will be able to get 21L VIF from a 19L pot.

frederick, this is correct. I'll write more later today but in the meantime, please read this post and the end of this post.

I'm going to do some consecutive posts here so please check posts above and below to make sure you don't miss anything that relates to you.

porchfiddler wrote:Thanks PP, it wasn't so much the sparging bit, I thought my pre-boil volume should be close to his, is it because I'm doing a 90 min boil instead of a 60?

This is an excellent comment .

I've never thought of using this as an EOBV-A 'clue' before porch. There are a few recipe reports that do include it and it could prove to be a much more valuable clue, when available, than any of the others I currently use. Thank you!

What I found using your clue is that the 19 L EOBV-A yu chose for Section D looks like a great choice.

Here's how I 'investigated' this (Advanced users)...

1. In your file, I changed the boil time to 60 mins.

2. In section X, I changed the evaporatin rate to 3.3 L/hr. The reason I did this is because a lot of brewers and software defaults (incorrectly btw) to a default evaporation rate of 15% of the pre-boil volume. 15% of 22.43 L is about 3.3 L.

3. In the 'Adjust Volume Loss from Lauter to:' field in Section X, I typed in 1. The reason I did this is because the original recipe was a traditional brew and the usual liquor retained by grain ratio is 1L for each kg of grain.

4. In section X, I also changed the KFL and FPL to 0. The reason why I do this in 'recipe investigation' is because it forces VIF in Section B to be the same as EOBV-A.

Here's what your file looks like after doing this... So, the original recipe report has a pre-boil volume or 'Volume into Kettle (VIK)' of "around" 22.3 L. The BIABAcus, after making the above adjustments is showing a VIK of 23.06L. I'm happy with that as I have only guessed the evaporation rate above. The evaporation rate, in reality, could be wide-ranging.

Now, I am going to have a bit of a look at IBU's and colour to see if anything else there helps confirm our numbers. This is pretty hard as you have to know the ins and outs of existing software errors. If I assume that the software the original author has used is one of the main stream ones I am familiar with, then I can actually get the IBU's matching when I correct for the errors I know are in that program. So, that adds up nicely.

But, what about colour? That is nowhere near a match. What is going on there???? .

Uh oh! Hold on! Here's the problem. You had the SRM's in the EBC column. (We recently reversed those fields so an easy mistake to make.) I have just changed them to match the original recipe and, once again, if I make some adjustments for errors in the other program I think was used, I get confirmation.

Your final file...

So, everything is 'balancing' quite nicely now. The 19 L EOBV-A in Section Dis the right way to go.

Here's your file with the recipe detective stuff removed but your colours corrected.

Thanks for getting me on to this extra clue ,
PP

P.S. Please note Andy that I haven't corrected the colours on the right hand side.

I'm doing some consecutive posts here so please check posts above and below to make sure you don't miss anything that relates to you.

frederick7 wrote:Thanks Richard! Per my previous post, I'm trying to figure out my first MaxiBIAB using the new BIABacus calculator. I'd like to use the sample Amarillo APA recipe just to keep things simple. I entered all the known information into the calculator, but am not sure where to go from here. Can someone please provide some guidance?

Hi there Fred,

Firstly, it is very important that you read my last post here to you written this morning and the links it contains. Once you understand those concepts, the below will be easy .

Okay...

Above you said you have entered in all known info. The only changes I can see from the original BIABacus file are your kettle dimensions and desired VIF.

If you were pure BIABing, that is all you would need to do. Cool eh?

But, we are maxi-BIAB'ing here and Section W is blank. We need to get some numbers in there and that's what we will do but we need to make sure the basic ground is covered first.

Maxi-BIAB

Once you have read the links I posted this morning, you will realise a few things...

Firstly, the current BIABrewer.info Maxi-BIAB guide is totally extreme and I know that replacing it is on the list of things to do. That thread should actually be called, 'extreme brewing'. Anyway, as mally indicated, getting 21 L from a 19 L pot is out of control. What I want to do here is get things practical and realistic.

The next thing yo will be aware of once you have studied the links is that sparging, sparging does not add as much 'efficiency' as you think. In fact, if you put as much water as you comfortably can into your kettle during the mash, there is very little reason to sparge. Make sure you understand why by reading those links and asking any questions.

The third thing is that any dilutions should always be added as soon as they can.

What is Maxi_BIAB?

Once you have understood and asked any questions on the above, we cn move onto the BIABAcus.

Maxi-BIAB is any sort of BIAB that does not put all the water needed for a brew in at the beginning of the brew. If you are not pure BIAB'ing (full volume mashing) then you are doing some sort of Maxi-BIAB.

There are only four places you can add water to the brew after the mash. These are listed in Section W.

So, make sure that you look at each of those four 'places' and ask any questions on if they are not clear.

Let's look at a file...

Maxi-BIAB is always about juggling numbers, time, money and recipe integrity. The BIABacus is the only software that enables you to see the effects of this juggle and therefore enable you to make informed 'Maxi-BIAB' decisions. And, if you are doing Maxi-BIAB, you need to be informed as an extreme Maxi-BIAB will not match the original recipe and will cause you a lot of trouble, time and extra grain.

Let's have a look at this file which is [b]not what I would brew.[/b] I've had a quick play around with some numbers in Section W whilst gradually increasing the VIF in Section B.

It is very much a juggling act. During the juggle, we need to keep an eye on all the intersactions between Sections B, the right hand side of Section C (and D a bit), Section K, and Section W.

The only way to learn this interactions at the moment is to play so let's do a tiny bit of that...

Playing with the file.

In section W, delete the 3.5 L from 'Water Added Before the Boil' and move it instead up to, 'Water Used in a Sparge'.

If you do this, the only thing that will change is the right hand side of Section C. In other words, the amount of grain we need drops from 5060 grams to 4370 grams.

Sounds good eh?

Well, anything can look good in Maxi-BIAB if you sacrifice the integrity of the recipe and we have done that already by adding such a large percentage of the water as dilutions. (Dilutions are the last three input fields in Section W).

It is very important to remember this.

The principle here is that the more value (less grain being required) you see from moving water from 'Water Added Before the Boil' to 'Water USed in a Sparge', the more it reflects how other dilutions are compromising the integrity of the brew.

This is not easy stuff to understand.

The thing is though that you can keep adding dilutions and increase your VIF but the more you do this, the more distorted the brew becomes.

On this recipe, I would not go any further than we have. In other words, move the 3.5 L as suggested and brew as is. That particular recipe is excellent and can be hammered in all different directions so you wouldn't have a problem.

That gives you 14.5 L from a 19 L pot and that is very good.

The 'Headspace' thing...

You asked about the headspace thing previously Fred. Now that we have entered some numbers into Section W, can you see how Sections S and T have no negative values now?

When you saw negative numbers before, there will have also been a red warning pop up in Section B, saying...

WARNING: Mash Volume exceeds kettle size.

You won't see that warning now. Keep an eye on those warnings though as they will tell you when you are getting out of control.

If you have moved the 3.5 L I was talking about above, you will see, in Sections S and T, how much depth and headspace your kettle will have at various times.

All make sense now?

Hold on, there is one headspace ambiguity I never noticed until now.

This is why the questions asked here are so valuable.

I just noticed a negative number on the first line of Section T. This is what was probably bothering you Fred. It is nothing to worry about as it is irrelevant to Maxi-BIAB. So, just ignore the first lines of Sections S and T.

I'll work out a way of the first line not displaying for Maxi-BIAB'ers - hopefully. Just, on a quick think, I'm not sure it will be easy. Adding all the Maxi-BIAB stuff into the BIABAcus has been incredibly difficult and, to save a single line, '[Hot] Strike Water Needed (SWN):' was intended to be used by Maxi-BIAB'ers etcv, etc, etc. It's a very long story.

Let me see if I can come up with something better.

So, Fred, your question resulted in me seeing something I have never noticed before. Same as the last question here.

Good on you ,
PP

P.S. Don't get too cocky though. Make sure you spend a fair bit of time absorbing all the principles in the last two posts .

[Sorry if the below is a bit rambly but I just had a Skype with BobBrews and he got me drunk .]

porchfiddler wrote:Thanks, PP! Of course that was a far more thorough answer than I was expecting! I'm glad though...

Like a lot of questions in this thread, I originally started out thinking I could give a fast answer to your pre-boil volume question. In other words, I was fully expecting to just write, 'Yes'.

Firstly, thanks for reading and acknowledging my answer. I am fully aware that many readers, as soon as they see a long answer, will refuse to read it. Who has time to do so?

Time is always a big issue. Sometimes though, slowing down and reading one thing properly can save you hours. For example...

I'm glad I didn't answer your question when I first saw it as I was racing off to work. If I had, I would have missed at least one important thing for you as well as one important thing for me.

That one important thing for me will save me a lot of time down the track. So, not rushing served me well here.

I should apologise though because the 'thorough' answer I gave was more for my benefit than yours as I was very excited to think on the EOBV-A from the different angle your question inspired. I hope you didn't mind me writing all the 'Recipe Detective - Advanced' stuff. If any of it made sense then you are doing really well . (There's also some others I know who read this thread and will have benefited from that part of the post.)

This thread is the one I spend the most time on although I never intend to. I still delude myself into thinking that some of the questions asked here can be answered quickly but am continually surprised at how questions like yours create real, "Wow! That is brilliant!" moments.

I'm not a maths nerd believe it or not - probably just a bit of a nerd in many areas. When it comes to brewing, I'd love to be a 'general practitioner'. In other words, like your medical GP, my personal goal would be to to be able to give you good advice immediately, if appropriate, and, if not, be able to refer you to the right specialist.

Hold on! Are there any specialists . (Can only think of two or three off the top of my head but there will be a lot more.)

But, that doesn't mean I didn't love your 1cm per litre thing. How cool is that!!!!


PP

BabyfaceFinster wrote:I've already had a bunch of help on this recipe for a Best Bitter.... I was told that section D was not calculated correctly.

How you going Stew?

I can't find where anyone helped you with this Best Bitter recipe? Anyway, see in Section D how there are no numbers on the right hand side under 'What you will use'? This means there is some critical information missing on the left or at the beginning.

The first thing we need to put in there is the AA% of the hops. I'm going to use this site to get some average AA%'s for your hops.

Next on the Dry Hop addition, I'm going to just type DR into the third field.

The other problem is that you have two numbers at the top of Section D. There would be very few cases where you would need to do this. So, two questions... Where did the 20.83 L come from? Where did the 25 IBU's come from?

Was there a source recipe to this? If so, is there a link? Make sure you include these in the BIABacus when you can.

Anyway, here is the fixed file.The other critical fields that need completing are the first line of Section E.

Finally on the actuals, you are missing the KFL in Section L. See if you can take a guess at that. If you can, you will get an actual EOBE result in Section P.

Good news on the kettle ,
PP

P.S. Try to save the file with the same naming as I've done. It will help you to keep track of versions and recipes. Upgrade to 1.3 on your next brew as one of the things you can do in 1.3 is type in IBU's only at the top of Section D. This may have been something you needed in this file - not sure until I know if there was a source recipe.

Hey there Stew,

BabyfaceFinster wrote:In that thread you had recommended the 20.83 based on past findings....

Ah! The above comments of mine actually didn't apply to the Best Bitter recipe, they applied to a Centennial Blonde in that thread. With the Centennial Blonde, we were scaling it whereas with this Best Bitter, we are designing. In the other thread, the Best Bitter recipe seemed to get abandoned half way through and was suddenly replaced with the Centennial Blonde. What happened there?

Anyway, if we had stayed on track with the Best Bitter recipe, the next bit we would have explored would have been designing the hop bill. We also would have noticed then an error in PR1.2. In the last post I wrote...

PistolPatch wrote:Upgrade to 1.3 on your next brew as one of the things you can do in 1.3 is type in IBU's only at the top of Section D. This may have been something you needed in this file - not sure until I know if there was a source recipe.

This is one of those situations .

Anyway, there are several ways to get around that bug in PR1.2. In this case, I simply typed in 24.5 L into EOBV-A of Section D as that is the EOBV-A in Section K. Notice how the hop weights on both sides match?

You can now post your Recipe Report in the other thread.

The file below has the above correction. [Omg, wtf is going on with your file names Stew - lol! Never seen so many % signs ]. You can now post the Recipe Report in the other thread. When you do, someone will probably point out that Best Bitters should be in the range of 25-35 IBU's whereas yours is only 22.5. So, that's one problem.

When you post the Report, make sure you delete any blank sections and lines otherwise it will look a bit crappy. Hit the 'Preview' button before you post to make sure it looks okay.

Good stuff on the AA%, trub loss etc.
PP

Good stuff Stew on the quality .

Looking forward to your updates. Don't hesitate to put your next recipe file up here. I think you have it pretty under control so it will only take two seconds to check.

[center]metalhophead[/center]

That is a cracker of a question!

Lambert told you to put them in Section F and that is exactly the right place because at the bottom of section F it says,
Amounts not scaled. Check they will suit this batch.
And, here you are doing exactly just that.

Perfect! (I hope you saw that red warning in the BIABacus. By your writing though I am not sure that you did though - lol)

Anyway, what to do?

Well, the critical question here is when the coriander and orange peel are being added?

You've said that,"the original recipe calls for 10 gallons but I am making 2.5." Fred, you know better than this by now. All recipe problems and all the time we spend here is because of poor terminology. Stop the cycle of abuse .

If you want to be serious about copying a recipe (and I know you are) you have to get very serious about terminology. If you don't then in many recipes you would be lucky to get within 15% of truly replicating it.

This is the perfect example...

Most of the recipe questions that we deal with here are based around trying to establish what the volume of a brew was once the boil had finished and it was cooled. We call this EOBV-A and every single recipe should have that as the main volume figure yet the BIABacus is the only that does it.

Why does the BIABacus do it? Because every critical brewing number stems forward and backward from that one volume figure. Why does other software not do it? Because a few early guys got stuck on one programming angle and kept with it, faulted though it was, version after version, because correcting that most basic error would cost them personally. Other inexperienced brewers who know how to program then have copied the other guys and continued the errors. We've talked on how ridiculous this is before. Personally, I feel like sending some of these guys a bill!

Honestly, these guys have bastardised so many simple things and caused so much confusion. Anyway, instead of me getting frustrated , let's get back to you Fred...

Let's look at the obvious....

I was chatting to some of the behind the scenes guys here the other day and we were talking about education and how the hardest thing on this site is not education, it is re-education due to so many things.

Brewing is actually really simple but the crap thrown at all brewers from so many different directions makes it a huge mess.

This one question asked by you Fred here should be so simple to answer but the whole terminology and culture of software and brewing make it impossible to answer atm.

The answer is actually dead simple...

Firstly, ask the author when they added the coriander and orange peel. Pre-boil, end of boil or into the fermentor? If the latter, did they do it on day one or later?

Whenever they added it, what was the volume of the wort at that stage?

If you can get the answers to those questions then the answer will become one of simple maths - you might be able to just divide by four. But, without knowing the above, you really are only guessing.

I am totally happy with people guessing as long as they are conscious that they are doing just that. My personal opinion is that if you are trying to copy a recipe that requires any guessing then you need to be very conscious of your reasons for wanting to copy such a recipe.

Fair enough?

You mightn't be happy with my next statement though ... I guarantee that 95% of the recipes you find published on the internet, even 'officially', are not published in a manner you can duplicate. (To be honest, it would be more than 99%.) Throw five at me and let's see how we go - honestly, it is that bad.

If the Original Recipe was Correctly Written

Old time readers of this thread will be well aware by now that the only decent and scaleable recipe report you will currently find is from the BIABacus.

Section F is for oddities like coriander and orange peel. There is enough flexibility in the BIABacus to put this miscellaneous stuff in, with detail but, to be honest, I'd have to think on how the orange peel and coriander could be typed into the BIABacus.

For now though it is a mute point because, from the original recipe, we don't know when they were added and what the volume was at that point.

[center]frederick7[/center]

Just caught your post. I'm a bit stuck on the following...

"If I limit my VIF to 14L, per your recommendation, it seems like that it should mutate the recipe too much."

Can you give a bit more detail on this?

In normal times I would spend time looking up our old files and posts but unfortunately I am being hammered from too many different directions atm.

The rest of your questions looked clear. Hopefully some others will answer those ones.

All the best ,
PP

Fred,

We can't determine the EOBV-A of the original recipe from your post above...

You need to go back over our old posts that concerned BeerSmith. Pay particular attention to the beginning of this post.

You'll see that the only way I could get the EOBV-A was from seeing the original .bsm file. Within the .bsm file is a clear answer. Nut. do they put it in a recipe report? No! Remember, 'Batch Size', in many programs, especially in BeerSmith can mean at least one of two entirely different volume numbers.

This is one of many reasons why I want to send them a bill for my time!


PP

Here is the first iteration of my first BIAB. Any help in analyzing it would be appreciated. Also, suggestions for further fill in.

I don't know the AA% of the hops yet as I haven't purchased they yet.

Also, not sure of the naming convention.. I hope this works.. If not, I can change it per suggestions.

Thanks,