Post #951 made 13 years ago
Good day everyone. I would like to do my first double batch and it needs to be a MAXI, also a first. What are the max limits to add water to the boil or fermentor? Should the hop bill be increased any for a MAXI?

My method of madness is to add 13.3L / 3.5 gallons of pre-boiled water to the kettle at EOBV, this way I can top up the kettle headspace as found in the BIABacus, section T. To find this FINAL kettle headspace I delete the 13.3L valve in 'water added during boil', section W.

I brewed this before as a single batch and it was a favorite at a club APA showdown, but was not to style.

Does this MAXI look legit?

EDITED AFTER POSTING 2/12/2013: I'm now thinking I will have some headspace after I pull the bag and squeeze. It seems I can add 11.5L / 3 gallons BEFORE THE BOIL. What do you think? This is my first MAXI.

~richard z mad scientist
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Last edited by Mad_Scientist on 13 Feb 2013, 05:33, edited 2 times in total.
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Post #952 made 13 years ago
Thanks for looking that over PP.

1. Changed this... numbers are much more along the lines of what I expected. Don't know how I missed that. :headhit:

2. Fixed, didn't realize that was something I could edit.

3. "The BIABacus will 'guess' that you are using percentages and a red warning will pop up when you have finished typing in your grain bill." I started from scratch with a new copy of the BIABacus and this time I didn't type "75%, or .75". I don't know how it was reformatted in the first place, but I couldn't change it back either. I think what happened is I typed "75" in first but it did what you can see in the sheet attached. For some reason it doesn't carry through the 75% it turns it into 71.4%?? :scratch: So last time I then tried 75% and then even tried 0.75 to fix it. Neither worked and somehow the cell was reformatted in the process. To make this section even more fool proof maybe adding something to the end of your "Note: Percentages may be typed into the Grams column above. (i.e.. 75% = 75)" would help.

4. Fixed. I put the Brew length value in instead of EOBV-A. Just didn't read what was being asked for carefully enough. :headhit:

5. For the chilling section I plan on doing a no chill, but after a 10 minute Whirlpool. Hence the "Chilling Method" would not begin until -10mins. If this is wrong please let me know and I will fix it.

6. Fixed. I changed the "Sparge" value for this to help get my Mash Volume low enough for my Keggle. I will boil/sparge with as much water as I can, but I might have to hold another Gal or so back till it is time to go to the fermenter. Just to make sure that I don't push the envelope too much with my keggle.

Thanks again for the help.
Caz

PS. You have spelled my name completely wrong in a different way on both posts :)
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Post #953 made 13 years ago
Sorry guys. I have a Logitech keyboard and on the far bottom left is a button that closes your browser window. I've just spent a bit over 90 minutes of pretty careful writing, replying in reverse order to cazadoro right through to checking on djseaton. It happens about once in every 6 months I hit that incredibly badly designed button.

If you were allowed to swear on this site, you would see a string of the most vile swear words you could ever imagine.

In my reply to Mad_Scientist, I had written that I would try and answer his question tonight as I don't like seeing anyone's recipe scaling questions sitting here for any length of time.

There were two other paragraphs I had written to Mad_Scientist. These mainly talked about how there are many members here capable of answering his question and that everyone should feel free in this thread to try and answer each others questions.

It's much more interesting for the 'old scaleys' like me and, as most of us 'old scaleys' have something to do with the BIABAcus, seeing how you are thinking is of tremendous benefit. You will always learn a lot when trying to scale a recipe and, if you choose to try and answer a scaling question, we are happy to jump in and make any corrections or offer any help if necessary.

So, have a crack! It's interesting for us old scaleys (and quicker!), might be a bit of fun for you and the site will benefit as a whole.

... As for the rest of you, I'll have another go tomorrow night maybe. There were a lot of excellent points you guys raised. Hopefully the reply I write tomorrow will have as much detail as I wrote in the lost post as it was very considered detail. Annoying stuff to say the least!!!!

Next post is focused on your question MS,
PP
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Post #954 made 13 years ago
I'm going to focus on Mad-Scientist's question in this post but haven't forgotten you others :). Please see my last post above.

[center]Mad-Scientist's Maxi_BIAB[/center]

Richard, I've just spent less than a minute looking at your file and, all I can say is...

I'm in a better mood now :P. Everything looks very nice and tidy in just that one glance. Good on you :peace:.

The 20.67 L in Section D gives me confidence that you have put that number in consciously. That's always the hardest number for 'old scaleys' and you have provided it. That never happens!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, let's have a look at some other things....

Some Pedantic Stuff

Points deducted in Section E - mash temp and time not specified :angry:. (From the below though, I can tell that is just a 'typo' on your part. You know what the temp is but missed typing it in. I do that all the time :P).)

[But, just noticed you had typed in 23.0 C in the grain temp field. Strike temp field will not populate until you fill in the mash temp. I think you already know this though ;)]

Points added in Section G - very nice! (In the post I just lost here, I talked a lot about the importance of Section G. Every time I see that section filled in, I love it!)

Points added in Section I - very nice again! (That's the only bit of the BIABacus that allows you to really 'talk' to another brewer. Important to me.)

Points added in Section H - once again, that indicates to me you have a handle on everything and really are planning/considering your brew. (Same goes with Sections ABC etc., and I even saw your notes in the checklist ;)).

[center]The Important Stuff[/center]

A quick note to new all-grainers or BIABAcus users

From the above, you'll see that that I think MS has done a superb job on providing all the info we need to get straight to the guts of his question. I don't like writing that last sentence as this thread is not about getting everything right in your first post to it. It's all about putting a bit of time in, not much, and then letting the other members know where you are getting stuck.

MS is a very experienced brewer and no new all-grainer or member should hope to master the BIABacus as well as he has done on his first try. If any new brewer or all-grainer can get the first field of Section D completed or right, I'd be amazed!

Anyway, let's move on...

Volume Questions

From the file you posted, you have all the hard stuff covered (e.g. EOBV-A in section D etc.) Your edit note is what has my attention. Going to copy it here so as to close a screen ;)...
EDITED AFTER POSTING 2/12/2013: I'm now thinking I will have some headspace after I pull the bag and squeeze. It seems I can add 11.5L / 3 gallons BEFORE THE BOIL. What do you think? This is my first MAXI.
That edit tells me you are using Section W correctly and fully understand the volume implications. In other words, if you move the 13.3 L you currently have in, 'Water Added During the Boil' to 'Water Added Before the Boil', your kettle will still not over-flow.

In fact...

I think you have nailed it!

When starting this post, I fully expected that I would, at this point be asking you to read a series of links on Max-BIAB etc, etc. Usually any maxi-BIAB question involves squeezing the last possible drop out of a small kettle.

It's only just hit me now that your question is the first we've had here of its type. You are not trying to squeeze every last drop out, you are simply trying to get a bit more out of your kettle.

Moving all dilutions as far forward as you can is exactly what you have done and that's why I think you have nailed it.

Good on you!!! That means there is only one thing left to talk about...

Water Used in Sparge

The only thing we need to look at is whether, in your situation, it would be worth you sparging that 13.3 L as you could do the whole lot. This is a very individual question as it depends on so many issues. For a start it requires more vessels and, especially at these volumes, it's a total PITA.

NOTE: If any new brewers are reading this, you should never even consider sparging if you can fit all the water you need for your brew into your kettle at the start of the mash. (There are almost no exceptions to this rule.)

Advanced Stuff

MS, I usually double-batch and can't fit about 15% of my TWN into the kettle. I never bother sparging those 12 litres and I have never noticed an incredible EIK drop. (Not too sure how up to date you are on my posts in this area but hopefully, you'll know that, in my experiments, there is no difference between a full-volume mash and a mash and sparge if you can get all the water in at the start.

The BIABacus is indicating though that you and I, because we can't get all the water in at the start, will need about 15% more grain if you choose not to sparge. This is due to the low EIK auto-efficiency estimate. I currently over-ride my BIABAcus auto-efficiency default (Section X - first line) by 5% on my single batches (but all my pH stuff etc, etc is great) and 10% on my doubles. Unfortunately, the formula we have is currently linear but the reality is that EIK is far from a linear equation.

In the Maxi-BIAB file you posted, I would over-ride the auto-efficiency by 10% if you think you have your pH etc under control. I think that would get you within 5% but, you and I both know that you can tell nothing form a single brew.

;)
PP
Last edited by PistolPatch on 14 Feb 2013, 23:18, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #956 made 13 years ago
Sorry PP for your loss (of data)!!!
A19TGaKCMAEtqUI.jpg
Thank you PP for the nice reply and thumbs up for my first MAXI. I love the BIABacus. I am attaching my revised BIABacus for further study, by anyone you wants to give feedback.

It is great to know how you use the auto-adjust efficiency. I set it at 5%. I think you got those two numbers reversed. 10% brought it to an efficiency I normally see for single batches. This MAXI holds back 11.3L/3G. I think the grain bill and efficiency is alright, hoping anyway.

~richard
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Last edited by Mad_Scientist on 15 Feb 2013, 03:48, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #957 made 13 years ago
[EDIT: A much better Kettle Efficiency/Gravity Graph and explanation can now be found here]

Lol on the pic MS :P. Think I'll leave re-writing the 90 minute 'lost' post until tomorrow otherwise I'll end up having a beer and the heat wave we have here has led to way too many beers this week :o.

Pretty sure that the only change in your file is the adjusting the auto-efficiency by 10% so all should be good there*. Let's have a look though at...

[center]The 5% versus 10% thing. (Advanced stuff.)[/center]

That actually wasn't a typo but I'm not too sure if I will do a very good job at explaining why. Here goes...

In the advanced section of my last post, I wrote, "...the formula we have is currently linear but the reality is that EIK is far from a linear equation."

The auto-efficiency formula is actually quite good already, even in it's linear form, particularly if you do a 90 minute mash. There are two ways we wish to improve the formula though.

The Time Factor

The current BIABAcus auto-efficiency formula has no time factor written into it. This is the immediate priority.

Your EIK will be lower if you mash for say, 60 minutes rather than 90 minutes. This time effect is logarithmic not linear so, to add this factor requires data which BIABrewer.info is asking members to provide in the Mash Gravity Figures Needed for BIABacus thread. Note that, if contributing to that thread, three measurements now need to be taken for the data to be useful.

The 'True' Liquor to Grain Ratio Factor

This is what the current BIABAcus auto-efficiency formula is based on. Basically, the more water that touches the grain at some point pre-boil, the better your 'Efficiency into Kettle (EIK)'. In other words, of the 'Total Water Needed (TWN)' of a brew, the less you use as straight dilutions, the better your EIK.

This principle also means that a beer with a high original gravity will result in a lower EIK than a 'smaller' beer.

But, this is not a linear function. Like the time factor, it is also logarithmic. Have a look at this pic which I have drawn up only to explain the linear/logarithmic problem. In other words, it is not accurate in several ways...
LG Ratio versus EIK.jpg
Let's say that where the red and green lines intersect is a 1.050 original gravity brew that has been full-volume mashed (or sparged).

I'm going to be a bit less general than the 5% and 10% figures I gave you in the last post. I don't like doing this on open forum as so many things can affect EIK and the point of the BIABacus is to get the new user in the ballpark better than anything else can rather than lead a new user into blindly thinking that their numbers should match any estimates.

With that being said, in my situation, on average, I tend to get about 8% higher EIK, than the BIABAcus auto-efficiency on a 1.050 brew. Let's say though that I did one of two things...

1. Let's say I did that 1.050 brew but held some water back for dilutions because I couldn't fit it in my kettle. (This is your situation).

2. Or, let's say, I did a 1.058 brew instead of a 1.050 brew but had no dilution water.

The above two situations, depending on how much dilution water was involved are basically the same. What I have noticed on my brews is the linear formulas we currently use, slightly over-emphasise the EIK loss on these brews. (Please bear in mind, that we need a lot of people to contribute figures in this area before we can quantify these conclusions to any reasonable degree.)

This over-emphasis is simply due to the logarithmic reality versus the linear estimation we are currently using. Distortions are not major around the central 1.050 point.

So, MS, that is why on a 1.050 brew that I am double-batching and, due to kttle size limitations, am forced to use about 20% of my water as a dilution, I only over-ride by 5%. (It possibly should be even closer to the 8% I currently use on a 'full-volume' brew. Until many brewers can do lots of brews testing this, we simply won't know. The BIABacus design makes collecting the necessary data possible for the first time.)

So that's the logic behind the 5% and 10% bit :P,
PP

* Not sure if you had it in the first file but I noticed in this one you have made the, 'Kettle Shape Volume Adjustment'. First one I've seen :thumbs:. I'm sure you have this right but to double-check, your input there tells me you are using a keggle with a base that curves upwards rather than downwards.
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Last edited by PistolPatch on 15 Feb 2013, 22:16, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #958 made 13 years ago
PistolPatch wrote: The 'True' Liquor to Grain Ratio Factor

This is what the current BIABAcus auto-efficiency formula is based on. Basically, the more water that touches the grain at some point pre-boil, the better your 'Efficiency into Kettle (EIK)'. In other words, of the 'Total Water Needed (TWN)' of a brew, the less you use as straight dilutions, the better your EIK.
We are using a Lauter Tun system in our Maxi Biab setup. If I would use all the water that I can't mash with to sparge (e.g. on my last brew I used 3.0l of water added to the boil) and we would use that excess sparge water as a waterboil addition.

How could I make that translatable in the Biabacus?
Just counting it as sparge water?

EDIT:
Another question, how does making a brewing at higher efficiency affect the flavor profile given by the malt?
Does being 10% points more efficient make for a completely different tasting beer.

Extra edit:
I think I found a small bug, in Section Q the amount of bottles required seemed to be based on the VIF number in Section L instead of the VAP number in Section O.
Last edited by Dauthi on 15 Feb 2013, 23:33, edited 7 times in total.

Post #959 made 13 years ago
Hi there Dauthi,

Before I get to your post above, I might write your section of the long email I lost the other night which refers to your post here.

- Cloudy Wort: This is not a problem but you shouldn't have particles of matter in the wort. Any brewer, traditional or otherwise, should not pulverise their grain in the crush let alone turn it to flour. See The BAsics of BIAB Chemistry and What should my grain crush be like?. Boil length also affects clarity so you are better boiling it than letting it settle assuming you don't have a ridiculously coarse bag, fine crush etc ;). All will settle out.

- Evaporation: You mentioned, " right now I just use a bowl as a huge domed lid resting on the pot handles." This actually won't reduce your evaporation rate significantly. If it is, what that means is that the things you want driven off in the boil are condensing and dripping back in back in. To reduce the evaporation rate significantly while preventing bad stuff dripping back in, you really need a floating bowl. This reduces the surface area of the wort that has direct access to the atmosphere.

- Clear rubber hoses etc: Be very careful with what hose you buy. A lot can cause really bad flavours in your beer even at low temperatures. If you are transferring hot wort, you will need to use silicone hose - nothing else. (Great stuff again on the use of Section N ;).

- Correct Calculation of IBU's: The answer is that there are no formulas in any software that can estimate IBU's correctly. I had a long ramble written here the other night but I usually need beer to write those :). As you mentioned, no hop estimate formulas account for post-boil hop additions which actually do add some IBU's (sometimes a lot). To compensate for the absence of any good formulas, the BIABAcus has Section G. It's the only software that allows the user to record in a defined manner their chilling and hop management procedure. If you want to read some of my rambles on this, search my posts that have the keywords 'Tinseth' 'Garetz' and 'Rager'. Also try the phrase 'hop estimate formulas' and 'chilling myths'.

As for FWH, that's an even harder area when it comes to IBU estimates. We simply don't have enough knowledge at this stage. I have written some posts here on how to create a FWH recipe. Try 'FWH and there should be one of these posts in the last 4 months.

- Sugar Extraction of Malts/Flavour: I think crush, temp and ph are the important things in mashing. More stuff though you can find in a link contained in 'cloudy wort' above. As for specialty malts, there's a thread hashie started here. In this post, I have a link to an excellent BeerSmith podcast with Gordon Strong, a part of which looks at this specialty malt thing.

- Section O: There are several parts of the BIABacus, especially the latter sections, that have been designed so that they will not populate unless you have put the required actual figures in. This forces the user into using the BIABacus consciously. Post your file up here and we'll see if we can find what actual figure is missing.

- Adding sparged water post-boil: You should be adding any wort to the kettle before the boil starts and the BIABacus assumes best practice. Regardless, you must include that wort as 'Water Used in a Sparge' for the gravity efficiency estimates to work correctly. Let's say if, on the brew day, you added the wort after the boil started, all you have to remember to do is add that wort to whatever start of boil volume figure you recorded.

- Brewing Efficiency / Flavour: Can't answer this one right now as I'm heading out the door. Will find some poss for you on this later. It's a very good question that few people ever consider :salute:.

- Section Q Error: To help me sort this, can you post your file up? This will help me double-check something.

Gotta race ;)
PP
Last edited by PistolPatch on 16 Feb 2013, 08:25, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #960 made 13 years ago
[center]Can you all please check that the following BIABacus has fixed any errors you have reported?[/center]

The file below is intended to be the third Pre-Release. Does this file correct any errors you have noticed or already reported? Has it made some improvements you were after?

Your reporting of errors and improvements is invaluable.

Even, what you think might be a small error is worth reporting. We don't want to see the thousands of hours of work that has gone into this project spoiled by a few errors on release. There is no reason the official BIABacus should have any bugs if we all chip in.

Even once a pre-release is written, it takes several hours to publish and we still miss things such as changing sheet names, version numbers etc. All these things are important.

Here is the file we would like you to check before we post it in the pre-release thread...
BIABacus PR1.26 - American Pale Ale - NRB's Amarillo APA - Batch 1.xls
The Changelog

This was a very difficult version to write as it changes the grain colour input field from SRM to EBC as well as finding and fixing a hop error that would occur in the rarest of scenarios. The user would rightly think that such changes would take five minutes to re-write but it has taken many attempts of many hours to get just those two changes completed in the right way.

I think I am safe to say that this is the only site you will find where the programmers listen carefully and respect what you write. If they are willing to do this, then, please do your best to help them. Whilst I have only mentioned colour and a small IBU change here, several other subtle but very important corrections or improvements have been made in 1.26 above, and they are completely due to members actively giving feedback.

This makes a big difference.

Please take the time to check and report anything we haven't fixed or improved. Let's give it 48 hours and, if no improvements or corrections, we will make this, hopefully, the last pre-release so as we can focus more on the site structure and BIABAcus help.

Thanks in advance,
Pat
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Last edited by Pat on 17 Feb 2013, 00:16, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #961 made 13 years ago
Hey guys
Just enjoying my 1st glass of the IPA you helped me with. Todd's IPA, It's great! Hooked on biab, no extract twange & great tasting beer!
Nice aroma, refreshing & great beer overall!
A little cloudy, may have to try secondary next time but I did burn a hole in my bag this batch.
Efficiencies are a bit low but part of the problem was I believe using hot tap water for the TWN instead of cold.
Thanks again for the help guys.
Attached is the biabacus file for the recipe.
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Post #962 made 13 years ago
PistolPatch wrote:Welcome back cazadora ;). I'm off to work now but maybe someone can help you sooner than I can. Otherwise, will check later today. (Hold on. Looks like Bob may have got you sorted :)).
djseaton wrote:If i can not get 23lts what will i get?
dj, in a rush but I've attached a BIABAcus file here for your recipe.

There's still a problem with your pot dimensions (Section B). I've put some figures in that make the pot volume read 23 litres. You'll need to check those.

The main things you need to look at are the right hand sides of Section C and D. These tell you the weights of ingredients you will need for the brew.

Section K tells you how much water you need etc.

In section W, you'll see I have put in some dilutions. These dilutions increase the yield from your kettle. (Make sure you read those posts I mentioned above in the recipe integrity thread.) They are on the high side but I think you can run with these today without any major problems.

The end result is that you should be able to get 19 L into your fermentor for this brew.

Gotta race,
PP
Hi Pistol,

Thanks for the responce, i started this brew before i saw your uploaded file.
I stayed with the same quanties as i mentioned in the early post, and just played it by ear, the best way to learn for me is to get stuck in and the learn from any mistakes i make.

I could not wait to get started in all honesty. But i appriciate your effort and work.

Thank you
As for the pot dimensions, they looked right to me, and it was 40cm high.
My grain bill was slighlty higher than the ones in the excel file you provided.
Last edited by djseaton on 17 Feb 2013, 18:51, edited 7 times in total.

Post #963 made 13 years ago
Strengthnhealth wrote: A little cloudy, may have to try secondary next time but I did burn a hole in my bag this batch.
Efficiencies are a bit low but part of the problem was I believe using hot tap water for the TWN instead of cold.
Secondary in rarely needed. Other factors may be clouding a wort. pH may be off or you just have to many proteins floating around? Just brew a bit more and see if all your beers are a bit cloudy before you try correcting it. This is a very forgiving passion. No two beers are alike just like us! As long as they taste great you are a winner.

Burning a hole in a brew bag is rare but I just did that last month also. :idiot: Make sure you keep the bag off the bottom by securing it at the top or by placing something on the bottom to protect it? Congratulations on getting that first BIAB behind you! Many Many more!
Last edited by BobBrews on 17 Feb 2013, 21:31, edited 7 times in total.
tap 1 Raspberry wine
tap 2 Bourbon Barrel Porter
tap 3 Czech Pilsner
tap 4 Triple IPA 11% ABV

Pipeline: Mulled Cider 10% ABV

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Post #964 made 13 years ago
I used the BIABacus yesterday (Saturday) for the first time, it is a very fine tool to have in your tool belt. :salute:

I calibrated my keggle before brew day. Section X shows my kettle shape volume adjustment of 4.26L/1.125 Gal (9 pints US) to the bottom welded seam. My kettle capacity is 55.3L/14.62 Gal to the top welded seam. That is for anyone using a 15.5 Gal Sankey US converted keg. The top shape of the keg accounts for another 7 pints, which makes the 15.5 Gal capacity.

Using a sight tube makes it too easy to measure the kettle headspace to the top welded seam. Using Section T to measure my kettle headspace for my SWN volume, I started my mash in. Mash volume measured good. I did a MAXI, so I added 2.51 Gal into the kettle before the boil. My Volume into Kettle, VIK, DID NOT MATCH, I account for this for the differences in squeezing methods, or lack thereof. I had less headspace, more volume, which was fine by me. Next time I'll just add water to the VIK headspace. I boiled down to the VIK and took my GIK reading.

I hit all the estimated gravities in Section M. I went with a 2% auto-effeciency adjustment and hit my target OG of 1.058, I had to really work for it (see my advanced mashing steps, Section E and I did a 90 mins mash instead of 60 after seeing I didn't hit my gravity reading, Pre-Lauter Gravity, PLG, in Section M).
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Post #965 made 13 years ago
Hi all,

This is my first non-BIAB kit attempt and also my first use of the BIABacus spreadsheet so I would like to get your thoughts. I will be using a Bayou Classic 44 qt. stainless steel kettle with straight sides. The height is 17.25 in by 13.5 in diameter. My boil-off in previous brews with this kettle is about 1 gallon per hour. My fermenter is a 6.5 G brew bucket. I will most likely not use a secondary, but if I do I have a 5 gallon glass carboy.

I tried to copy and paste from BIABacus but for some reason it will not let me so I will attach the file to this post. The instruction sheet for all-grain Northern Brewer kit can be found here.

Thanks!
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Last edited by mtate75 on 18 Feb 2013, 21:48, edited 7 times in total.

Post #966 made 13 years ago
mtate75: Glad to see you found your way here. I've just written all of the below so will have to take a break ;). Any one of the following guys should be able to help you out in some way, if not fully so fingers crossed :peace:...

Hold on...couldn't help myself and had a look. You have done a great job mtate :thumbs:.

I'll let the other guys fine tooth comb it and give you any suggestions. The only critical one I can see is that you need to change the EOBV-A in Section C from 22.08 to 20.83 L. (That's the best guess we have been able to make of Northern Brewer's EOBV-A figure.)

cazadoro: I still haven't responded to your last post sorry. I remember there were a few important things there. Sort of thing I'd like to reply to when focused so apologies for the delay. (Also trying to think of yet another way to spell your name :lol:).

dauthi: Sorry dauthi, I know there are still a few questions of yours I have left unanswered. First though can you let me know if my last post made sense? Better still, do a re-post of the questions I missed? If so, I'll tackle it when I'm having a beer next as some of those questions are tricky and need a beer :).

djseaton: Thanks for getting back to us :thumbs:. As I said in the other thread - nice attitude :peace:. Looks like you are going well but let us know if you get stuck on anything.

[center]Feedback on Actual Numbers[/center]

Strengthnhealth and Mad-Scientist, thanks a heap for posting your completed files up. I always love looking at these.

Strengthnhealth

Sorry to hear about the bag. Good to see Bob did a sympathy burn for you :P. How's that for the Brewerhood?

Your file actually opened up with an unreadable content warning. I think it's because you saved it as an .ods. If using Libre or whatever, still save it as an .xls file (2003) as I think this is problem free.

Your numbers are looking 'honest' to me on a single brew. (You've actually done a superb job at filling the actuals in). See how you have a discrepancy between EIK and EOBE? They should be much more in agreement but anyone who gets perfect agreement on every brew on these two numbers is fudging.

All you can do on any one brew is notice a discrepancy. Rarely should you do anything about it.

To me, your file looks very typical. Your numbers could be mine on any of my brews. What next?...

Don't make any adjustments on your next few brews. Your end of the day numbers are definitely in the ballpark. Nothing worries me at all. If you leave things as they are for a few more brews, the 'noise' will settle down and, if there are any adjustments to be made, we will see them easily and be able to place some good faith in those adjustments.

Very nice :thumbs:.

Mad_Scientist

Just have been looking at your file in conjunction with your great post in the Mash Gravity Figures thread. Once again, nice :party:.

The great thing about the other thread is that it emphasises the value of considering things over a number of brews instead of a single one. e.g. THe numbers there are showing a definite advantage of a 90 min mash over a 60 and there also is a mash-out advantage (although at this stage, we don't have enough numbers to know if this is due to more time, increased temp or both).

All the numbers look 'honest' except for the 'Mash Volume' and 'VIK' in Section L. I'm guessing that you just copied those numbers from K. YOu said above that your 'Mash Volume' measurement was okay but that your VIK did not match. Can you remember what they were off the top of your head?

I think you said you had more VIK than predicted so here's what is sticking out for me...

(Bear in mind this is one brew so we should not be drawing any conclusions at all but, there is one over-ride in your BIABAcus file that I think needs to be deleted.)

1. Your evaporation over-ride strikes me as too low. Maybe this is why you ended up with too much VIK? Delete that and you'll see that we have gained nearly 2 L VIK.

2. If you do this, you'll also notice that the GIK requirements drop by over two points.

On this brew, doing this would have avoided all your troubles. (I'm going to come back to this.)

Leave your 2% auto-efficiency over-ride in. This is doing no harm and has actually worked pretty much perfectly on this brew. Don't hope for such accuracy on the next one ;).

So, I reckon just get rid of the evaporation over-ride for your next few brews and use the BIABAcus default. Besides that, change nothing!

Also make sure you do the 90 min mash and a mash out but don't wait. Just pull the bag when you reach mash out temp. And here's my main point...

What I do on my brews Richard is let them run. I never ever try to match my numbers. I make a plan, from figures I totally trust as they are based on averages (that's what the BIABacus does for us) and then brew the beer. I never make adjustments prior to the end of boil.

One of the worst bits of advice, and you'll see it written in so many places, is the casual sentence, "Just brew your wort down until you reach the correct pre-boil gravity." The problem with this advice is two-fold. For starters, the person is relying on a single gravity reading and a single gravity reading is prone to wild variations. Secondly, it assumes that the evaporation rate will match the one estimated. Evaporation rates can also vary wildly depending on atmospheric conditions.

I often get strange readings pre-boil but at the end of the boil, all works out fine. If it doesn't, I check it again after transferring from the kettle and if something is way out, now that I have a confirmation, I might choose to make a pre-pitching adjustment.

In other words, just let the brews ride through the boil.

Isn't there a saying that if you fiddle with some things too much you go blind? :think:

I'm pretty sure there is :lol:.

Never thought of that before but it is perfect brewing advice when it comes to numbers.

... Thanks again Richard for posting your actuals file and also for posting perfectly in the Mash Gravity Figures Needed for BIABacus thread. And for helping out in that other thread over the weekend. These things make a big difference.

:peace:
PP
Last edited by PistolPatch on 18 Feb 2013, 22:15, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #967 made 13 years ago
PistolPatch wrote: All the numbers look 'honest' except for the 'Mash Volume' and 'VIK' in Section L. I'm guessing that you just copied those numbers from K. YOu said above that your 'Mash Volume' measurement was okay but that your VIK did not match. Can you remember what they were off the top of your head?
No problem with my SWN or Mash Volume, that's what I used and what the Mash Volume came to. My actual VIK after adding my MAXI water was at 2.125" of kettle headspace. I subtracted the 2.125" from the 2.48" and got 0.36". I entered that into Section U and got 0.34 Gal more.
PistolPatch wrote: 1. Your evaporation over-ride strikes me as too low. Maybe this is why you ended up with too much VIK? Delete that and you'll see that we have gained nearly 2 L VIK.
Yes, I was off by nearly 2L. I deleted the over-ride and it changed my evaporation rate to 1.38 Gal, which is spot-on to the 0.34 Gal extra water I noticed at VIK. My EOBV was the same as the estimated volume in Section K, so I noted that in my checklist to use 1.34 Gal evaporation for my next brew day.

I measured my actual KFL as 4.60L.

So my 'honest' actuals, Section L is 49L VIK and 5.13L Evaporation, can be updated. My VIF actual is only an estimate, but believed to be true because of the numbers and the missing 2L you noted.

Thank for PP for your deep analysis!

AFTER POST EDIT: I filled two corny keg fermenters and it appeared to be 1L short in both. I took pictures of my brew day and can be found on my Flickr link below.

ANOTHER EDIT: I forgot to mention that the KFL difference was .42L. Aftering adding this 0.42L to 1.20L extra evaporation loss, it accounts for 1.62L, very near to the 2L loss we both noted.
Last edited by Mad_Scientist on 19 Feb 2013, 00:05, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #968 made 13 years ago
PistolPatch wrote:
2. If you do this, you'll also notice that the GIK requirements drop by over two points.

On this brew, doing this would have avoided all your troubles.
I did delete the evaporation over-ride and saw a lot of figures change, less grain, 1 point more efficiency, higher liquor to grain ratio and the GIK too.

You can bet that I will leave this over-ride blank in the future and let PP take away 'all [my] troubles'. :smoke:
Last edited by Mad_Scientist on 19 Feb 2013, 07:23, edited 7 times in total.
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Post #969 made 13 years ago
Just wanted to pop in and say a belated thanks to Yeasty and Mally for having a look over my Gwinness recipe a few pages back.

Taking your advice I altered my VIF down to 19 litres, did 2 x 5 litre sparges and added 4 litres of water to the fermentor.

A taste from the trial jar after taking the F.G. promises a satisfactory result, even my wife (very hard to please) said it tasted great!
So just waiting for it to condition for a few weeks, hopefully ready for St Paddys day :thumbs:

Think I may try an Old Hooky next.. :)

Post #970 made 13 years ago
I hope you guys realise I live just around the corner from 'Pat'. All of you (and me) are in the bad books from Pat. He didn't get one reply to his post here. From the way I am counting at least 7 of us should have replied :o.

I'm actually totally with Pat on this one. There were a lot of things he asked in that post that could have saved hours. Instead, I ended up at his place and he and I had to go through everything on our own. There is still probably stuff we have missed. Who knows? It took hours and two visits.

Anyway, it's all sorted now but it's also very late here. I'd love to reply to Mad_Scientists's posts and a heap more but it's probably most important now that everyone reads this post first and makes sure they understand what is being asked there.

And, I'll get in trouble :). Most of the stuff I write on the forum these days is simple work that can be split in several ways. Anyone can do it! So, jump in if you can ;).

PP

P.S. MS, Great posts. I'm out of energy now but you need none. I think you have everything sorted. One thing caught my eye but it may have been someone else. Will check tomorrow.
Last edited by PistolPatch on 20 Feb 2013, 00:02, edited 8 times in total.
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Post #971 made 13 years ago
PP, it's very hard to work like that without feedback, but is it possible BIABacus is getting there! and people couldn't find problems. It seems from an outsider that everyone loves it.

I expect you'll get lots of feedback on 1.3. Must be a catch 22. Feedback=problems/no feedback=WTF

You sound exhausted! I was just checking the weather in Perth (I was bored) It's supposed to cool down a bit and rain in the next few days. Just trying to help here :sad:
Guinges

Post #973 made 13 years ago
Thanks for giving my BIABacus a look! I changed the EOBV-A as you recommended.

Since I was off work and SWMBO was working I went ahead and brewed with the numbers that BIABacus recommended. I guess my boil was a little too vigorous as my EOBV ended up a little under 5.5 gallons, and I only got about 4.5 gallons into my fermentor. My pot doesn't have a ball valve (yet) so I had to siphon and I think I pulled it out just a little too soon.

My OG ended up low at 1.056 instead of 1.064. GIK was 1.048. I wish I had noticed the Pre-Pitching Gravities section of BIABacus yesterday instead of just now. I definitely would have mashed longer.

Total brew time was about 5.5 hours (not including cleaning up). I haven't had time to enter all my post-boil data into BIABacus yet, but will try to do so soon and post it here.

Post #974 made 13 years ago
To Pat and PP,

I compared my file I printed and used on my brew day 3 days ago against the PR1.26 and found the following differences;

PR1.26 is reporting some higher numbers...

Section C, 533 more grams
Section K, higher volumes
Section P, EIK +.02 higher
Section P, EOBE +.02 higher
Section M, slightly different

Also, my two items I reported was fixed

Attaching both files...
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