That's it mate .

Getting your head around this not being able to rely on IBU estimates is really hard because it is so illogical. Your brain tells you that all the formulas should agree but the reality is that most of the time they aren't even close .

Once you get your head around the above, things become much easier as you know what numbers can be given some respect and which numbers can lead you astray.


PP

LOL but that's it mate . The only reliable way to measure IBU's is in a laboratory and even that result will not tell you everything about how the beer will taste.

The mouth and nose are the ultimate instruments.

I'm not so sure on this hop thing with regards to BCS I've got to go to work but I'll start another thread if I have time tonight as I think its worth a discussion.

As if you ain't got enough to do eh PP

Yeasty

Ha! Just working on one last final bugger of a formula for the new calculator Yeasty .

The problem is BCS works off the Rager formula (in Promash). I know it's hard to get your head around but the BeerSmith screenshot here tells the story.

See the top recipe? Imagine if someone wrote to you who used the Garetz formula and said the recipe was 12.2 IBU's but gave you no more information. If by chance, your program worked on Garetz, you should get a fairly good scale*. However, if your program worked on Tinseth and you scaled it, you'd end up with about half the hops you really need to duplicate the recipe.

Yep, it is that silly unfortunately.


PP

* I think, like Tinseth, some programs also will interpret the Garetz (and Rager)formulas differently or have actual errors so, once again, weights and AA% will always be more reliable.

Looks yummy, I would recommend doing a 90 minute boil (always a good idea to boil 90 minutes when using pilsner). Be aware that 3068 is a top-fermenting monster.....give yourself lots of headroom in the fermenter and use a blow-off tube. Fermenting at 68 give a nice balance, 70-72F gives a lot of banana, 64-66F gets you more of the clove flavors.

---Todd

5 gallons + 3068 in a 6.5 carboy will be OK but you should still use a blow-off tube (trust me). I always use a 7 gallon bucket when fermenting with this yeast and just cover it with plastic wrap until the krausen settles down a bit.

As to IBU's, I like 10-12 for a Hefe (as indicated with BeerSmith2, other software may vary.....How's that PP?). Hops really are just for a bit of balance with this recipe, the yeast profile is going to overpower any hop aroma/flavors.

Okay, this is a good example of a recipe where the hop bill that really can't be scaled properly without more information from the original brewer. We'd need to ask the brewer the following...

1. By 'batch size' do you mean 'volume into fermentor' or 'end of boil volume at ambient'.?

2. If you meant 'volume into fermentor', what were your kettle trub losses.

3. What was the AA% of the hops used?

Or alternatively you could ask, instead of 3 above, "What program did you use and what hop formula did you use?"

This post above explains why IBU numbers cannot be used reliably. (There's a few posts that follow it, like this one which offer further reinforcement).

So, unfortunately, unless wherestheyeast can get those answers above, the recipe will have to be a guess .

Lots of recipes are in the same boat on the net.

Hope the above helps explain the problem at least.


PP

Hi there nu_brew,

Have you tried Grain and Grape? They will be able to sort you out for sure.

Any ale malt will do for the two row but I'd go for a pale ale malt on that recipe.

On the crystal you are looking for around 30 EBC and 80 EBC so yes the 140-160 you mention above is too high for these. Any good grain shop should have something close to these.


PP

Ah, that's great! They will certainly have what you need.

Grain names are massively confusing and not very well classified so you are right to be scratching your head. It gets even worse...

Lovibond, SRM and EBC have actually changed several times over the years . Basically though, at the moment, Lovibond equals SRM and SRM = EBC/1.97. (i.e. EBC = SRM*1.97)

Nothing in brewing terminology is ever made simple .

We're working on an easy to understand grain list to accompany the BIABacus but this could well be an impossible dream .

Thanks for taking the time to post that up nu_brew and glad to hear you got sorted .

I see you are on the list of future BIABacus Betas as well. Good on you . You haven't been forgotten btw. The current betas pointed out a few improvements which have just been incorporated so I imagine we'll be seeing you in betas shortly.

So, put your hard hat on .

Howdy folks! BIAB newbie here, planning my first batch and I have a few questions related to converting recipes. I read the first example conversion (Goldy's) and it makes sense reading through it, but I want to ensure I get this right, and still have some lingering questions.

I have 4 batches under my belt, the first ones were extract + specialty grains, and I recently did a partial mash. I've been using Beersmith to enter the original recipe, getting the OG and volumes to match up, and then I scale it to my equipment and convert to whatever brewing method I used. This has worked well for the most part, and helps me visualize it as well.

For the most part, this Calculator is fairly easy to understand once you start entering things in. However, I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding the Hop bill portion, or if there is an error, but I'm getting a Division by Zero error for some of the fields. Attached is my spreadsheet if someone wouldn't mind taking a look. I am also confused by the End of Boil volume field under ORIGINAL RECIPE ... I'm not sure what the end of boil volume was for the recipe creator's batch – they only posted the batch size. I could just assume end of boil was ~ .5 gal more than the batch size? Or am I supposed to enter in MY projected end of boil volume there? Any clarification would be much appreciated.

Now that these questions are on the table, I'll move onto what I want to brew, a Rye IPA, here's the original recipe: http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f69/bee-cav ... ipa-82451/ – It may also be worth noting that on the linked thread there was discussion of what his efficiency was, and 66% was the end consensus. Not sure if that matters for me or not, but I'm guessing no?

"Bee Cave Brewery Rye IPA

Recipe Type: All Grain
Yeast: Safale-05
Yeast Starter: Hydrated Dry
Batch Size (Gallons): 5.5 gal
Original Gravity: 1.064
Final Gravity: 1.010
IBU: 67
Boiling Time (Minutes): 90
Color: SRM 9
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 10 days at 62-65 degrees
Additional Fermentation: Crash cool to 39 degrees for 3 days then keg
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): None
Tasting Notes: Spicy, malty, & very tasty!

BCB Rye IPA

This is a tasty, yet big beer at 7.2% abv. The flaked barley gives it incredible head retention and a cascading effect like a nitrogen pour.

10 lb 2 Row
2 lb Rye
2 lb Vienna
12 oz Crystal 60L
8 oz Flaked Barley

1 oz Tettnanger FWH 4.4% (First Wort Hopped)
1 oz Chinook 60 min 12%
0.5 oz Chinook 30 min 12%
0.5 oz Chinook 5 min 12%

Mashed in at 154 F for 70 minutes. Ran off 7 gal and boiled for 90 minutes."

_______________

My kettle is ~ 47 L (50 qt) / 16 in diameter

I have a brown ale that fermented with the 05 yeast and is about to be bottled, so I think I'm just going to pitch straight onto its yeast cake. It's in a 5 gal glass carboy so I'm thinking I want to put ~ 4.3 gal into the fermenter, and come out with about 4 gal into bottles. I plan on using a blow-off hose and possibly some anti-foaming type of addition as well.

_______________

I think I've got the grain bill figured out:

7.7 lb 2 Row
1.5 lb Rye
1.5 lb Vienna
.6 lb Crystal 60
.4 lb Flaked Barley

_______________

But the calculator is confusing me on the HOPS. Would someone mind taking a peak at my xls file and helping me out here?

Thanks!

p.s. I've read that for calculating IBUs of first wort hoppings setting them as a 20 minute boil does a good job so that's what I've done for that hop addition in the xls file.

In the meantime, I've run the original recipe through Beersmith, and came out with the exact OG, IBUs, color, and ABV % that he spec'd in his recipe. I then converted it to my equipment profile in Beersmith, and I tried it using 75% efficiency and also 79% efficiency (I don't know what mine is because I've not BIAB before!).

There was just a slight variation in the grain bill between the 75% and 79%, and the hop additions were exactly the same.

Here is the recipe Beersmith gave me at 75% efficiency for my 4.3 gal batch:

grain
6.6 lbs (2993 g) 2 Row
1.5 lbs (680 g ) Rye Malt
1.5 lbs (680 g) Vienna
.65 lbs (295 g) C60
.375 lbs (170 g) Flaked Barley

hops
.75 oz (21 g) Tettnang (first wort hopping)
.75 oz (21 g) Chinook 60 min
.38 oz (11 g) Chinook 30 min
.38 oz (11 g) Chinook 5 min

_______________

How does this sound? The Beersmith recipe calls for about 1 lb (454 g) less of 2 row than the Calculator, while the other grains are almost exactly the same.

One noticeable difference between the Calculator and the Beersmith recipe is the water volume that's called for. Beersmith says to mash with 43 L of water, while the Calculator says to add 31 L of water. Both show end of boil volumes as ~ 5 gal (19 L). I think the trub loss are similar and the evaporation rates are both about 1.5 gal / hour.

Does this sound like I'm doing something wrong, or could there be another explanation?

Something wrong with the BS calc.You would have to boil for many hours to get down to your Volume into fermentor.
Stick with The Calculator, it worked has worked fine for me for the last 30 or so brews!I used BS a bit and some of the free online ones, but always tested them against The Calculator and went with it's numbers above all, with no problems, other than self inflicted ones

Yeah, I was thrown off by the huge water volume BeerSmith was giving me. I like the idea of using less water, and more grain, but I still am having issues with the calculator regarding the hops bill (see my first post, 3 posts back). There seems to be a division by zero error, or something.

This is going to be my first BIAB so I really need some guidance here on converting this recipe (again, 3 posts back) to the BIAB system. Would appreciate any help on that.

Thanks!!

Way better help than me is on the way.These guys love this stuff.I know that I have had that problem in the past and will try to remember what I did about it.In the mean time one of the guy's is sure to jump in and help.

Thanks, Lylo!

Hi there laserghost ,

Excuse the long read below. I think you are the sort of bloke that will read it though and it may help you better understand some of the main problems in recipe scaling. Not an easy thing to get your head around unfortunately .

Here's a few random thoughts and then we'll take a look at your recipe...

Some History

1. In BS, it is quite easy to scale a recipe incorrectly and get a wrong answer unfortunately. Have a wade through the Beersmith2 Guide for BIABrewers to make sure you are scaling using the right method.

2. BS intends brewers to make their 'Brewhouse Efficiency' their efficiency into fermentor and their batch size as being what they get into the fermentor. This is a confusing way to go around things. In addition to this, as the hop formulas in BeerSmith1 were incorrect, so many brewers started to set their 'Brewhouse Efficiency' as their efficiency into kettle and their 'batch size' as 'end of boil volume'. (The current BS2 hop formulas still has one of the original errors but the volume one has been fixed now).

3. The most important volume figure of interest when scaling a recipe is the 'End of Boil Volume'. So, the problem is, when you see a BeerSmith recipe report, you can't really scale the recipe properly as you have no idea whether the author means by 'batch size' their EOBV or their volume into fermentor and these two can be significantly different.

4. All the above problems could be solved if the recipe report displayed 'Losses to Trub and Ckiller" (kettle trub). If this said zero, then we'd know the author was using EOBV as their batch size. If it said anything else we'd know they meant VIF and we would add the trub losses to this and scale away.

BS2 now has 2 of the reports that show kettle trub which is a start.

(Just quickly on your disparity with the base grain as compared to other grains, BS has probably tried to keep the colour the same which is not a great way to go. Specialty grains are primarily flavour grains so altering their ratio to maintain colour is something I don't think is correct. On top of this, colour formulas are not very good at predicting the end result - they are only a vague guide.) )

Why End of Boil Volume is so Important

The end of boil is the point at which the brew basically becomes finalised. (Ignore post-boil top-ups and hop additions in this example.) Let's say at this point your brew is 20 L and has an OG of 1.050 and a bitterness of 20 IBU's. If you lose 5 L (an extreme example) to kettle trub, what you get in the fermentor will still be 1.050 and 20 IBU's.

Imagine if you sent me this recipe and accidentally told me that your EOBV was 15L. I would end up scaling your recipe and coming up with a totally incorrect result. My beer would end up being around 1.067 and my IBU's would be about 27 - no where near right!!!

Nearly all the problems with recipe scaling in this thread come down to trying to 'guess' what the end of boil volume was in the original recipe.

Your Recipe

You've done a nice job there laserghost. All the grains are fine. The calculator scales the grains according to their ratios and what OG you need so EOBV of the original recipe is not needed here.

The calculator does need EOBV of the original recipe to calculate hops correctly and unfortunately we don't know what this is in your case. Is it 5.5 gallons? Or is it 5.5 gallons plus kettle trub?

Here's where we get into having to become a recipe detective and this is not as simple as you think as so many programs have errors in their basic calculations so the numbers in their reports could well be wrong. For example we can't work off the IBU's of the original recipe for the reasons explained in this post and the links within it.

The easiest way is to ask the original author what their volume into fermentor and their kettle trub losses were. The other way is to play around with the numbers and see what fits which is impossible to explain here as there are so many variables involved unfortunately.

My best guess is that this author's 'batch size' does mean 'EOBV' so I'll write this into the calculator below.

Note in the file below, I have upped your efficiency into kettle to 79.6% as this is what the auto-efficiency estimator in the new BIABacus gives.

The #DIV/0 Error

In your case, you have this as you hadn't put the AA% in column J. I've fixed that in the attached file - also changed the 5.3 AA%'s that were in tere to 12.0%. The other way you can get a #DIV/0 error is if you set the Time to 0. (The new BIABacus does not have these problems).

The new BIABacus will also be reverting to the ones that were contained in the first version of 'The Calculator' as these were correct. The formula that exists in the current 'The Calculator' is a compromise between BS and the correct formula. If you want the correct Tinseth IBU's change F5 on the hop sheet to the original gravity i.e. 1.064.

So, here's your recipe scaled as best as we can. Let me know if you have any questions.


PP

Actually laserghost, on the hop sheet in the file above, change F8 to 22.7 as I think this is a better estimate of the original recipe's end of boil volume.

There is no way to be sure though unless you ask the original author more info about their volumes or at least find out what software they used to produce the report.

Fun stuff eh?