GazKilla, I updated section W with 10 Liters withheld, and now the "Mash Volume" reads 64.58L or 17.06 gallons

Gazkilla wrote:Thanks Joshua but I actually want it upscaling to 46l to a double batch as I can do a 40l in my pot without holding any water back.
I've put water to hold back as 15l and I'm 1 litre below the top of the pot

His file is a 46L batch, look at the VAW figure. This is generally what people are referencing when using 23L/46L volumes. This gets about 21-22L into fermenter, and 19L to packaging depending on KFL and FPL.

You should probably read through this thread, and listen to this podcast to avoid further confusion. This site is all about addressing ambiguity in brew terminology.

shetc wrote:cwier60: Brewed the Two Cents IPA today. Hit the OG at 1.066 so I'm chuffed. Can't wait to drink this for Americano Thanksgiving.

My 1st batch of Two Cents IPA has been in the fermenter for 3 weeks -- it reached a FG of 1.009 or 7.4% ABV. Cold crashing now, and then will dry hop with an 1 oz of Centennial in a corny keg while it carbonates.

Here's my hop sock, what do you think?

That will work.

I use an Old BIAB Bag, that looks the same with stains from Porter.

goatchop41

Welcome aboard.

You are quiet right when you say BIABacus takes some effort to work out but the effort put into learning the software is well rewarded.

You are also right when you say SWN is a hot TWN and Mash Volume includes the grain. Put the TWN into your kettle, heat it up to strike temperature , SWN, and add grain to get mash volume. As long as you've noted the warnings about "mash volumes approaching kettle limits" you are away.

A couple of points about your recipe source that you will see repeated ad nauseam in this forum. All to do with recipe integrity.

This looks like a great recipe by the way. I think I'll give it a go.

Back to the point, the recipe makes 5 gallons .... of what

Possibly beer that you end up with into packaging (VIP) ....

Possibly wort into the fermentor (VIF)....

or maybe

wort at the end of the boil (VAW) ...?

It doesn't say .. but on the bright side it does make 5 gallons.

A little bit of detective work shows that if you add up all the water they use

15 qts + 8.4 qts + 2.8 gals gives us 34.6 qts or 8.65 gals, I think ( a long time since i've used imperial measurements).

That would give the total water needed (TWN). Putting that into BIABacus and using the default values gives us a volume into packaging (VIP) of 5.72 gals. Not exactly 5gals but in the ball park (sort of).

BIABacus tells us the you will have a volume of ambient wort (VAW) of 6.86 gals. Remember that number . There is a test later.

The recipe tells you the hop bill in great detail but it doesn't tell you how much of that hop bill together with wort is going to be lost during kettle and fermentor transfers. You need to account for that by knowing the volume before the losses start, that is the VAW before losses start

You have enterd 5.42 gals for that figure in section D. I can't see where you got that number but I'm not the brightest spark in the room so maybe I just can't see it. The recipe tells you that you will end up with 66 IBU. Enter that number into section D if there is not a definite VAW figure given in the recipe.

That leads onto another conudrum

How was that 66 IBU calculated ?

Unfortunately there are at least three diffent ways of calculating IBU's, which will give three different answers using the exact same ingredients. If you know the VAW you can recreate the original bitterness. If you have to calculate it your pretty much on your own. BIABacus uses the Tinseth method but without knowing how the recipe creator calculated them you can't recreate the bitterness component with any certainty.

Put 66 IBU into section D, leave out the VAW figure and brew it. Adjust later brews to suit your taste.

As you can see most recipes published on the net and in respected books / magazines do not have the integrity required to recreate the beer the designer made ... which does not mean they won't make great beer ... just that it will be unlikely to be that beer.

As an aside I note that you have added 5% cane sugar. Was that an attempt to dry the beer out ??

Regardless of all that, you have done a great job of filling out BIABacus.

Keep asking questions

Majorphill

richpollard wrote:Hello! I stumbled across Charlie Papazian's The Complete Joy of Homebrewing at a library booksale. I have attempted to enter the Silver Dollar Porter recipe into Biabacus. It is a 5 gallon recipe that Biabacus scaled down to one gallon, actually a little more so that I could get hydrometer readings and still end up around a gallon. I was able to find OG/FG in a later copy of the book. The book indicated that this brew would yield 5.5 gallons of wort after chilling. So I used that number for VAW. Hops were simply listed as the variety, how much to add in ounces, and when to add them. The book had a table indicating average AA% for various hops. I entered the low number of the average into Biabacus. Thanks for all input!

Rich

Hello Rich, welcome to the forum.

I am attaching a BIABacus file of how I interpreted Charlie Papazian's (3rd Edition 2003) recipe. I have the book and the recipe can be found on page 311. The hops are listed in HBU's and are explained on page 169, hence 1 oz at 8% equals 8 HBU, etc...

I found the recipe grain bill balances well when I entered 18.5 L for the VIF. You will notice this in Section B, before you make any changes. I chose to enter 43 IBU into Section D, per the recipe, instead of the VAW, in this case it's 20.53 L. 43 IBU was the higher number.

Please reply back for any further questions.

MS

goatchop41

I'm glad I didn't put you off with my rambling. I get a bit long winded on occasions.

Adding sugar depends entirely on what you want out at the end. More fermentables i.e. sugars, tend to dry the beer out. Conversely less fermentables will give you a maltier mouth feel. It's up to you.

One way to get more fermentables is by adding a sugar of some sort. The other way is to mash with temperatures in the range of 130 to 150 F. Mashing in the 154 to 167 F range will give you a maltier mouthfeel. None of these figures is the correct one. They are just a guide. Your brother is right.

A quick google search gave me this page which explains it a lot better than I can.

The best way is to start brewing. It is pretty hard to make an undrinkable beer.

Majorphill

windrider wrote:Hoping somebody will be able to have a look at the recipe below to see if everything ties up. Wanting to do this recipe kit from The Malt Miller: http://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/index.ph" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... ead_review

Got a bit confused on the Hop additions as the recipe calls for a 90min boil but looking at other Belgian recipes said you should be aiming for 15 - 30 IBU.

Hello windrider,

I had a look at the website recipe link and your BIABacus. I made some changes to your file.

1) - Belgian Candi sugar should be entered into Section B, as it is a fermentable with approx. 36 ppg, so no adjustment in Section Y is necessary.

2) - I entered a 'Y' into Section G for hopsock, as I hope you will use one, plus it changes the grain bill some.

3) - ... then I played 20 questions on the VIF in Section B and found the grain bill weight balanced closely in Section C for 'What you will use...'

4) - Added 90 mins. mash in Section E.

5) - The hops question you have..., if you have the kit in front of you and the hops package says 5% AA, then you should get an 38 IBU from a 90 mins. boil.,, again this balanced to the right side 'What you will use...'

Hope this clears up some questions.

MS

It's a good point windrider.
There is an article here from Bavarian Brewery Technology that makes a lot of sense.
If anything read the "stages and length of boiling" section. There are some things here that I would never have considered beforehand.
Salient points are;

1. Never boil wort for less than 90 minutes.
2. Unless high gravity beer, don't boil longer than 2 hours.
3. Don't add hops within the first half hour of boiling.
4. Don't boil hops longer than one hour.

Don't forget however, that everything I read I use as a guide not necessarily as a god. It is your beer and your process at the end of the day.

shetc wrote:cwier60: Brewed the Two Cents IPA today. Hit the OG exactly at 1.064 so I'm chuffed. Can't wait to drink this for Americano Thanksgiving.

And here is the final product! This beer finished with 7.4% ABV; it has a nice opening malt flavor followed by a hoppy, floral finish. Both my sons will be home for Thanksgiving so I am looking forward to sharing the Two Cents IPA with them. Thanks, cweir60!

Let us know how you get on with the Zombie, nicko.