What are you doing with homebrew today?

RoadRoach said:
That’s a pretty spiffy malting bed. How long does it take to germinate rice, and is that just ordinary brown rice off the grocery shelf? I thought that stuff would be too processed with too much of the husks removed. You are definitely at the apex of DIY homebrew skills.
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Cheers it takes 4-5 days to germinate the rice.
I do it in a bucket.
That thar is the dehydrator for drying the rice once it's malted to get it ready fro kilning and storage ;).

For those thinking about giving it ago its really not that hard.
Soak the grain air rest soak untill 40% moisture I go buy what the grain feels like when I chew it lol.
Then germinate for a couple of days.

It's the drying and kilning that can be a bit tricky.
 
Transferring poor man's Beer
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Looking pretty brite already in the sample glass!

And getting the kettle full for brew day tomorrow
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Having a very mixed day.

Changed my plans. Put the lager back one step as I'm gonna try get hold of some better yeast next order time.

Brewed 3 gallons of Amber Ale instead as I am out of that. All went well.

Chilled Mini-keg of my 3 month old Darker Brown Ale, turned out flat. Tasted okay and not off though so I reprimed it - has worked 50/50 in the past with bottles just not happened for a while. I have another one of these off same batch and hope it is not the same story. Maybe just a case of insufficient primer or somehow forgetting to add at all. Less likely it is an issue with the top vent. They are a bit fiddly to set up. I got one sprayed out a little but they have basically all worked pressure wise. I finally open one of these young and it goes wrong LOL think I am being told something there.

Put a mini-keg of Strong Bitter in the fridge then went looking for an alternative dark beer to drink.

Tried my test bottle of Bonfire Toffee Stout - it was not good in any way but just out of conditioning fortnight. Gonna be a while still before I have any stout fit to drink.

Plenty of a good batch of Porter still to go at though.

Batteries need replacing in camera so no photographs which on reflection overall is probably a good thing.

One of them days but it has ended well with a decent drink.
 
I brewed a batch of Oatmeal Stout today so I had to move the Irish Red I bottled three days ago out of the temp controlled "refermentator" into the basement after I labeled them. I rearranged the cases of older beer that I have stacked on a wooden pallet and I noticed I had a bottle bomb, the first one in about 80 cases.

I need to say three things about this. First the bottle was a reused non-refillable with embossing, I think from New Belgium. I was given a bunch of bottles after I lost most of mine in a fire (not full). I lost about 6 cases of returnable bottles which are the kind I normally used until four brews ago. I had always made it a point to never use embossed bottles and even the non-return ones I did use I never had a bomb before.

Second, the yeast used for the bomb was Philly Sour. The first time I have used it and the first time I made a Berlinerweiss (great tasting beer). I had used 6 ounces of table sugar in a 5.5 gallon batch as I wanted higher carbonation following the style.

So--has anyone had bad experience with embossed bottles, with Philly Sour, with higher carbonation (but still within recommendations of online calculators), or was this the result of several factors all adding up to the bomb? I also have several cases of the tapered bottles from Boulevard beers. Does anyone know if they are any stronger?

In the future I plan to use the returnables for anything brewed with Philly Sour or on the higher end of carbonation. At least I still have about four cases of them.
 
Hogman Brewer said:
I brewed a batch of Oatmeal Stout today so I had to move the Irish Red I bottled three days ago out of the temp controlled "refermentator" into the basement after I labeled them. I rearranged the cases of older beer that I have stacked on a wooden pallet and I noticed I had a bottle bomb, the first one in about 80 cases.

I need to say three things about this. First the bottle was a reused non-refillable with embossing, I think from New Belgium. I was given a bunch of bottles after I lost most of mine in a fire (not full). I lost about 6 cases of returnable bottles which are the kind I normally used until four brews ago. I had always made it a point to never use embossed bottles and even the non-return ones I did use I never had a bomb before.

Second, the yeast used for the bomb was Philly Sour. The first time I have used it and the first time I made a Berlinerweiss (great tasting beer). I had used 6 ounces of table sugar in a 5.5 gallon batch as I wanted higher carbonation following the style.

So--has anyone had bad experience with embossed bottles, with Philly Sour, with higher carbonation (but still within recommendations of online calculators), or was this the result of several factors all adding up to the bomb? I also have several cases of the tapered bottles from Boulevard beers. Does anyone know if they are any stronger?

In the future I plan to use the returnables for anything brewed with Philly Sour or on the higher end of carbonation. At least I still have about four cases of them.
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Did the bottle break, or blow the top off? I tried some bottles from a 6-pack of Leffe Abbey Blonde Ale that the missus got for me. NEVER again. There’s enough difference in European bottles and’Murican bottles that I have a LOT of trouble crimping the caps, and usually destroy them rather than crimp them. For that matter, I refuse to use any returnables that I haven’t already proven will seal. Embossing doesn’t seem to be a problem. I’ve got several Bell’s Brewery bottles with the double B that work just fine. A case of virgin bottles isn’t cheap, but it only takes a few bottles of beer and the cleanup to make me wish I had spent the extra bucks. So far, no bombs, but I have had a couple‘duds’ that had no fizz when the rest were spot on. I’ve started using cane sugar as well, usually at a rate 1 oz/gallon. I really can’t tell the difference from that and much more expensive corn sugar.
 
Hogman Brewer said:
I brewed a batch of Oatmeal Stout today so I had to move the Irish Red I bottled three days ago out of the temp controlled "refermentator" into the basement after I labeled them. I rearranged the cases of older beer that I have stacked on a wooden pallet and I noticed I had a bottle bomb, the first one in about 80 cases.

I need to say three things about this. First the bottle was a reused non-refillable with embossing, I think from New Belgium. I was given a bunch of bottles after I lost most of mine in a fire (not full). I lost about 6 cases of returnable bottles which are the kind I normally used until four brews ago. I had always made it a point to never use embossed bottles and even the non-return ones I did use I never had a bomb before.

Second, the yeast used for the bomb was Philly Sour. The first time I have used it and the first time I made a Berlinerweiss (great tasting beer). I had used 6 ounces of table sugar in a 5.5 gallon batch as I wanted higher carbonation following the style.

So--has anyone had bad experience with embossed bottles, with Philly Sour, with higher carbonation (but still within recommendations of online calculators), or was this the result of several factors all adding up to the bomb? I also have several cases of the tapered bottles from Boulevard beers. Does anyone know if they are any stronger?

In the future I plan to use the returnables for anything brewed with Philly Sour or on the higher end of carbonation. At least I still have about four cases of them.
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If only one bottle blew then it was most likely due to a crack or other defect in the bottle rather than embossing on the bottle. If others blow or are gushers, then the yeast wasn't done fermenting when you bottled. What was your target CO2 volumes? Another possibility was uneven distribution of sugar in the beer before bottling. Some bottles could have received more sugar and therefore carbonated more than others. You might just have to make the sacrifice and sample a few bottles to check carbonation levels. Let us know if you need help with that! :D
 
RoadRoach said:
Did the bottle break, or blow the top off? I tried some bottles from a 6-pack of Leffe Abbey Blonde Ale that the missus got for me. NEVER again. There’s enough difference in European bottles and’Murican bottles that I have a LOT of trouble crimping the caps, and usually destroy them rather than crimp them. For that matter, I refuse to use any returnables that I haven’t already proven will seal. Embossing doesn’t seem to be a problem. I’ve got several Bell’s Brewery bottles with the double B that work just fine. A case of virgin bottles isn’t cheap, but it only takes a few bottles of beer and the cleanup to make me wish I had spent the extra bucks. So far, no bombs, but I have had a couple‘duds’ that had no fizz when the rest were spot on. I’ve started using cane sugar as well, usually at a rate 1 oz/gallon. I really can’t tell the difference from that and much more expensive corn sugar.
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It broke at the bottom of the neck, right where the New Belgium bottles have that thick ring. To me, it looked like the glass was rather thin, much thinner than returnables, and I have broken them before and know how thick they were.
 
BarbarianBrewer said:
If only one bottle blew then it was most likely due to a crack or other defect in the bottle rather than embossing on the bottle. If others blow or are gushers, then the yeast wasn't done fermenting when you bottled. What was your target CO2 volumes? Another possibility was uneven distribution of sugar in the beer before bottling. Some bottles could have received more sugar and therefore carbonated more than others. You might just have to make the sacrifice and sample a few bottles to check carbonation levels. Let us know if you need help with that! :D
Click to expand...

They are not gushers. I had a 2.5 gallon batch of those once, all in old returnables, and none blew up. Some of those bottles were from the early 1950s and into the early 70s. I have some returnables dated in the late 80s and they are not as heavy but still 1/2 inch taller than the throw aways.
 
Hogman Brewer said:
They are not gushers. I had a 2.5 gallon batch of those once, all in old returnables, and none blew up. Some of those bottles were from the early 1950s and into the early 70s. I have some returnables dated in the late 80s and they are not as heavy but still 1/2 inch taller than the throw aways.
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I bet your returnables are thicker and heavier than anything in my inventory. Returnable beer bottles brings back memories of going to the beer depot with my dad in the 70's. Us kids (depending on age) would help dad swap cases of empties with cases of full bottles. When my dad went up front to pay, the owner would give us kids a pretzel rod.
 
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