Recent content by brewpood

A few months ago, I left some odds and ends in my bottling bucket, which I had filled with water and PBW or Oxyclean, I can't remember which. It had tubing, a blow-off rig with tubing, my auto-siphon, a starter flask, that sort of thing, plus the foam stopper for the flask. Today I was finally...

1.074 is the SG. Looks like I need a 4 L starter, so we have agreed to make one apiece instead of trying to do a big one. That's good to know about using a carboy--I hadn't thought of that. Thanks!

A friend and I are going to make a 10-gallon batch. Can I make a big enough starter for our big batch using a 2 L flask? How? Thanks!

Just amazing!

Thanks for all the good ideas. matc, that is a work of art and something to aspire to. Maybe I can make an uglier version that will work. You didn't happen to make any videos, did you?

Right, recipes for 5 gallon batches. I'm interested in using metal instead of a plastic thermos for my lauter tun, which is why I was thinking of converting the pot. But no good, huh?

I am moving up from a 4 gallon pot to an 8 gallon, so can do all-grain now. But I need a lauer tun. Can I turn my 4-gallon pot into a lauter tun? Details? Thanks!

Yes, ResumeMan, that's what I was thinking when I added the OO. I was also concerned that, at that point, the airlock had shown a lot of activity for only one day and then stopped, so I thought I hadn't aerated enough. This was my attempt to get the yeast going again. But it turns out they were...

I promise, no more foolin' with it. I took a gravity reading last night, and it had reached the target of 1.014. Tasted great, too, much better than before I added the extra DME. I'll leave it for another couple of days, take another couple of readings, and then transfer to secondary. I hope the...

No explosions after 2 days (and very little visible activity), so I guess, knock wood, everything is OK.

Cool--thanks! I will just wait and take a gravity reading this weekend to see where things are. I hope the yeast are busier than they seem to be--that they are quietly working away.

I decided to add some more concentrated wort to my fermenting batch on day 2 to raise the ABV a little after missing the OG mark with my partial mash. Yeast is WL 570, and fermentation had chugged along the first day, then dropped off so that it was barely noticeable. I put a drop of olive oil...

P.S. Should I pitch more yeast? Thanks!

Oooo, that hops number is way off--thanks for noticing. I also worked some more on the recipe so will edit when I am in front of Beersmith again.Sorry!

Yep, I sparged, but I guess not well enough, or maybe my temps were off when I did the partial mash. I didn't use a cooler, just a pot, but tried to monitor the temperature as best I could. Next time! I decided to go ahead and add some more wort last night. I boiled about a pound of DME with...