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Depends on the size of your chamber. I use a decent sized fridge and even deep in the mountains of Colorado, a single 40 watt bulb keeps my chamber at any temp I set. My set up is in a unheated garage and my last batch stayed at 68 while the outside temp dropped negative. If I use clear...

I am interested in how this turns out, as I am looking at the same situation. I brewed a scottish ale and planned on mashing at 158f. Usually, since I do 12-14 gallon batches, what ever temp I start the mash at, I end with. I have always worried about my electronic thermometers being off. Well...

The pectan will lend a tart flavor to the beer and as said above, most of the raspberry flavor will be lost due to the fermentation. Plus you need way more raspberries to lend flavor. My rule of thumb is at least one pound of fruit per gallon. Since I do not want that much fruit, I have gone to...

I would like to get in for some grain, but I would not be able to make the trek down to Denver until the second weekend of July. Would that be a problem if Dahoov would have to hold onto 100-150 lbs of grain until then? I am about 2+ hours south west of Denver, so it is not cost effective for me...

My 5 gal igloo (round) cooler is going on 20 years old with no warpage or cracking. I use it for my sparge so it always gets near boiling water. Like above, I just spray my mash tun (10 gal) cooler and use a soft sponge or just my hands to clean it. I do take out my false bottom every time to...

Find a local welding supply place and see about buying/renting a smaller bottle from them. If you rent, you usually can just swap out cylinders. I own 4 of the large welding H tanks myself for glass art. So I always have plenty of O2 available.

That's way funny!:cross: While he does not leave it for girl friends is beyond me?

Never tried a cross one, but between my 2" and 1 " bars, the smaller, lighter bar works better. As far as wide or narrow, how wide are you going? I would think narrow would be easier to get a foam stopper for.

Refractometer is for before you ferment, so no alcohol, just sugar. Alcohol will distort the reading making it inaccurate.

Sure you can use it, but you will boil off much, much more liquid. So do larger batches or use a smaller pot for 5 gallon batches. Personally, I do not like to do anything less then 8 gal batches. Its the same amount of work to do 5, 10 or even 15 gallons, and who does not want more beer?

If you start with way more then you need, and you know how much you will lose during the boil, then just boil longer in the beginning. So if you start with 9 gallons and expect to lose 2 gallons during a 90 minute boil, and you are looking for 5 gallons, just boil until you only have 7 gallons...

You might but 'we' don't! Hot water can leech out lots of things faster, including heavy metals. So why chance it? I live in a house built in the 50's, so no way I am trusting the old piping to not have tracies of lead. So hot water only for cleaning and bathing, and we run the cold water for a...

I am in the camp of just letting it go until I am ready to transfer to secondary or to bottle. I am a firm believer of bulk aging or conditioning so being patient is a plus. I try to keep my pipeline full so I am in no rush to bottle early. If I find my gravity is not low enough at transfer...

Opps, I meant .028! I have never conditioned my grain as the climate is so dry here it is tough to do it without either getting it to moist or having it dry out as fast as you spray it.

Looks fine to me too. I don't think you can have too fine a crush unless you start getting stuck runoffs. I set my Barley crusher at 0.0028" with no problem. I also thought a medicine taste is usually from a slight bacterial infection too?

It should be fine. When I brew outside in the cold of Colorado winters, I just use a old sleeping bag over my cooler. With it I can keep my mash temp without losing even a single degree, over a 90-120 min mash, at outside temps around 10!

I do 2 weeks primary and 2 weeks secondary for my IPAs and my lighter beer styles. My Scottish ales and darker beers I let go a full month in primary and 2 weeks to a month in secondary to allow them to clear up and condition on mass.

Wrap each bottle in small bubble wrap and then surround with peanuts so its tightly packed in the box. Then that box goes into a bigger box with more peanuts surrounding it completley, hence double boxed. If you do this, the bottles will not make noise and will survive being dropped. It is how...

I want at least 3 days as my starters tend to go for a while. That gives me 2 days for the yeast to grow and 1 day to crash cool and decant on brewday.

Slightly off topic but if you freeze the final runnings from mashing and then boil it when you go to use it, I assume your fine. Right? I am assumeing the botulism threat is for wort kept at room temperature in an anaerobic condition?