A few things on my mind...

[avibayer]

I have been having horrible luck with my past few batches. I think sometime in may was the last time i made a batch of beer i loved.

One of the main problems i seem to be having is an off flavor, kinda like cardboard/paper/nasty funk. Is this flavor from aldehydes? I ferment in true brew pales, and try not to get oxygen in them, but its not easy to do all the time.

Any help or suggestions, or things i need to look into, would be great. I also seem to notice it more with pale ales, and could taste the off flavor a little bit last night drinking a saranac winter pack beer (maybe the moose ipa).

I watched brewmasters on discovery the other night, got the bitches brew and the world wide stout. My friends and i could not taste much of a difference, but we might not have a very sophisticated palate.

And lastly, on this crazy rant of mine, I had trouble with an ESB i am brewing now. I made a yeast starter of london III, from wyeast, a smack pack, and after ten days, racked into a secondary. The gravity (OG 1.056) was supposed to get down to 1.012, there abouts, but was only 1.028. i thought maybe letting it sit for another week might help. It didn't, and so i pitched a new starter i made from washed munich yeast from danstar. Used it in my previous beer, and those little fungi ate plenty of sugar. I am not seeing signs of active fermentation yet, but i'm gonna give it another day or to and hope the FG drops some more.

Oh, and any suggestions how to get better at bottle conditioning? i have some beers that explode, and some with no fizzle. I use a beeralchemy to tell me the conversion for the style, but dont get good results, and they tend to be very inconsistant from bottle to bottle.


cheers everyone, and happy thanksgiving

 

[Nateo]

Carboard tastes might be from oxidation, or they might be from using stale extract. If you don't already, use dry malt extract instead of liquid. I use the same buckets and don't have that problem, so I doubt it's the pails.

Leave your beers in primary longer. Like, 4 weeks. If the gravity isn't where it needs to be, don't rack it. If the beer is done, then rack it. Letting it sit in secondary won't help the FG that much. You need the yeast from the primary.

When bottling, I dilute my priming sugar a bit more than most people say. 2c water is what most people use, I use 3-4 cups depending on how much sugar I'm using. I dump that in the bottling bucket, and siphon the beer in so that it swirls around and evenly distributes.

 

[avibayer]

I do all grain. so the extract is not an issue. Will for sure leave the brew in the primary for longer next time. As for the priming, i do the same thing, and get very inconsitant results. But i appreciate all the feedback.

Is there a way to limit oxidation without going to CO2?