Customized brews (outside of the brewprints.....)

[Captain 3 Droids]

5 minutes ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

still use the BrewArt ingredients such as E5 and X2. Or am I better off using a Tin such as Coopers Pale Ale Tin?

All sounding good.

I’d use the BrewArt ingredients.

[Dustin Frothman]

2 hours ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

Honestly, I just want this to either fail quick or show that it is working and then I'll be patient

Pure poetry, that is!

😅

 

[Wazza_wantsbeer]

Frustrated, so very frustrated.

So I've been watching this "brew" for the past 20 hours, wearing out the viewing port I'm pretty sure, and I am now seeing no sign of activity. No small and/or large bubbles which have been readily seen in all previous brews. No floatie bits. And this from a yeast that is famous for it's veracious fermentation activity.

Basically, thru the viewing port, it's as still as can be.

So something in the wort must be killing off the yeast because:

When hydrating the yeast before pitching, it looked good and healthy with bubbles appearing in the flask which I used for rehydration.

Not long after pitching the hydrated yeast, I saw activity in the viewing port, small bubbles appearing and some convection movement within the wort because you could see the odd floatie moving around.

Another thing I noticed after pitching, when wafting from the spew port, the smell had changed from that sour smell to a tropical fruity smell like when I first put the wort into the Droid and topped up with water and pitched the yeast and added the Element packages.

Now, some 23 hours after pitching, absolutely nothing in the viewing port and that sour smell has returned.

Will give it another day but tomorrow morning, if there is still no signs of activity, it's all going down the drain and will get the Cider on.

[Captain 3 Droids]

8 minutes ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

Will give it another day but tomorrow morning, if there is still no signs of activity, it's all going down the drain and will get the Cider on.

Don’t give up yet, if it tastes ok it’s worth persisting, let the EOF by the Droid happen. Usually when a brew is infected it tastes like crap and there can be a lot of gas activity.

[Dustin Frothman]

36 minutes ago, Captain 3 Droids said:

there can be a lot of gas activity.

My wife says that to me regularly ...

[Dustin Frothman]

47 minutes ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

Frustrated, so very frustrated.

So I've been watching this "brew" for the past 20 hours, wearing out the viewing port I'm pretty sure, and I am now seeing no sign of activity. No small and/or large bubbles which have been readily seen in all previous brews. No floatie bits. And this from a yeast that is famous for it's veracious fermentation activity.

Basically, thru the viewing port, it's as still as can be.

So something in the wort must be killing off the yeast because:

When hydrating the yeast before pitching, it looked good and healthy with bubbles appearing in the flask which I used for rehydration.

Not long after pitching the hydrated yeast, I saw activity in the viewing port, small bubbles appearing and some convection movement within the wort because you could see the odd floatie moving around.

Another thing I noticed after pitching, when wafting from the spew port, the smell had changed from that sour smell to a tropical fruity smell like when I first put the wort into the Droid and topped up with water and pitched the yeast and added the Element packages.

Now, some 23 hours after pitching, absolutely nothing in the viewing port and that sour smell has returned.

Will give it another day but tomorrow morning, if there is still no signs of activity, it's all going down the drain and will get the Cider on.

Keep the faith @Wazza_wantsbeer

p.s. you clearly need a 2nd Droid ...

[Wazza_wantsbeer]

30 minutes ago, Captain 3 Droids said:

Don’t give up yet, if it tastes ok it’s worth persisting, let the EOF by the Droid happen. Usually when a brew is infected it tastes like crap and there can be a lot of gas activity.

@Captain 3 Droids  the problem is, I'm going away this weekend for 6 days and I don't want to waste the time stuffing around with something that may or may not make it. I'd rather cut my losses and put the Cider on and just it do it's thing whilst we are away.

As a number of members have mentioned, I definitely need another Droid as having only the one Droid obviously means I'm limited to what I can brew and how often. I'm feeling the frustration because even if this brew does work, it will take quite a while, at least a couple of weeks given the minimal fermentation activity, and I promised the wife I will provide a Cider next brew which will also likely take a couple of weeks to brew.

I could end up with only completing a single brew for all of January, and then with the conditioning time, we would likely end up drinking whatever gets done at the end of summer, early autumn. So much for enjoying a summer with my own beers on tap.  😭

And of my first 4 completed brews, I've drunk all but a bottle each of the N-C IPA and the Point IPA, the Hazy IPA is completely finished and I'm down to less than 2 litres of the All Inn NEIPA, call it 4 litres remaining out of 40 litres brewed.

I do understand it is my fault, I should never have been so ambitious and tried to do that partial mash which clearly added a bunch of variables which weren't necessary and just added risk.

Given I had all the Brewart ingredients, I shouldn't have stuffed around and just made the Hazy the same way I did last time as it was a really enjoyable beer.

Now, I'm back to buying beers until I can build up stock which looks to be a long time into the future. At least the Balter Hazy IPA was on sale at BWS today.

[Captain 3 Droids]

4 minutes ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

I could end up with only completing a single brew for all of January

Fair enough. If you have one of the plastic fermenters you could dump it all in that and see what happens when you get back.

[Wazza_wantsbeer]

4 minutes ago, Captain 3 Droids said:

Fair enough. If you have one of the plastic fermenters you could dump it all in that and see what happens when you get back.

Actually, that's not a bad idea right. Get a cheap plastic bucket fermenter and transfer it over. I like it. 

Thank you for the suggestion @Captain 3 Droids

[Dustin Frothman]

1 hour ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

And of my first 4 completed brews, I've drunk all but a bottle each of the N-C IPA and the Point IPA, the Hazy IPA is completely finished and I'm down to less than 2 litres of the All Inn NEIPA, call it 4 litres remaining out of 40 litres brewed.

...

Now, I'm back to buying beers until I can build up stock which looks to be a long time into the future. At least the Balter Hazy IPA was on sale at BWS today.

In another post on here somewhere I suggested that you should get four cases of beer with a Droid purchase to encourage you to keep on brewing without digging into your stocks too early.

Your kegerator has two taps ... so 2 Droids required.

Mine has three ...

😮

 

[Hambone]

1 hour ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

Actually, that's not a bad idea right. Get a cheap plastic bucket fermenter and transfer it over. I like it. 

Thank you for the suggestion @Captain 3 Droids

Yeah that's a great idea. 30l water cannister from Bunnings $25 (wide mouth) glad wrap over the top with the rubber seal from the lid to hold it on. Budget fermenter. Works every time. 

Robert is your mother's brother. 

Cheers 

 

[Captain 3 Droids]

1 minute ago, Hambone said:

Robert is your mother's brother. 

 

No Bob’s your uncle

[Hambone]

6 minutes ago, Captain 3 Droids said:

No Bob’s your uncle

Yeah. That's what I said.🤣👍

[Thagomizer]

Try the "pinch of sugar" test. Carefully open the lid and sprinkle a small amount of priming sugar on the top.  If you get a reaction, close the lid and keep waiting.  Otherwise, at this level in the process, it may be time to start the next batch.😒

However, I have sometimes waited several days for the droid to detect fermentation - and then it happens.

[Wazza_wantsbeer]

An update for those following.

The whole thing ended up being a sink pour.

I did the @Thagomizer"pinch of sugar" test last night before bed and again, there was nothing. I actually added a tablespoon of sugar and there was literally no impact.

There was no activity in the view port and when I opened the lid this morning, nothing.

So into the sink it went as I didn't have time to go and get a bucket or plastic fermenter.

That my friends was a good learning experience with a lot of takeaways.

For those interested, I put on the cider after the sink pour and the details of that are in another thread.

 

[Thagomizer]

Wazza_wantsbeer,

It looks like something killed your yeast.  You indicated initial signs of vigorous yeast activity on activation.  Here are some of the mistakes I have made over the years:

• Not thoroughly rinsing out the sterilizing chemicals
• Not cooling the wort sufficiently to accept the yeast  

I can't think of anything else at this time.  Good luck on your cider.

[Captain 3 Droids]

1 minute ago, Thagomizer said:

It looks like something killed your yeas

I think the yeast was already kind a dead. Wazza has admitted his possible error, that is he bought out of date yeast, so much so the seller gave him an extra packet. Then when told the brew was 10l he was told to use one. We all learn. 

[Thagomizer]

Yup, yeast does have a limited shelf life.

Nevertheless, I encourage Wazza_wantsbeer to keep on brewing beer - - and to keep looking for bargains where applicable. 🙂

[Wazza_wantsbeer]

Thank you @Thagomizerand @Captain 3 Droids

I definitely think the expired yeast had something to do with it.

I also think that I royally stuffed up the wort. When doing the sink pour, the wort had a consistency of a milk shake or smoothy.

I think too much proteins from the Wheat and rolled oats and so it was quite glutenous in texture.

[Captain 3 Droids]

6 minutes ago, Wazza_wantsbeer said:

I think too much proteins from the Wheat and rolled oats and so it was quite glutenous in texture.

Besides the yeast I think your on.

[T D]

Quick question for the knowledgeable lads on this forum.

I bought a kit today designed for at 23L fermenter, understand all ingredients need to be halved for the droid, but in terms of hops, would you keep that at 12 (half the packet) or go the whole 25? 
 

for context, these are being added to the boil, not during fermentation.

 

cheers

[Captain 3 Droids]

31 minutes ago, T D said:

Quick question for the knowledgeable lads on this forum.

I bought a kit today designed for at 23L fermenter, understand all ingredients need to be halved for the droid, but in terms of hops, would you keep that at 12 (half the packet) or go the whole 25? 
 

for context, these are being added to the boil, not during fermentation.

 

cheers

Hops in the boil really add/promote bitterness therefore for 10l I’d half it, 12g.

Cheers

[T D]

13 minutes ago, Captain 3 Droids said:

Hops in the boil really add/promote bitterness therefore for 10l I’d half it, 12g.

Cheers

Thanks Captain, I knew I could rely on your help, much appreciated!

[Captain 3 Droids]

@T DOut of interest what’s the kit? If it’s a can kit is there a particular reason for you going to boil the ingredients.

[T D]

9 minutes ago, Captain 3 Droids said:

@T DOut of interest what’s the kit? If it’s a can kit is there a particular reason for you going to boil the ingredients.

Don’t hate me for this, it’s a VB kit from Australian home brewing (just needed something easy for camping in a few weeks) 

 

https://www.australianhomebrewing.com.au/beer-recipe-kit-vb-victoria-bitter-clone