FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
Re: Kegging 5.5 gal in 7.25 keg (Joe Walts)
Electric MT ("Eric \"Rick\" Theiner")
Re: Looking for MT heating solution (Mike Schwartz)
Joe Starzyk keg filling ("Dave Burley")
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Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2012 23:35:49 -0600
From: Joe Walts <jwalts at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Kegging 5.5 gal in 7.25 keg
Joe,
You should calculate your priming sugar under the assumption that
you'll have 7.25 gallons of beer. It's a valid method because CO2 in
the headspace will end up in equilibrium with CO2 in the beer. In
other words, you'll essentially need to carbonate both the beer and
the headspace to the same level of carbonation. If you take the
"initial carbonation" of the headspace into account (i.e. whether or
not a keg is purged with CO2), the margin of error will be smaller
than what you'll be able to address with your sugar scale. This
applies to bottle conditioning as well. If you expect to need 48
bottles for a given batch, you should base your priming sugar on the
total volume of 48 bottles instead of the beer volume going into those
bottles. For a 5-gallon batch, a 5-gallon keg has less headspace than
53-54 bottles. Plus, kegs are often purged with CO2 and bottles
usually aren't. Those two factors are probably why homebrewing
literature often recommends using less priming sugar for kegging than
bottling.
Another Joe
Madison, WI
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Date: Mon, 27 Feb 2012 07:38:59 -0500
From: "Eric \"Rick\" Theiner" <rick at ecologiccleansers.com>
Subject: Electric MT
Mike is looking for an electric method to heat his mash tun, but isn't
too sure about using a recirculating method...
That's a tough one because although I can say for certain, I think
that having your grain in direct contact with the element is a bad
idea. So you can either put in a high false bottom and have a lot of
dead space under your mash (and much higher demand for mashing), or
your can build a tube to go around the element.
The latter option may be more difficult from a build perspective, but
I like it from an efficiency of space point of view. Now the question
is how to go about it; perhaps a copper tube (okay, that's going to be
expensive) around it with very tight slits to allow liquid to flow
through it, but not the mash. Another option would be to put
something in the tube like glycol and then seal it, although I would
be worried about pressure buildup. That second is not just a crazy
idea; I can't remember where I came across it before, but it's
something I've heard of before...
Honestly, although I know you're thinking you don't want to take this
approach, I think an electric RIMS tube might actually be the best
solution. There are plans out there for DIY tubes that aren't too bad
in terms of cost. And although polymers isn't my area, it seems like
there should be something on the market now that can handle the high
heat of the RIMS unit and maybe that would be more cost effective
(something like PEX?).
Anyway, my early morning thoughts.
Incidentally, I'm all electric, too, and for my own system I was
taking the HERMS approach for years but was finally talked into RIMS
by John at Stout Tanks (not affiliated, etc.) and although I still
haven't gotten my new design up and running (much to the chagrin of my
brew-day buddies), it's going to be a lot easier to clean and deal
with than my previous generation systems. Check out the picture and I
think you'll see what I mean about that-- he built in easy
disassembly. I'm just saying it might give you some ideas.
http://conical-fermenter.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/RIMS-Module.jpg
Regardless, let us know what you end up doing!
Rick Theiner
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Date: Mon, 27 Feb 2012 09:23:13 -0600
From: Mike Schwartz <mjs at seadogboats.com>
Subject: Re: Looking for MT heating solution
Mike Eyre was looking for a mash tun heating solution:
"I've pondered HERMS, but the cost of copper and the slower ramp
times, and addition cleaning of said HERMS tubes is sorta putting me
off. I'm also familiar with the newfangled RIMS tube ideas, but..
wow, that much SS for the tubes is darned expensive! Is there
anything you all are using that I'm missing?"
I started with an electric RIMS, later switching to a HERMS. With
either I could get a temperature rise of 1 degree F/minute which I
always thought was fine. The electric RIMS was just a water heater
element in a pipe that I use a pump to recirc wort through. That was
all controlled with a digital temp controller. Cost overall was very
minimal except the controller but that was just taken from my fermenter.
The HERMS was 20 feet of 3/8" ID copper tube in the HLT. It worked
great and the only cleaning was flushing with clean water then running
cleaning solution through it, all done while cleaning the pump and other
equipment so no big deal. The only drawbacks are the HLT temp has to be
adjusted so it can interfere with making a second batch and if you're
not careful you can compact your mash bed. The alternative is to put
the coil in the mash tun and pump hot water through it which eliminates
the issue of stuck mash but requires stirring. The 20' of copper
doesn't cost that much (less than a controller) and you don't need more
because of the low flow rates.
These days I mostly add 200F + water for temperature rises. Just start
with a thick mash and thin it as you go. The calculations for the water
additions are easy.
Good luck with whatever your choice!
Mike Schwartz
Beer Barons of Milwaukee
beerbarons.org
worldofbeerfestival.com
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Date: Mon, 27 Feb 2012 22:05:58 -0500
From: "Dave Burley" <Dave Burley at charter.net>
Subject: Joe Starzyk keg filling
Joe,
I know it is common practice to blow out a keg with a few volumes of CO2
and then fill the keg. Thinking being you'll just push out the air with the
CO2 "since it is heavier than air" I've tasted those beers and they are
always disappointing.
Sorry but it doesn't work that way. Oxygen in air and CO2 are perfect gases
at atmospheric pressures and obey those gas laws. Such as mixing
instantaneously with other gases. As you blow in CO2 you have an excellent
mixing chamber. So to get down to about 1% of the oxygen in air with this
method, you will need 100 exchanges or about 500 galllons of CO2 gas. That's
a lot of gas and possibly more than you have in a full bottle of CO2.
So what to do? There is an easy way to solve this problem. Use water to
flush the air out of the keg and then push the water out with CO2. This will
guarantee you have an oxygen free keg to fill to whatever level you desire.
5 gallons in 7.5 gallons s no problem. Fill the keg by having a hose reach to
the bottom and have the top of the keg mostly closed with the lid. I have
done this at least hundreds of times and the beer maintains its clean
non-oxygenated taste. If you are going to naturally condition, you will want
to use non-chlorinated water for the flush. You can buy bottles of this at a
supernarket or set up to remove the chlorine from your tap water.
Keep on Brewin'
Dave Burley
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End of HOMEBREW Digest #5903, 02/27/12
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