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DirtyCaner

Landlord.
Joined
Apr 25, 2011
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Location
Scotland
Hi Everyone,

Hopefully this weekend is going to see my first brew in about 5 years. A recent houseguest brought me a can kit of BREWFERM Diabolo. It says it makes 9 litres of beer at about 8%. OG is 1.075

I was thinking of doubling the batch by simply doubling sugar quantities and add water to 18L. It just 9L is gonna leave a lot of space in my fermenter. What do u think guys, I'm not gonna mess it up like this am I?

Ah well... off to see if I can find a chemist that sells isopropanol.

Cheers,

DirtyC
 
leave it as it is, brewferm kits are superb, they are well worth the wait, once you bottle it you will have to leave it for 3 months (or more) i know its only 9 litres but a great 9 litres, once you start agin you wont be able to stop, get another kit or 3 to see you over till the brewferm will be drinkable, normal kits dont take long before you can throw them down your neck!
 
Ok mate, thanks, I get your point.

It does however leave me in a dilemma tho, the only other kits I've got (also gifts) are Breferm Ambiorix (makes 15L) and a Thomas Coopers IPA which calls for 500g Coopers light dry maly (which I don't have). Unfortunately there's no brew shop in Aberdeen...

Is it feasible to stick the IPA on to brew and add the malt later on in week (and I could order it online)? Or is gonna be another month of Graffenwalder for me lol...

Cheers,

DirtyC
 
i cant believe im gonna say this... if you cant wait you can use normal sugar(sorry people!) if it were me i would wait, as to adding later in the ferment, never known that happen before, i would def say no, you will get far better flavour, body etc with beer enhancer that just plain old sugar but needs must, normal sugar will make it a tad 'thin' on flavour but will mean you can start the brew straight away, at the mo i have a few bottles of coopers ipa left from a kit i did last year, i used beer enhancer and its a really good pint so patience is the only thing which is constant in brewing and you need lots of it.
 
Aye, ok. Don't get me wrong I'm not usually the impatient type but I've only got this 2 week window to get summit on the go before social commitments will get in the way. At the end of the day, if your gonna do something, do it properly I eh? I'll prob crack on with one of the Brewferms n shelve it for a bit once it's done. Thanks for the advice mate, I'll post how I get on.

DirtyC
 
Aye, so I went for the Amborix in the end. All good but got a bit over excited n fired up my yeast in a glass before I checked the brew temp. It'll probably take hours to go down to 20. Do you think its worth adding a spoonful of sugar to yeast to keep it happy , while i wait to add it?
 
Chucked the yeast in on Sunday night before I went to bed, think was about 23 and left it. All seems to be coming along nicely, bubbling away in the spare bedroom. Been a long time since i used this beer kit, I'd forgotten the floating thermometer is only graduated in f... lol
 
So the farmentation has slowed down a lot. The kit advises to keep it some where about 25c. Unfortunately ambient temp in spare room is between 10-23c. I did have a small heating pad before, it was capable of raising the temp of a 30l brew 1c. Unfortunately I seem to have misplaced it. I did think about sticking it the wardrobe with the boiler in it but the mrs said no, " It's a house not a brewery appprently"...

So I figure instead I'll give it an extra 3-4 days just to make sure fermentations complete (kit says 10 days). Sound feasible? or do I really need to raise the temp some?

Cheers,

DirtyC
 
Well, I bottled the Ambiorix this weekend with the help of a friend. Considering its straight out the fermenter it tastes not bad. Reckon it will be pretty good in a few months. I managed to bottle 12L and supped about 2.5 . Had couple of tins too and can barely remember eating my tea on saturday!

Thanks to bomberns and luckyeddie for your input.

:cheers:

DirtyC
 
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