Hi.

[barbeer]

Hi. I am fairly new to home brewing. I bought a kit last year and have so far done two kits. I am only interested at the moment in the basic kits brewing with the plastic bucket thing with a lid, as I don't want to spend on any more expensive equipment at the moment.

The first kit was from The Range - Yorkshire bitter style. It came in a plastic pouch. This one worked better and brewed better down to 1.002 on the hydrometer. It came with some dry hop pellets which made a bit of a mess with some of the bottles having sediment floating around in. Some of the ones bottled last (further down the fermentation vessel) and probably with more sediment I guess were gushing out when opened which ruined those a bit. Probably about 10 of the bottles were affected like that. The ones that didn't gush did taste quite good though.

The second kit I did was Milestone Lion's Pride. I was hoping this one was going to be a better as it was one of the types that you don't add any sugar to (all liquid malt extract). However this did not ferment as well. The hydrometer starting reading was 1.038 and only went down to about 1.020. I decided to bottle it anyway as it had been in the plastic bucket for about 18 days and it didn't appear to be changing, and I didn't know what else to do to make it ferment any more. I was expecting it to be a lower alcohol percentage anyway based on the description - around 3.6% I think. This kit did not come with any dry hops but ended up with less sediment due to that I think. The taste was not quite as good as the first kit I did.

 

[ManseMasher]

Welcome aboard!

 

[Notlaw]

Welcome to the forum... :smile:

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Welcome to the forum :

 

[cheapbrew]

Welcome :hat:

How long has your 2nd brew been bottled?
Bottling at 1020 is a little high and may cause the bottles to over carb if fermentation continued, I would check one after a few weeks to see how its doing and to make sure its not turning into bottle bombs.

 

[terrym]

Welcome barbeer.
If you are staying with kits for a while you may find this useful if you haven't looked through it already.
http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=57526
Your second kit looked like it 'stuck'. There are remedies that may solve the problem. If it happens again come back and ask.
If you are brewing on a budget then give Coopers kits a try. There is quite a big range, and the kit yeast is reliable, although they will need brew or beer enhancer or better DME. However they can be lifted with a dry hop.Otherwise look through the Review section for other ideas. And if you like that sort of thing the Youngs American range is good; I have done both the APA and the AIPA.

 

[barbeer]

Welcome :hat:

How long has your 2nd brew been bottled?
Bottling at 1020 is a little high and may cause the bottles to over carb if fermentation continued, I would check one after a few weeks to see how its doing and to make sure its not turning into bottle bombs.

Only one of the bottles has gushed out so far from that brew. I do have about 15 bottles left though so will have to see what happens with those. It has been bottled since 23/11/2015.
It actually tastes better now compared to just after two weeks in the bottle. To start with it wasn't that great and I decided not to try after one week because of the experience with the first brew which was much better after 1 month in the bottle, although wasn't too bad even after a week.

 

[barbeer]

I just realised I made a mistake in my original post saying the second beer stopped at 1.020. It was actually 1.010/1.012 (I now have two different hydrometers). So maybe not so bad. I was still expecting or hoping for it to be lower as the first brew went so low.

 

[barbeer]

I have a few ideas on what I would like to brew after these. First one to do is Geordie Yorkshire Bitter. I thought I would try a cheaper kit after having done one that I thought would be better - the Lion's Pride with no added sugar. So I found the kit a while ago in Tesco when they had a sale, at I think about �£8.50. I also bought some Munton's medium spray malt 500 g because I was visiting a shop that is not too far away and saw it there. So I thought I would do it with the Geordie with some brewing sugar as well but not sure how much of the brewing sugar to use. I was thinking 500 g but would it be better with more? (I have a full 1 kg bag of dextrose).

 

[terrym]

I have a few ideas on what I would like to brew after these. First one to do is Geordie Yorkshire Bitter. I thought I would try a cheaper kit after having done one that I thought would be better - the Lion's Pride with no added sugar. So I found the kit a while ago in Tesco when they had a sale, at I think about ���£8.50. I also bought some Munton's medium spray malt 500 g because I was visiting a shop that is not too far away and saw it there. So I thought I would do it with the Geordie with some brewing sugar as well but not sure how much of the brewing sugar to use. I was thinking 500 g but would it be better with more? (I have a full 1 kg bag of dextrose).

The reason your Geordie kit is cheap is because it only contains 1.5kg Malt Extract. Youngs Harvest and the one can Wilko kits are the same. Generally the better one can kits have 1.7 or 1.8 kg malt, some even more.
If you make 40pints/23 litres with your kit it will turn out a bit thin, worse if you use all of the dextrose
To get round this I suggest you brew short to say 19 litres, add the 500g spray malt, but only 500g of the dextrose. This will give an OG of about 1.042.
Why not try a dry hop to give this kit a lift, say 25 - 40g Goldings or similar for the last five days of the primary, to add flavour and aroma. I use a large muslin bag to stop the hop particles getting everywhere, but others just chuck em in.

 

[barbeer]

The reason your Geordie kit is cheap is because it only contains 1.5kg Malt Extract. Youngs Harvest and the one can Wilko kits are the same. Generally the better one can kits have 1.7 or 1.8 kg malt, some even more.
If you make 40pints/23 litres with your kit it will turn out a bit thin, worse if you use all of the dextrose
To get round this I suggest you brew short to say 19 litres, add the 500g spray malt, but only 500g of the dextrose. This will give an OG of about 1.042.
Why not try a dry hop to give this kit a lift, say 25 - 40g Goldings or similar for the last five days of the primary, to add flavour and aroma. I use a large muslin bag to stop the hop particles getting everywhere, but others just chuck em in.

I have partly followed your suggestion to brew it short but to 20 litres. Medium spray malt 500g and dextrose 600g. Almost ready to bottle it now in the next day or two.