Hi all from the hub of the civilised world aka Bewdley, Worcs.

The Homebrew Forum

Help Support The Homebrew Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Mar 1, 2020
Messages
13
Reaction score
2
Location
The hub of the civilised world aka Bewdley, Worcs.
Hi all, from the hub of the civilised world. Have been all grain brewing for many years using the traditional home set up but recently moved to Grainfather kit to improve consistency and quality. Getting there but as you all know its a long slow problem...theres only so much beer you can drink. I am a bit of a traditionalist real ale drinker and favour British style bitters, porters and stouts but still love a cold Pilsner Urquell.
Cheers for now acheers.
 
Hi BlueShack, welcome to the forum.

I'm not too far away and also a Grainfather user. I like some of the American ales, but much of the time nothing beats a traditional British bitter for me.
 
Welcome from the southern outpost of the civilised world. Where British beer is brewed, you can call it civilised. I, too, love a cold pint of Urquell and have spent many brews trying to copy it. Too lazy so far to go for the triple decoction mash so haven't quite got there yet, but the results have been very drinkable. I agree that the brake on experimentation is getting rid of the product. I've started brewing smaller batches of 12 litres instead of 25 litres. Can you do that in a Grainfather or does it have to run at capacity? Being retired with a good stock of everything in case there are supply problems in January, it's definitely the drinking that slows down research. Could make more friends, but have a violent aversion to expat gammon. The French, by and large, really don't get beer unless they're from up north by Calais or from the Alsace. They tend to think English beer is Guinness! The Germans, Belgians and Dutch love the stuff.
 
Welcome from the southern outpost of the civilised world. Where British beer is brewed, you can call it civilised. I, too, love a cold pint of Urquell and have spent many brews trying to copy it. Too lazy so far to go for the triple decoction mash so haven't quite got there yet, but the results have been very drinkable. I agree that the brake on experimentation is getting rid of the product. I've started brewing smaller batches of 12 litres instead of 25 litres. Can you do that in a Grainfather or does it have to run at capacity? Being retired with a good stock of everything in case there are supply problems in January, it's definitely the drinking that slows down research. Could make more friends, but have a violent aversion to expat gammon. The French, by and large, really don't get beer unless they're from up north by Calais or from the Alsace. They tend to think English beer is Guinness! The Germans, Belgians and Dutch love the stuff.

Hi An Ankoù, I have also adopted smaller batch brewing of 15 litres solely because it does not prove so costly as larger batches if all goes horribly wrong. The Grainfather is ideal for this and can easily deal with small grain bills of say 3-4 kgs. When I have perfected a beer that I consider very quaffable and consistent I will be making larger versions of it. Got my eye on dispensing via a hand pump in future months but need to perfect cask conditioning first which is quite an art. Cheers for now.
 
Once you get the hang of it, it's easier and quicker than bottle conditioning. I used to used a 40pt plastic PV and connect a plastic tube to the tap (the black ones that most suppliers stock). Prime the beer with about 25g of sugar and dispense after a week by loosening the lid to let the pressure out and to allow the air in when the beer is drawn. This is very much like the way it happens in a cask where the pressure builds up during conditioning and is released when the hard spile is knocked in and replaced with the porous peg. Like a cask, the contents have to be drunk within a couple of days otherwise the drawn-in air will spoil rest.ho
However, one of our members @Coffin Dodger invented an ingenious way of capturing the conditioning gas in a balloon, which is then sucked back into the void left by the drawn-off beer. I must confess I haven't yet used it as I got distracted by party kegs, which work in exactly the same way as a cask in that you vent the excess pressure and then let the air in to replace the beer. As they're only 5 litres, I can finish one of in three days so nothing's wasted. The best way of getting these kegs is to go to Tesco and get one or two full of Adnams Ghost Ship. Avoid the Doom Bar ones- they're more difficult to use and the beer's sh1te.
Of course you can't really connect it to a hand pump unless someone knows a way of replacing the red tap.
 
Last edited:
What you suggest is spot on and a plan for my current brew, a TT Landlord clone, if it turns out ok. I have a 15L plastic ‘keg’ with a an inlet value only and proposing priming sugar of around 20gms, maybe less. I recognise the dangers of not have a relief value but hopefully at conditioning temp of around 12ºc, the 1.7 volumes produced will not exceed the 10PSI of the sealed 'keg'. The 20 grams is a rough guess but otherwise hope I have done my maths correctly. As you point out, after a period of time the cap is vented slightly, as a conventional cask would be, and there you have it…a perfectly conditioned and gravity dispensed real ale. A hand pump would be nice but accept the difficulties would be for another day. There is always an option of a blanket covering the surface with a spurt of CO2 but this, strictly speaking, in not approved by CAMRA. Not that that matters in the home environment.

I understand the principles of the the balloon but not how the vent would be operated with it in place, or have I missed the point? Agree that Doom Bar is sh1te beer. Cheers for now.
 
here is always an option of a blanket covering the surface with a spurt of CO2 but this, strictly speaking, in not approved by CAMRA. Not that that matters in the home environment.
I wouldn't be too worried about CAMRA approval. Certainly they've done a good job in rejuvenating real ale, but their stand against cask breathers has been a major setback to quality ale and complete bolllox. I understand they've changed their collective minds now. Nope, CAMRA are far too big for their boots and it's time they were pensioned off.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top