Recent content by rob7

Hi vlbaby, Apparantly acrylic isn't so good at higher temperatures - I think it gets hazy or something. Polycarbonate is better. I got some 10mm polycarb tube for sight glasses recently, got one on my kettle so far, and it works brilliantly. Really useful addition. Cheers, Rob

Hi Trent, I've found this site: http://hbd.org/recipator/ (the 'spreadsheet' link) to be a good promash-type recipe calcuator, it gives you the colour approximation, which is all anything can give you, by the sounds of it. might be worth a look cheers, rob

hey pedro, it didn't really smell like vinegar - it's pretty hard to describe what it did actually smell like. maybe because i haven't smelled anything quite like it before. i'm not sure if stringy is the best wat to describe the growth - it was sort of a scum on the top surface with a few...

ok, fair enough

It's rank! :blink: i've got a few jars of washed yeast from previous batches sitting in the fridge, one was some belgian yeast that i put there at the end of september. last week i noticed some stringy growth starting at the top of the water, gave it a sniff - whoah! rinsing out the jar...

hi pumpy, based on yesterday, the grain crushing has definitely had something to do with my low efficiency (not to mention my frustration). now that seems to be sorted, so it's time to start looking elsewhere, as you've said (a few times!). In terms of doughing-in, that may be an issue, as...

I'll add my thanks, I did a batch this morning, the crush went magically - really quick, excellent crush. My overall efficiency was 78%, which is way above the best i've ever got. brilliant. i've now drilled out a couple of new holes in the wheel, ready to go again tomorrow! i'm all keen to...

thanks a lot dicko & tim i'll give that a try later today - i'd read that i wanted the bottom gap to be wider than the top so that it wasn't in use, but it does make sense to have two gaps working. cheers, i'll let you know the results Rob

not easily i've got an old canning boiler (~30L, 1800W electric element), first to heat strike water, than sparge water (which then goes into pots on the stove), then to boil the wort. also a 25L esky for mashing. so, i grind into the esky, put the strike water in, heat the sprge water, put...

Hey Shawn, good to know it's not just me. i just tried the slow speed this morning for a quick trial, and the crush did look better, but i reckon it'd even slower than 6kg/hr. i might have to work on my patience. and maybe build a bigger hopper - that might help, i could leave it to itself...

I've joined this a bit late, but I'd be interested in some AG get-togethers. I'm in Toowong, btw, and in an apartment/unit, but am doing AG in an esky on the kitchen bench. Desperately trying to figure out how to fit a proper system eventually. I've got into this by doing not much more than...

Hi All, I've been reading the board here for a month or so, finally decided to get off my bum and write something. I've been doing AG for a couple months now, maybe 6-8 batches so far. results have been really tasty, but i've been having lots of efficiency problems, it's been something like...