2008 Hag Xmas Case Swap

[Tony]

So was i

Im so pissed off i have that sickly tight feeling in my chest. I think its stress that i have another summer of pouring beer down the drain.

Going to stick with lagers and the like for a while.

No more case swaps for me. Thats about $150 i have wasted screwing up this 2....... the last swap wasnt much better.

Like i said. I give up. Im done.

I feel like crying actually. The beers i have on tap are fantastic......... really really good. I have honest family critics and they agree. But anything i rack to bottle doesnt stand much of a chance. Dont know why.

Might ditch the bottles, forget case swaps, get a freezer to hold 2 x 50 liter kegs and a corny and upgrage the 2 tap font ive never used to a 3 tapper and just live with that.

Ahhhh sory for the rant..... trying to chear myself up and work out how to have a few different styles available without bottles and keep fermenting beers cool and out of the air

 

[Offline]

Sorry to hear that Tony

Maybe you should build a counter pressure bottle filler

Offline

 

[Tony]

Na........ id just **** that up too

 

[Weizguy]

Well i give up!

Never again!

First the NSW swap beer and now the HAG swap beer.

It was fine last night. Went down to bottle it just then and its got the white skin and nail poillish happening.

So down the drain with it too. 360g of NZ hops, 12.5kg of grain and the rest.

It must be in the air in my garage. I give up!

Will stick with brewing for myself, obe beer at a time and keep them sealed up in a fridge. These seem to be fine.

Soffy folks........ im out for good.

Sorry to hear that Tony. I stir you a bit, but this heartbreak belongs to us all.

I made a batch of London Pride recently and it was great, but a bit flat last week. Great fruitiness, malty Maris and nice balanced hops and dryness. This week, it's started to show fusels, like your beer.
I reckon that we have the same bug from the air, or the conditioning temp was too high.

 

[Tony]

I dn ot mind a stir Les........... friends do that.

This is different to the late forming funkiness i had a while back. This is the origional infection. The beer is fine till i rack it to clear for bottling, within 48 hrs its all hazy with algal bloom and the white skin on top and nailpollish aroma. The beer tastes as normal but has the nailpollish aroma slightly in the background. Thats what gets me.......... the beer tastes fine, just smells like solvent.

2 posabilities.......... leaking chiller or its getting inside the tap outlet rom when i have drawn a drible to make sure its ok. Then when i rack it it washes into the beer, no fermentation to compete with, it goes nuts and has its self a nail pollish party.

BEcause of this......... im looking to change how i brew/process the beer.

The bottles are going, all of them! No more swaps, no more comps. Bugger it.

All beer will be fermented and then chilled, filtered and conditioned cold to prevent this happening. All the beers i have had on tap in the last few months have been great. They were lagers brewed in the fridge, racked and CC's then filtered cold and kegged, gassed and put on tap.......... cold the whole time. Bloody fantastic beers too.

Going to get a big freezer to hold a few kegs and a 3 tap flooded font so i can have a bit of variety that i enjoy with the bottles. The current keg fridge will become CC fridge.

If thats what i have to do, im afraid its a sacrafice i will have to make. I love competition and case swaps, but i cant afford to be throwing all this out.

maybe one day i will be back. Untill then i will have to be selfish and brew for me only.

Was going to drop some beers i thought were good out to keith for the comp but wont now....... they will only be faulted badly too.

Im actually feeling quite depressed and thousands of blokes growing stupid Mo's arnt helping me feel better. I spent many years in the past with massive depression and hate this heavy feeling. I hate it!

Only one thing to do.......... BREW!

cheers

 

[bigfridge]

I dn ot mind a stir Les........... friends do that.

This is different to the late forming funkiness i had a while back. This is the origional infection. The beer is fine till i rack it to clear for bottling, within 48 hrs its all hazy with algal bloom and the white skin on top and nailpollish aroma. The beer tastes as normal but has the nailpollish aroma slightly in the background. Thats what gets me.......... the beer tastes fine, just smells like solvent.

2 posabilities.......... leaking chiller or its getting inside the tap outlet rom when i have drawn a drible to make sure its ok. Then when i rack it it washes into the beer, no fermentation to compete with, it goes nuts and has its self a nail pollish party.

BEcause of this......... im looking to change how i brew/process the beer.

The bottles are going, all of them! No more swaps, no more comps. Bugger it.

All beer will be fermented and then chilled, filtered and conditioned cold to prevent this happening. All the beers i have had on tap in the last few months have been great. They were lagers brewed in the fridge, racked and CC's then filtered cold and kegged, gassed and put on tap.......... cold the whole time. Bloody fantastic beers too.

Going to get a big freezer to hold a few kegs and a 3 tap flooded font so i can have a bit of variety that i enjoy with the bottles. The current keg fridge will become CC fridge.

If thats what i have to do, im afraid its a sacrafice i will have to make. I love competition and case swaps, but i cant afford to be throwing all this out.

maybe one day i will be back. Untill then i will have to be selfish and brew for me only.

Was going to drop some beers i thought were good out to keith for the comp but wont now....... they will only be faulted badly too.

Im actually feeling quite depressed and thousands of blokes growing stupid Mo's arnt helping me feel better. I spent many years in the past with massive depression and hate this heavy feeling. I hate it!

Only one thing to do.......... BREW!

cheers

Hi Tony,

Sorry to hear your heartache - it would break a lesser man.

There is obviously something fundementally wrong with your process. The bug is in your equipment, not the air.

You are welcome to pop down to the Cardiff sub-chapter of HAG and we can brew and chat together to exchange ideas.

Hang in there mate,

David

 

[Tony]

Thanks for the offer dave. Not sure i can raise my head at the moment though.

Im switching sanatizers and going to bomb everything to death and back again twice over.

Ive had multiple infections all from different problems that i found but this one........ it went away for 6 months and now its come back just for my case swap beers. both of them.

Im a problem solver by nature and profesion and this is the one ******* i cant crack. And i dont like to loose. I will push to the ends of the earth for a solution.

I will die trying!

Thats just me i guess..... when you go down, you go down fighting!

cheers

Now......... where are those germs hiding?

 

[Weizguy]

Hi Tony,

Sorry to hear your heartache - it would break a lesser man.

There is obviously something fundementally wrong with your process. The bug is in your equipment, not the air.

You are welcome to pop down to the Cardiff sub-chapter of HAG and we can brew and chat together to exchange ideas.

Hang in there mate,

David

HAG brew day at David's house. All welcome? :lol:

Tony, you can bring a keg to the next swap if you want.
We can bottle it on the day, from the keg, or we can just drink it.
Don't give up. There's always a way!

Maybe the bugs will die off if you're only kegging for a while, and you can go back to bottling again in a year or so.
Otherwise, if the bug's in the equipment, your good kegged beers will eventually go the same way.

Maybe a fresh set of eyes, checking over your equipment, might provide some insight.

Les (BN Army)

 

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Updating user name

1. n00ch - No idea yet but I will attempt to up my standard this swap.
2. Schooey - Schwarzbier
3. Spare Spot
4. Leeboy - Imperial Porter
5. Les (Weizguy) - Am blonde
6. The Ol' Boozeroony - hopefully something tasty
7. ryanmoore184 - Witbier
8. Pok - Something....no idea at the moment...i'm on holidays so brain is in cruise mode
9. Rurik - (Tentative) - Mild
10 MHB - Dark Wheat Double Bock
11 Offline - Some fermented hop and malted barley type thing
12 Shmick - Something for Summer
13 goatherder - Munich Dunkel
14 Loftboy - Yankee Doodle Weizen (American Wheat). Either that or something similar for a hot summers day
15 Peve - Coriander Porter (revised) - unless I get time do do another brew
16. Head - Unsure as yet.
17. BJL- Hefe Weizen (at this stage, may change)
18 - Trent - Not sure yet, maybe an american wheat, still debating.
19. Fingolfin - not sure yet.
20. BigFridge - Something inspired by my USA trip (but they brew all styles here)
21. Punter- not sure yet.
22. Michael Mosely - not really sure, but probably beer
23. HarryB - not sure yet

 

[HarryB]

1. n00ch - No idea yet but I will attempt to up my standard this swap.
2. Schooey - Schwarzbier
3. Spare Spot
4. Leeboy - Imperial Porter
5. Les (Weizguy) - Am blonde
6. The Ol' Boozeroony - hopefully something tasty
7. ryanmoore184 - Witbier
8. Pok - Something....no idea at the moment...i'm on holidays so brain is in cruise mode
9. Rurik - (Tentative) - Mild
10 MHB - Dark Wheat Double Bock
11 Offline - Some fermented hop and malted barley type thing
12 Shmick - Something for Summer
13 goatherder - Munich Dunkel
14 Loftboy - Yankee Doodle Weizen (American Wheat). Either that or something similar for a hot summers day
15 Peve - Coriander Porter (revised) - unless I get time do do another brew
16. Head - Unsure as yet.
17. BJL- Hefe Weizen (at this stage, may change)
18 - Trent - Not sure yet, maybe an american wheat, still debating.
19. Fingolfin - not sure yet.
20. BigFridge - Something inspired by my USA trip (but they brew all styles here)
21. Punter- not sure yet.
22. Michael Mosely - not really sure, but probably beer
23. HarryB - Belgian-style ale

 

[bigfridge]

Thanks for the offer dave. Not sure i can raise my head at the moment though.

Im switching sanatizers and going to bomb everything to death and back again twice over.

Ive had multiple infections all from different problems that i found but this one........ it went away for 6 months and now its come back just for my case swap beers. both of them.

Im a problem solver by nature and profesion and this is the one ******* i cant crack. And i dont like to loose. I will push to the ends of the earth for a solution.

I will die trying!

Thats just me i guess..... when you go down, you go down fighting!

cheers

Now......... where are those germs hiding?

Hi Tony,

I can only wish you the best of luck but I fear that you have missed what I am saying. There is probably nothing wrong with your existing sanatisers - it is the design of your equipment or the way that it is being used (ie your process) that is causing you grief.

So that we can all throw some light on your problems if you can post a photo of your equipment and a description of how you use it them we may be able to make some suggestions.

We are only interested in the post-boil as anything that happens before the boil is irrelevant. You should only 'clean' mash-tuns, boilers and HLT. Using sanatisers just wastes money, builds up the the resistance of the bugs you want to kill and harms the environment.

Speaking of the environment - what is near where you brew ?

The first thing that a new brewer did at Chimay was move the stables, together with their manure heap, away from the brewery. Do you have a similar problem ?

Also, where do you store and grind your grain ? It should be in a seperate building (or at least room) to where your brewery is.

HTH,
Dave

 

[leeboy]

Is anyone willing to loan me a bottle washing tree for a couple of days so I can get my Imperial Porter bottled. I have a capper etc. Just never got a washing tree cause I just keg and for comps only do a couple of bottles.

If someone is willing I'll happily come collect and repay the loan with a couple of bottles of the best I have on tap currently ( Pilsner, Porter, Belgian Tripel)
Lee

 

[Weizguy]

I'd like to help, Lee, but my bottle tree is a drying tree only, for hanging the washed bottles upon pegs.

 

[schooey]

I don't have one either. I wash them in Pink, and then rinse them in really hot water and shake **** of them and the heat usually dries them off

 

[Tony]

Yeah Dave...... i know what your saying.

I have changed a couple of things post boil and will be making some mods to my system to rule out other posible offenders.

The other one i was thinking of is the ducted vacuum in the garage where i brew. Thinking of having the exhause ducted outside.

I crack my grain outside the garage where i brew.

Also thinking of having a HAG brew day at my place one day next year when it cools down a bit.......april/may ish

If im still having problems you can happily pick me and my garage to peices Im all ears

cheers

 

[bjl]

Sorry but I have to pull out. Rostered to work that weekend and I just haven't had the time to put a brew down.

1. n00ch - No idea yet but I will attempt to up my standard this swap.
2. Schooey - Schwarzbier
3. Spare Spot
4. Leeboy - Imperial Porter
5. Les (Weizguy) - Am blonde
6. The Ol' Boozeroony - hopefully something tasty
7. ryanmoore184 - Witbier
8. Pok - Something....no idea at the moment...i'm on holidays so brain is in cruise mode
9. Rurik - (Tentative) - Mild
10 MHB - Dark Wheat Double Bock
11 Offline - Some fermented hop and malted barley type thing
12 Shmick - Something for Summer
13 goatherder - Munich Dunkel
14 Loftboy - Yankee Doodle Weizen (American Wheat). Either that or something similar for a hot summers day
15 Peve - Coriander Porter (revised) - unless I get time do do another brew
16. Head - Unsure as yet.
17. Spare Spot
18 - Trent - Not sure yet, maybe an american wheat, still debating.
19. Fingolfin - not sure yet.
20. BigFridge - Something inspired by my USA trip (but they brew all styles here)
21. Punter- not sure yet.
22. Michael Mosely - not really sure, but probably beer
23. HarryB - Belgian-style ale

 

[Offline]

You don't need to be available on the swap day, there will be a drop off point for those who can't make in on the day but you will miss out on chatting to the brewers.

And it's not to late to do a brew either, at least I hope its not because Ill be doing mine tonight

Offline

1. n00ch - No idea yet but I will attempt to up my standard this swap.
2. Schooey - Schwarzbier
3. Spare Spot
4. Leeboy - Imperial Porter
5. Les (Weizguy) - Am blonde
6. The Ol' Boozeroony - hopefully something tasty
7. ryanmoore184 - Witbier
8. Pok - Something....no idea at the moment...i'm on holidays so brain is in cruise mode
9. Rurik - (Tentative) - Mild
10 MHB - Dark Wheat Double Bock
11 Offline - The Wild Mild
12 Shmick - Something for Summer
13 goatherder - Munich Dunkel
14 Loftboy - Yankee Doodle Weizen (American Wheat). Either that or something similar for a hot summers day
15 Peve - Coriander Porter (revised) - unless I get time do do another brew
16. Head - Unsure as yet.
17. Spare Spot
18 - Trent - Not sure yet, maybe an american wheat, still debating.
19. Fingolfin - not sure yet.
20. BigFridge - Something inspired by my USA trip (but they brew all styles here)
21. Punter- not sure yet.
22. Michael Mosely - not really sure, but probably beer
23. HarryB - Belgian-style ale

 

[bigfridge]

Just updated my entry. It will be the hitherto unknown style of 'Kloudy Klsch'. :unsure:

1. n00ch - No idea yet but I will attempt to up my standard this swap.
2. Schooey - Schwarzbier
3. Spare Spot
4. Leeboy - Imperial Porter
5. Les (Weizguy) - Am blonde
6. The Ol' Boozeroony - hopefully something tasty
7. ryanmoore184 - Witbier
8. Pok - Something....no idea at the moment...i'm on holidays so brain is in cruise mode
9. Rurik - (Tentative) - Mild
10 MHB - Dark Wheat Double Bock
11 Offline - The Wild Mild
12 Shmick - Something for Summer
13 goatherder - Munich Dunkel
14 Loftboy - Yankee Doodle Weizen (American Wheat). Either that or something similar for a hot summers day
15 Peve - Coriander Porter (revised) - unless I get time do do another brew
16. Head - Unsure as yet.
17. Spare Spot
18 - Trent - Not sure yet, maybe an american wheat, still debating.
19. Fingolfin - not sure yet.
20. BigFridge - Klsch
21. Punter- not sure yet.
22. Michael Mosely - not really sure, but probably beer
23. HarryB - Belgian-style ale

 

[balconybrewer]

are we going to finilize the numbers soon so those of us who havent bottled can know how many we are swaping?????

would like to put the remainder in stubs.

cheers

 

[Tony]

Bugger you lot! I said i wouldnt..... didnt trust my beers, but i have a batch of Red Ale made with galazy hops that is good to go. NOt to any style..... well maybe American Amber but not as hoppy.

Also will pe pitching some 1272 into the Coffee Porter i brewed last night with 200g fresh coffee beans in the next few days so if its bottled and not infected i will enter that.

I just love the swaps so much.

cheers


1. n00ch - No idea yet but I will attempt to up my standard this swap.
2. Schooey - Schwarzbier
3. Tony - Bugger it, i will have something ready! Red Ale kind of thing or a Coffee Porter.
4. Leeboy - Imperial Porter
5. Les (Weizguy) - Am blonde
6. The Ol' Boozeroony - hopefully something tasty
7. ryanmoore184 - Witbier
8. Pok - Something....no idea at the moment...i'm on holidays so brain is in cruise mode
9. Rurik - (Tentative) - Mild
10 MHB - Dark Wheat Double Bock
11 Offline - The Wild Mild
12 Shmick - Something for Summer
13 goatherder - Munich Dunkel
14 Loftboy - Yankee Doodle Weizen (American Wheat). Either that or something similar for a hot summers day
15 Peve - Coriander Porter (revised) - unless I get time do do another brew
16. Head - Unsure as yet.
17. Spare Spot
18 - Trent - Not sure yet, maybe an american wheat, still debating.
19. Fingolfin - not sure yet.
20. BigFridge - Klsch
21. Punter- not sure yet.
22. Michael Mosely - not really sure, but probably beer
23. HarryB - Belgian-style ale