Well done to you guys in QLD who put so much hard work into this event. These things don't happen without a lot of very hard work.
It's nice to see BIAB being declared a winner but I'm not sure that it should have been. I'm tempted to start a whole new thread on why but maybe it's best if I let you guys deal with it.
Here's my reasoning....
1. Firstly, the reader should regard me as pro-BIAB. (Iam , but I have good reasons for it.)
2. Even though BIAB 'won', I can see serious flaws in the 'war.'
3. The BIAB efficiency into kettle was way below a normal BIAB. Why?
4. In my thinking, you can't compare beers of different original gravities. The beers should have been measured by several people as many times as possible. (One reading means nothing.) The beers should have certainly been diluted to a common ground of the lowest OG before fermentation.
Whilst I personally know that BIAB is a magnificent way of all-grain brewing, this experiment would do nothing to convince me. I don't see it as a 'win' for BIAB. If the experiment was done in the manner I proposed above I would fully expect BIAB to be a winner but I really think on side by sides, original gravity, carefully measured, needs to be the common ground.
And, even if you get the above right, you need to repeat the experiment many times.
The 'wars' are a great idea, fun and interesting but I think a lot more thought needs to be put into them. BIAB and traditional brewing have a lot of things of value to share and, more importantly, investigate.
Spot!
Pat
Happy to hear from you Pat,
That's a short post for you mate
Yes it was a lot of work, but was worth it to showcase brewing to the people that came on the day and at the conference.
1) B)
2) You really cannot split the 2 winning systems as the difference is statistically insignificant, but we had to declare one winner. I did as much as I could to level the playing field to make the differences the system and the brewer only. It wasn't perfect. Everything post cubing was me doing it side by side and the recipe packs were identical for all 4 systems.
The only "flaw" I see was in the tasting part....We just asked everyone to vote on their favourite.....this was to make it easy and fun.....
3) Efficiency means nothing unless you have a very accurate volume and measure the gravity correctly. The volume in the BIAB case was an estimate as the original one I was told was a stuff up. I'm not sure what happened on the day. Note that BIAB was the system that also ended up with too much wort at the end of the boil and had to tip "efficiency down the drain." Just not Bribie's day
4) OG's - This was discussed and fleshed out in the planing stages. In the end, to make it about the systems (and brewers), I asked everyone to hit 75% efficiency and to target 20L @ 1052. I really did not expect such a huge difference in OG.
What should have happened on the day - BIAB should have boiled down further to get the gravity....not the other 3 systems watered down.
I am a trained laboratory scientist and did all the measurements until I got 3 identical readings with a hydrometer on all the worts post cubing at the different stages. This made it fairer (and ironed out the bravado factor) IMO.
NOTE: If I had been allocating points in the systems wars for time, technique, accuracy, gravity, education, clothing, humour etc .....the result would have been different....and everyone would have said it was rigged (I brewed on the Braumeiser).
It was too much work to do it every weekend......but we will do more in the future to showcase brewing and have fun which was our original intention....
Dave
