Specialty Grains - Questions

[buttersd70]

Edit: not saying your an idiot butters......... your not.

But beersmith seens to assume it of brewers if it thinks people cant steep grain properly. thats all.

didnt mean to come across the wrong way

cheers

Nah, thats OK mate, I knew you were referencing what Beersmith assumes of its users, and weren't directing things to me.....
Fact of the matter is, I never used Beersmith for extract brews or working out steeps....even back then, I thought there was something well dodgy in it's calculations in extract mode, and I did my recipes manually working off of the ppg

My suggestion to beersmith users that are doing extract with specialty grains is to change the beer type to "partial" instead of "extract", and set the efficiency to 70%........the numbers it gives you will make more sense.

Edit...don't even get me started on what I think of the hop utilisations in beersmith... B)

 

[Tony]

Or just get promash :lol:

 

[Jase71]

Edit...don't even get me started on what I think of the hop utilisations in beersmith... B)

I'm going to ! It's interesting you mention this, as when I tried to emulate the figures we discussed over the weekend with my other brew, I couldn't get Beersmith to read 28IBU on the hop schedule I used, along with the other ingredients. For example, without any grain or malt additions, I can only hit around 24IBU. Im wondering if this has something to do with the hop stability index, which on my trial version makes SFA difference if I change the figure between 0% & 50%.

 

[buttersd70]

I'm going to ! It's interesting you mention this, as when I tried to emulate the figures we discussed over the weekend with my other brew, I couldn't get Beersmith to read 28IBU on the hop schedule I used, along with the other ingredients. For example, without any grain or malt additions, I can only hit around 24IBU. Im wondering if this has something to do with the hop stability index, which on my trial version makes SFA difference if I change the figure between 0% & 50%.

I didn't do the hopping in beersmith on that one, I used brewsta. Its a pretty average programme overall, but if you know how to use it, it's super quick to crunch numbers in, because it's so bare-boned. It tends to over-calculate slightly, but its closer to promash than it is to beersmith in the formulation. And water boils for corrections, like we were doing, are rough and ready, anyway, so a couple of IBU over estimated is not such a bad thing.

Basically, my issue with beersmith is with the utilisation, not the hop stability index. I've found that using tinseth, beersmith gives a lower stated IBU than other programmes (like promash, for instance), and it is different to what tinseths own calculator says. An example is my mild recipe....after tonys last post in this thread, I got a bit curious......I have the promash trial, so I put in my Mild recipe, making sure that all the details were identical. One thing that stood out (as I thought it would) is the hopping. In beersmith, it gave 18.1 IBU using tinseth. Entering the same recipe, volumes, losses, etc into promash, it gave me 20.1 IBU. (2 IBU doesn't sound like much, but when its a 1035OG, with only 18IBU overall, its actually reasonably substantial, . In a bigger beer, with a higher IBU, 2IBU is a like a drop in a bucket, and wouldn't be noticable). So compared to promash, beersmith under calculates the hopping.....and out of the two, I believe promash is right.....

There were quite a few threads a while back about people considering their beer to be more bitter than what beersmith was leading them to believe, and it doesn't really surprise me. Under the details tab on my equipment (in the recipe itself) there is a hop utilisation....If I set that to 110%, it gives me basically the same IBU as promash does for the same recipe....but I don't know if that holds up over a range of different recipes with different boil losses and higher overall IBU's. I suspect it is likely that the differences may narrow, somewhat. One of these days, I might enter a range of recipes in both programmes, compare the IBUs given, and then compare that back to Tinseths own calculations....probably doing the whole lot in yank weights for direct comparison (cos tinseths metric calcuator is dodgy still). Might get a nice, kind, promash oriented person (like Tony :lol: ) to do the promash side of it so that the reports can be exported to clipboard for easy posting and comparison.

If I could go back to when I got the software....I would possibly go with promash over beersmith. But whats done is done.

 

[buttersd70]

Alright, I couldn't help myself....
Rather than clutter this thread, I've started a new one about Beersmiths hop utilisation woes.
link

 

[Jase71]

Wow, that's an informative posts, definately one for future reference. It's great the way you haven;t 'dumbed it down' too much, for it allows the reader to look into specific terminology over and above the statement you're making. As mentioned in the other thread, it might be interesting to let the beersmith developer know about this thread, it would be great to hear what his comments are

I'm still concerned that regardless of the figures, that the deterioration of the hop material over time (the stability index?) isnt factored in. Flavours & other goodies in any plant material fades over time, so this is going to affect final IBU surely - unless you know you are buying from a reputable retailer who can tell you precisely the age of the pellets/plugs/fliowers. While pellets are compressed, tehrefore less overall surface area per gram exposed to the elements, and living in my freezer, I have no idea how they were stored previously, so that could be a very big X factor that potentially outweighs a 10% calculated variant.

While on hops, you talk about IBU's in the range of 30, yet I see on the Coopers website they rate their kits at figures like 490IBU ! WTF is that all about ? Oh hang on, I just calculated 490/20 and the figure is 24.5, so Im going to jump the gun and guess that the stated IBU is for the actual can itself, and not the finished brew when its mixed into 20+ litres. Correct ?

Save opening a new thread..... Looking for the IBU on Blackrock products too (namely Whispering Wheat for now, theres some bits already at home I want to use up), so if anyone can assist......... I've emailed them but no response was forthcoming.

 

[np1962]

While on hops, you talk about IBU's in the range of 30, yet I see on the Coopers website they rate their kits at figures like 490IBU ! WTF is that all about ? Oh hang on, I just calculated 490/20 and the figure is 24.5, so Im going to jump the gun and guess that the stated IBU is for the actual can itself, and not the finished brew when its mixed into 20+ litres. Correct ?

Jase
You are pretty close with the Coopers kit, This is what is quoted on their site:-
To calculate the bitterness of the brew: multiply the quoted product bitterness by the weight of the product (1.7kg)^* and divide by the total brew volume (normally 23 litres).
^* We use the weight because our quoted colour/bitterness figures are base on a weight/volume dilution.

Product Bitterness x 1.7 / Brew Volume = Total Bitterness before fermentation

As an example, if a brew is made with Mexican Cerveza up to a volume of 23 litres:

270 x 1.7 / 23 = 20 IBU (International Bitterness Units)
This figure represents the brew bitterness prior to fermentation. Generally, fermentation reduces colour and bitterness by between 10 to 30%. So final bitterness of the fermented brew may be anything from 14 to 18 IBU.

Colour may be calculated in the same way. Ensure to add the colour contribution of all ingredients together. Colour figures are quoted for liquid extract are at the time of packaging as these products will darken with time. The darkening process is accelerated by exposure to elevated temperature.

Nige.

 

[buttersd70]

I'm still concerned that regardless of the figures, that the deterioration of the hop material over time (the stability index?) isnt factored in. Flavours & other goodies in any plant material fades over time, so this is going to affect final IBU surely - unless you know you are buying from a reputable retailer who can tell you precisely the age of the pellets/plugs/fliowers. While pellets are compressed, tehrefore less overall surface area per gram exposed to the elements, and living in my freezer, I have no idea how they were stored previously, so that could be a very big X factor that potentially outweighs a 10% calculated variant.

....so Im going to jump the gun and guess that the stated IBU is for the actual can itself, and not the finished brew when its mixed into 20+ litres. Correct ?

........ I've emailed them but no response was forthcoming.

There is a deterioration calculator in both beersmith and promash...to be honest, I've never really bothered with it (but I'm a malt lover, not a hophead, so if it's down in bitterness, as long as it's not too sweet, it doesn't really bother me.) Unfortunately, it is one of those things that you need to take on faith, that the supplier has treated them the same way you would want them to be treated. In my case (buying from beerbelly), the hops are marked with the crop year, and are vac packed, and kept in a coolroom. When I get them, they go in my freezer. I've never really had an issue with noticably different levels of bitterness to what was expected. But like everything else, there are so many things that effect the utilisation anyway, that consistency in your process is going to be much more important than the degredation of the hops (assuming of course that the supplier has treated them reasonably well).

re coopers...yeah, its a concentrated value....technically, its IBUx1.7/volume. But I've found that coopers overstate the bittering on the tin - they say in their faq that you get anywhere between 10%-30% less at the end :blink: ...they base this on the fact that dropping yeast will strip some of the isomerised alphas (which is true), but thats one hell of a big error margin. Personally, I feel that IBU/volume gives a more realistic number (even though technically not correct) when compared to beers I've hopped myself, or compared to tins that give a stated total IBU in 23L (like the old grumpys tins).....many other people share this belief, there was a massive long thread about it about 6 months or so ago.

And I emailed blackrock too, once upon a time.... :lol: