To all,
Several weeks ago we posted that we have a non-silicone based De-Foaming agent available.
We sent a sample to a HBT member (Daugenet) for trial.
All looks good;
Here is his review:
10-23-2010
I took a gravity reading earlier in the week and I think that fermentation is about complete. I am going to take another reading tomorrow when I get home. Both batches are approximately the same gravity.(.001 difference currently which could be from about anything)
One thing that I did find interesting is that your defoamer has no krausen while the five star has a good bit left over. If your defoamer is oil based then I would expect this to be the cause. I dont think that it would be a problem for the final product providing the very top is not siphoned off. (which is not likely for most brewers as they will not siphon the "top" of the fermented beer, greedy brewers may get some but they will get some trub along with it as well)
Will this have an effect on the final product? Maybe, but right now I would doubt it.
I will be bottling this weekend. (provided my gravity reading shows I am done) Hopefully It will all be complete after a couple more weeks!
I may attempt to do a quick carbonation with some carbonation caps I have for a preliminary result. I need to see if I have two bottles that are the same size. If not I can just run to publix and get a couple of their seltzer bottles, they are cheap. I have played with them some before but not seriously attempted to carbonate something with them. It should be interesting.
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11-4-2010
I began this experiment to compare two different anti-foaming agents, 5 Star and Chicompany. I used the recipe for All-Grain - Bee Cave Brewery Bavarian Hefeweizen (5 gal) and only used the anit-foaming agent in the fermenter and NOT the boil.
During fermentation two different sized carboys were used. (3 and 5 gallon for 5 Star and Chicompany respectively) I used 2 drops per gallon in each carboy.
Ambient temp was approximately 68*F. The yeast used was WLP300 Hefeweizen Ale Yeast. Both carboys were placed side by side the a corner of a dark room.
At high krausen, the day after pitching, the 5 Star had approximately 1 inch and the Chicompany had 0.5 an inch. Doing a little math we get....A=Pi*d*h (I am using the outer diameter since I do not have the inner diameter handy)
5 Star: 3.14*1*9= 28.26 in^3 of krausen
Chicompany: 3.14*.5*10.5= 16.5 in^3 of krausen
I don't think that this really means anything since the level of krausen in a container is not perfectly flat and can vary by the hour. This was just the average that I was able to take while I was not at work.
After fermentation was complete I bottled both batches using equal amounts of priming sugar. After approximately 3 weeks I opened a bottle of each batch (@ 38*F) and poured into identical glasses at the same time.
I observed no discernible difference in head retention between the two nor did I detect any difference in taste. I plan on having some friends see if they can tell the difference while doing a triangle test, but that will have to wait for another day.
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You may see our De-Foamer here:
http://www.chicompany.net/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=308&product s_id=2293
REVIEW: Chi Company non-silicone De-Foaming Agent
Linear Mode
