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**Zen_Brew** · 11-06-2009, 05:07 AM

So I see some fairly aggressive changes in batch 4. Nice to see you experimenting with the grain and hop bills. Looks like you upped the malt profile, changed from Marris to std 2-row, and lowerred the IBU's using some alternate hops and hop boil times. Also completely cut out the 30 min additions. I'd be interested to hear how much of an impact that has on the hop flavors with the 30 min additions moved to 15. Were you trying to move more of the bittering into a floral citrus flavor component?

saq · 11-06-2009, 04:07 PM

The grain bill is more or less the same, just tweaking proportions and accounting for efficiency issues with this grain bill. I got like 60% efficiency on #2 and #3 so I upped the total volume grainbill and got about 70% which put my OG in the range I wanted.
I also switched from WLP001 to Pacman because WLP001 for me has only ever pulled 75% attenuation and Pacman pulled in nearly 80% which is what I want.

I think the Maris Otter brought too much grain flavor to the table and got in the way of the hops.

I'm certainly overkill on bitterness before I even throw in non-FWH90 hop additions, certainly beyond maximum IBU soluability levels so theres not really a difference in my mind between 220 and 260 IBU. Because of this I moved the 30 minute hop addition to 15 minutes for more flavor and aroma.

**Zen_Brew** · 11-06-2009, 08:06 PM

I missed the switch to Pacman. Pacman should definitely chew through a few more points of sugar for ya. That is one efficient bug.

saq · 12-06-2009, 07:09 PM

Hopinator 4 took Best In Show at the 2009 Walk The Line - Barleywine competition, finally netting me my first BoS! I knew it was destined for greatness as soon as I poured my first pint, everything was finally *perfect*. The grainbill and OG were exactly where I wanted, and the addition of some hop extracts made this thing insanely bitter and hoppy. My only changes in the future will be switching to pellet for better utilization/less beer loss.

HarkinBanks · 12-07-2009, 01:22 AM

Congrats saq, that is awesome. Always interested in water, looks like you may have tweaked it for batch 4. Any details?

saq · 12-07-2009, 03:11 AM

Yeah, thought I included that with the recipe. Here it is.

CA = 55 ppm
MG = 13 ppm
NA = 56 ppm
SO4 = 125 ppm
CL = 25 ppm
HCO3 = 149 ppm

I think I overdid the SO4/CL ratio a bit. I've usually done about 2.75-3:1 SO4:CL but this was 5:1. I have a pretty good feeling that Port does this extreme SO4:CL ratio in Hop15 and moreso in 2nd/3rd Anniversary IPAs because those are the only things remotely similar to the kind of bitterness you get here.

I was over at a beer tasting party with some buddies earlier and brought some Hopinator 4 and broke it out after drinking 5 other good IIPAs, everyone's response to the nose on this was "Jesus Christ thats hoppy!".