Recent content by thrawn86

maybe its just me, but I'd die before I showed up at a party with a 2l soda bottle full of beer. reminds me of the scene in superbad where the guys fill up laundry soap jugs full of coors. that said, get a carbonation-cap, one of the 12g co2 pellet dispensers, and shake till your hearts delight.

not sure what you mean by "full taste of homebrew", but if anything kegging will improve your beer, or at least make it clearer. Instead of getting sediment in every bottle you'll get a couple of cloudly pours and then its clear sailing. I do secondaries, so I get almost none. there's...

I prefer more than a week if carbing at serving pressure, but it will definitely be mostly done. I personally do a day or two at 30psi and then down to 12psi serving pressure and its ready after 3-4 days. I did a batch this way just last sunday, so hopefully by the end of the week it will be...

they will technically start to lose carbonation like that. best way is to reduce your flowrate enough that you can serve at carbonating pressure. I deal with the same thing, as I serve from cobra taps at carbing pressure. it can be a little foamy sometimes, but I plan to add some of those...

I'm sure fresh fruit is a better option, but fwiw, I've had *fantastic* results with fruit extracts from NB. I made their raspberry wheat a while back and it was great.

I've recently had a couple of batches with the medicinal flavors, but I've also had a ton of other batches that turned out great, all using tap water. It will be interesting to see the results.

the water and fan is about all most of us do... though you can look up "son of a fermentation chiller" if you want to get really fancy :)

figured I'd ask in here: how in the hell do you take apart a kegconnection manifold!? I've got a 3-way with a plug in the third hole, and I'd like to add another check vale/nipple so I can have a dedicated line with an air chuck to carb soda bottles (and pump up my bike tires! :) )...

well, there's only 7 continents :P

well it certainly wouldn't hurt, but i'd use gelatin or something else just to be sure.

the guy at my lhbs had a similar setup, but he said he screwed carbonator caps onto them [the part where the c02 bulb goes in, I didn't get a good look at it], and hooked that up to his co2 tank to carb.

smell can be a big indicator to infection. does it smell like beer? does it taste like beer? I'd go ahead and take the gravity reading.

awesome freezer :) looks like you could fit another keg in there, or at least another mini keg or two on the hump :)

I kegged an extra pale ale a couple days ago, does that count? :) This may be the hoppiest beer I've had in awhile, second only to auburn ale house's hop dragon, which tastes like you put a fistful of hops into a blender with some 'normal' IPA. war eagle!

consider yourself lucky that you've got a basement at that temperature! some of us have to use buckets of water/ice to cool fermentation... just remember that 2 weeks is a pretty 'young' beer. should be interesting to see it improve after that.