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I have a Ranco thermostat and I can't find anything over here that'll securely grip the cables to stop them coming loose if the cable gets knocked. I saw a Romex connector mentioned on one of the "How To Wire A Ranco" threads, and wondered if anyone could confirm whether this... 3/8 Twin...

I've managed to acquire a load of empty champagne bottles which I intend to use for bottling a future batch of beer. I can get plastic corks and wire cages to seal them, but I think the finished product would look better with foils over them to hide the crappy looking plastic corks. Has anyone...

I've just figured out my water chemistry using the charts on How To Brew, and in terms of color, my brewing water seems pretty spot on for the beers I tend to make (pale ales and IPAs). What I wondered was: if I made a stout without altering my water chemistry, would there be off-flavors in the...

...because if so, Je'Rod Cherry is raffling his to raise money for starving children. It's $10 for five tickets. Story here: For this former Patriot, charity has a (very) nice ring to it Raffle here: https://www.celebritiesforcharity.org/raffles/RaffleID_SuperBowlRing.cfm Big props to...

I've got about 1.5oz of Target hops and 1.5oz of Challenger hops from my first-year hop harvest, and I'd like to combine them in a single batch of beer. I'm thinking of doing an ordinary bitter, but I'm not sure of the best way to split them in terms of bittering vs flavor/aroma hops. I've seen...

I've got a crop of around 30 jalapenos that are just about ready for harvest. I'd like to smoke some of them to make into a Chipotle Ale (which will also feature my home-grown hops). Has anyone ever smoked their own peppers before, and if so, do you have any tips for a novice on how to go about...

Some of the non-beer-afficionado people that drink my beer often struggle a bit with the idea of pouring the beer gently into a glass so as to not disturb the yeast. It's mildly galling as they then say "Your beer would be great if it didn't have the gross-tasting sludge in it". The only beer...

I'd like to grow additional hop plants next year by taking rhizomes from my existing plants. I remember reading that if you bury the bines while they're still attached to the main plant, they'll put down new roots where they're buried, and these can then be separated and planted as new plants...

The top are Target, the bottom are Challenger. The Challengers feel light and papery (so I guess they're probably good to go), the Target feel more succulent (so I'd be inclined to leave them for now) - though the Targets have quite a bit of coloration on them. Is that just the variety, or is it...

I'm going to be pitching a big beer (around 1.100) onto some yeast from a previous batch. I gather that using the whole yeast cake isn't the best option, so I had a look at JZ's pitching calculator to find out how much yeast to use (the calc's at http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html for those...

I'm going to try making a Single Malt and Single Hop beer using Amarillo, and would really like some thoughts on what malt to use. I've used either Maris Otter or Golden Promise in all my previous beers, so for this one I want to go with something different. I was thinking of Munich, or possibly...

I'm making Jamil's Belgian Dark Strong Ale from "Brewing Classic Styles", which calls for 4% Hallertauer. The Hallertauers I've got are only 2.1%, which is no biggie. But when I use Beer Smith to work out the appropriate amount of extra hops to add, I notice a big discrepancy between Beer Smith...

Goddamn it! I came on here feeling like Mr Big Man because I thought I'd just invented the most disgusting fat-ass meal ever. Now I see bacon-on-a-stick with fries and realise I'm just another small-town kid with a crazy dream. My idea was based on that feeling you sometimes get when you're...

I've been reading The Mad Fermentationist's beer blog (well worth a read if you've not seen it before), and was struck by his use of a microwave to dry his home-grown hops: http://madfermentationist.blogspot.com/2007/08/drying-hops-in-microwave.html Anyone ever try this?

I've got two hop plants growing in my greenhouse and I'm just about to transplant them outside. One plant (Target) is growing great - it's about 5' tall, has two bines growing around the same guide rope and seems very happy. However, the other (Challenger) is a little more problematic. It...

Saw this a while ago - it's still one of my favorite ever things on YouTube, just for sheer idiotic guts:

I'm currently brewing two batches of Bells Two Hearted IPA. They're identical save for the yeast used - one is US 05, the other is Safale S-04, as I thought it'd be informative to try a side-by-side comparison. The US 05 batch is fermenting very visibly (big krausen, airlock farting like crazy)...

I'm going to brew a clone of Bells Two Hearted IPA this weekend, and found the following 5-gallon recipe on t'interweb. Does it look OK to you folks? Ingredients: 10 lbs Maris Otter Malt 2 lbs Vienna Malt 1/2 lb Crystal Malt (20L) Hop Schedule: 1 oz. - Centennial (60 min.) 1 oz. -...

I'm soon going to make my fourth beer, and I'm going to try to approximate an IPA that a local brewery makes (the excellent Jaipur IPA by the Thornbridge Brewery, for any other UK dwellers). It's very bitter and aromatic, but it also has a slight sweetness to it that tastes very like honey. The...

I've just noticed that the instructions that came with my wort chiller say "Please note: it is important to have run off the wort via a hop strainer before using a wort chiller, otherwise you will put all the proteins, coagulated during the hot break, back into solution". I've never heard of...