Which Hop IBU formula do you use?

For those that use software allowing different IBU formulas to be used, which one do you use? I have ProMash which is set by default to Rager. Has anyone found one of the other formulas to be more accurate?

Tinseth here, mainly because I think Palmer prefers Tinseth...

I use Tinseth, too. I think that I "know" how 50 IBUs in the Tinseth scale are, so I'm comfortable using it.

Tinseth because it's the BeerSmith default, and it works for me when creating recipes. I've also heard it's the most accurate for the average homebrewer.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I was curious because I've been a little dissatisfied with the bitterness in my IPA's even though the Rager formula shows IBU's in the 70s.

Bromley said:

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I was curious because I've been a little dissatisfied with the bitterness in my IPA's even though the Rager formula shows IBU's in the 70s.

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Try changing to Tinseth then. Are you plugging in the accurate alpha acid %'s?

Bromley said:

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I was curious because I've been a little dissatisfied with the bitterness in my IPA's even though the Rager formula shows IBU's in the 70s.

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Hmmm- can you switch to Tinseth in that recipe, just to see what the Tinseth scale says?

YooperBrew said:

Hmmm- can you switch to Tinseth in that recipe, just to see what the Tinseth scale says?

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Yeah, just got done doing that. I had 77.3 IBU with the Rager and it dropped significantly down to 68.6 with Tinseth.

Bromley said:

Yeah, just got done doing that. I had 77.3 IBU with the Rager and it dropped significantly down to 68.6 with Tinseth.

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Problem solved (hopefully)

Soulive said:

Try changing to Tinseth then. Are you plugging in the accurate alpha acid %'s?

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See my numbers above for comparing Rager and Tinseth on the recipe. And yes, I always make sure to edit the aa%.

Soulive said:

Problem solved (hopefully)

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Yeah, thanks for the help. Now I just need 30 bucks to buy the hops for the recipe!! Stupid hop shortage.

ProMash asks for a concentration factor when you switch to Tinseth. Anyone able to explain what they're talking about. Are you leaving it at the default 1.3?

I'd say, stick with one and adjust to taste. I'm using Tinseth (b/c its the default) and I know that the calculated IBUs for my beers are quite far off from similar commercial examples with the same IBU number.

Tinseth, Raeger and the third one are home brewers with access to a lab were they can run IBU measurements. Their series take only time and gravity into account, though another major factor is pH. I e-mailed Glenn Tinseth once trying to find out if he measured the pH of the wort for his experiment and he didn't have that number. His numbers can be found here . He also wrote me that he measured the IBUs pre fermentation. The literature suggests that during fermentation about 30% of the IBUs are lost which surprises me since from my experience Glenn's IBU numbers turn out lower than what I would expect by comparing to commercial examples.

Kai

Bromley said:

ProMash asks for a concentration factor when you switch to Tinseth. Anyone able to explain what they're talking about. Are you leaving it at the default 1.3?

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This may have to do with the fact that Tinseth IBUs are pre-fermentation IBUs. I don't know about the other ones though.

Kai