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plumber

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Just added Beersmith to the equipment list. I can't wait to figure it out and get my next batch of all grain mashing. This is probably one of the less expensive purchases but one of the more exciting. I will be brewing my third all grain (hopefully with better results) with this and if any one has any tips or advice, all is welcome as I hope to learn as much as I can.

Any Ideas on next beer? Looking for good recipies.
Thanks
 
I'm learning Beersmith as well. I think, as with most software, the best way to learn it is to just play with it for a while. I've learned something new every day that I've opened the program.
 
I actually bought Beersmith before I even bought my brewing equipment.

Best money I've spent in terms of overall quality and control of my brewing in my opinion.

-D
 
I've been using BeerSmith since getting into AG brewing 15 months ago (19 batches so far), and love it. It is an outstanding program that is very intuitive, and, once you have it tweaked to your equipment, gives remarkably accurate results.

Brad Smith ..... you rock !!! :rockin:
 
One thing I would recommend, but may be viewed as a PITA, is taking the time to actually setup and calibrate your equipment in Beersmith.

Take the time to actually figure out and enter things like evaporation rate of your 'Boiler', deadspace in your MLT, entering in the actual material it's made from, things like that (you can find these under the Mash Profile and Equipment sections).

When I first used it, I picked equipment and mash profiles that looked 'close' to what I was using, but my efficiency suffered as well as my final volume coming up short when the boil was done.

I did an about face and actually took the time to enter in actual numbers, and things went much smoother come brew day, not to mention more predictable.

I think this probably applies in most aspects when brewing, not just Beersmith. :)
 
chris21274 said:
Take the time to actually figure out and enter things like evaporation rate of your 'Boiler', deadspace in your MLT, entering in the actual material it's made from, things like that (you can find these under the Mash Profile and Equipment sections).

How did you calculate these figures?
 
It wasn't anything scientific I did. Initially, I used the default for boiloff rate, which I think is 9%. But I found that differs based on how vigorous I was boiling.

Also I think height above/below sea level you're at and also the weather affect this if you want to get *really* technical.

I found for my particular setup I ranged somewhere between 4-7%. I came by this through trial and error - just boiling wort from different brew sessions and watching how much I lose in a 60 minute boil. I try to keep my heat consistent between sessions when boiling also.

More importantly though, was the Loss of wort to Trub and Chiller. If you have a spigot on your boiler or MLT you'll lose leave some wort behind. Take that into consideration too, othewise you'll end up with less in your fermenter than originally thought!

Same goes for your MLT, if you have deadspace, make sure you note how much, otherwise beersmith won't calculate correctly.

Most of it was trial and error for me. Going through a couple brews, things were coming up short (total boil volume, finish cooled wort amount, etc) and I became more diligent in my note taking.

Sorry it's not more technical. That's just the way I went about it.
 
Thanks for the info chris. I have already sat down and and figured out most of the set up. I have done three AG so I know a little about what to enter. One I don't know is "dead space" in th MLT. Not to sure what that is. Going to be booked up for the next couple of weekends due to holiday stuff so during the week I'll hopefully get all the correct data and get some recipies entered. After the holidays I am going to go nuts though and brew as much as possible with a little ice fishing in between:) Again thanks for the info and if anyone wants to recomend some good recipies I am open for ideas.
 
plumber said:
Thanks for the info chris. I have already sat down and and figured out most of the set up. I have done three AG so I know a little about what to enter. One I don't know is "dead space" in th MLT. Not to sure what that is. Going to be booked up for the next couple of weekends due to holiday stuff so during the week I'll hopefully get all the correct data and get some recipies entered. After the holidays I am going to go nuts though and brew as much as possible with a little ice fishing in between:) Again thanks for the info and if anyone wants to recomend some good recipies I am open for ideas.
MLT dead space is the amount you leave behind in the MLT after draining off your sparge water. Unfortunately, I think that will change just a little bit with each grain bill, based on how much water your grains absorb (i.e. base malts vs. adjuncts vs. wheat, etc). I just put some water in my MLT, drained it through my manifold, then measured the amount I had left in my tun by picking the tun up and pouring it out into a measuring cup. Although this amount should be a little larger than my actual deadspace with grains in the tun, I figured it should be pretty close. Worst case scenario, you'll wind up with a little extra (probably less than a quart extra) in the kettle, and you'll be shooting for a target post-boil volume anyway, so it shouldn't change things much.

Alternately, you could probably try to do the same thinig after a brewing run, but trying to recapture the small amount of water under your grain bed after sparging sounds like a huge, messy PITA to me, for not a huge gain in accuracy.
 
The grain absorbtin shouldn't matter in the dead space since it's calculated in in a different part of the calc. He had it almost right it's the amount left if you drained the MLT dry via normal sparing techniques.
 
Yeah, re-thought that after I posted it, and you're right -- grain absorbtion shouldn't change the dead space, because by the time the grainbed for sparging has set up, the grains are long since saturated, and have done all of the absorbing they're going to. I do stand by my assertion that dead space will be different when measured with water only vs. after an actual sparge, though. The former is really easy to measure, and the latter is quite a bit more challenging/messy.
 
Well I just went through the example in BeerSmith for the Pale Ale. Then I clicked on one of the wheat and instantaneously chnaged mash profiles. No longer then to double click em. Then saw a DETAILED step by step instructions of how to brew it depending on which mash schedual I choose. I'm speechless.....I'm sure I speak for many when I sit in ah and think back to how many nights it took me to figure out how to do a simple batch in ProMash.

Keep thinking there has got to be something Im missing that will make this process much more complex..... eh..... nothing comes to mind......

Nobody on this software is working for MicroSoft thats for sure.....
 
Gammon N Beer said:
Give a shout over at Beer Smith. I have had great luck with BS showing up and helping me out with any questions I might have. He may of course, pop in here as well.

http://www.beersmith.com/forum/index.php

Based on the replies, they be better off asking here.
image1gp1.jpg
 
orfy said:
Based on the replies, they be better off asking here.

He has a problem with importing a Promash recipe into BeerSmith, why exactly would he post that in the Recipes forum like your screen shot?

Beersmith does a decent job anwsering questions/support issues in the "Support" sub forum there.

 
HarvInSTL said:
He has a problem with importing a Promash recipe into BeerSmith, why exactly would he post that in the Recipes forum like your screen shot?

The answer (the answer my friends is blowing in the wind........)... the answer my friends comes down to two words.

"propietary format"
 
Beer Snob said:
The answer (the answer my friends is blowing in the wind........)... the answer my friends comes down to two words.

"propietary format"
Here is a tool to turn that "propietary format" ProMash recipe into a BeerXML file that can be read by Beersmith, BeerToolsPro, Strangebrew, or most other recent packages.
http://www.beerxml.com/converter.htm
 
The Beersmith program...Pros, cons? Worth getting? I downloaded the free 20 day trial, and it seems like it would be great. But I wondered what your thoughts were.

Thanks
 
Well, I use Beersmith all the time, and I love it. It really is a good program. There are a few limitations (I'd like to open multiple windows for example, to compare ingredients) but overall I think it's great.
 
You'll find that a large number of members here who have brewing software have chosen BeerSmith. I tried out BTP and ProMash and while they were both good programs as well, I like the interface of BeerSmith better - it seemed to make it a bit easier to use.
 
I really like beersmith. It has made recipe formulation much easier and completely taken the work out of water volume/temps, efficiency, etc. I haven't found anything I wish it did that it doesn't already do. Worth every cent IMO.

YooperBrew said:
Well, I use Beersmith all the time, and I love it. It really is a good program. There are a few limitations (I'd like to open multiple windows for example, to compare ingredients) but overall I think it's great.

If you just want to have a view of one recipe open while you work on or look at another, you can already do that. Click on the recipe you want in another window, and click View->Preview item in New Window (at the bottom). That button is also on the toolbar, 4th item from the left. Is that what you were looking for?
 
I bought Beersmith about 2months ago. I also tried the free version first, and found it helped quite a bit. Now, I can't believe I waited 3 yrs. before getting it. It really makes recipe formulation soooo much easier.
PS.. Thanks Lil Spraky for the tutorial. Never even thought of trying something like that before.
 
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