My understanding of HOPS, need help!

When looking at the essential oil content (myrcene, humulene, caryophylline) of hops Hop Data - Brew-Monkey.Com here, I am confused why magnum hops is not used as one of the best aroma hops there is.

First, it is my understanding that the essential oils in hops are very volatile, so this only applies to using hops lets say at flameout for their aroma properties. Now, myrcene is perceived to be harsh, grassy, american hoppy aroma. Humulene is supposed to be the sought after very pleasant hoppy aroma oil. And Caryophylline, well all I know is that you take the ratio of Humulene to Caryophylline, and the higher that number (the H/C value) the better the hop is ranked for it's aroma. Well I comprised a table of H/C values and the actual amounts of essential oils that one ounce of each hop will add to the boil. Sorry these tables are poor looking, they don't directly copy from EXCEL... The columns are Hops, H/C, Humulene ml/oz, Caryophylline ml/oz, and Myrcene ml/oz.

Hops H/C H ml/oz C ml/oz M ml/oz
ahtanum 1.38 5.1 3.68 14.97
Horizon 1.45 3.96 2.72 32.2
Simcoe 1.92 7.97 4.14 39.84
Columbus 2 9.91 4.95 34.7
Nugget 2 9.63 4.81 31.7
Willamett 2.84 7.43 2.62 18.06
Mt Hood 3.13 8.49 2.72 17
US Goldin 3.2 8.5 2.65 5.84
Crystal 3.43 8.5 2.48 16.64
Sterling 3.58 9.75 2.72 20.95
Magnum 3.75 22.3 5.94 19.33

Everything in the table looks correct, as I expected to see mt hood, crystal, goldings and sterling near the highest H/C levels, but to see magnum even above that really surprised me. Has anyone every used magnum as an aroma hop? Is it really pleasant? Does my table look right?

Here is another table looking at the amount of harshness (from the cohumulone % multiplied by the AA%/ounce of same hops if used as bittering hops)
Hops COHUM% AA% harsh/oz
US Goldin 22.5 4.5 1.0125
Crystal 23.5 4.6 1.081
Mt Hood 23 5 1.15
Willamett 32 5 1.6
Simcoe 15 13 1.95
ahtanum 32.5 6 1.95
Sterling 24 8.7 2.088
Horizon 18 12 2.16
Magnum 26 14.2 3.692
Nugget 27 14.6 3.942
Columbus 32.5 17 5.525

Is this the way you would predict how harsh your beer would turn out if you used any of these hops? For instance if you wanted to raise your IBU's but keep your cohumulone low, I'd chose Simcoe hops as a bittering hop since it's AA is 13% of which cohumulone is 15% (therefore 13 x 15 /100 = 1.95 which is relatively low when looking at Nugget at a close AA of 14.6% but of which 27% is cohumulone (therefore 14.6 x 27/100 = 3.942) Sorry for this math, but does that mean the same weight of Nugget is nearly twice as harsh as Simcoe? Is this math correct? Thanks for reviewing my beginning to understand hops.

I have to say that I repackaged the magnums I got from freshops last night, and they did smell fantastic. I guess the problem is you pay more for high AA hops, because you use less of them for bittering. But you'd be using the same amount for aroma, making them relatively expensive.

Outside of that... beats me, man. I love 'em.

Good catch. Many high alpha hops are fantastic for dry hopping. I love the aroma of Columbus. I have never heard of using magnum for dry hopping, but since I just got in 8 oz of the 2008 crop, I may just have to spare an ounce to give it a try now that you have made me curious!

I dislike high cohumulone hops for bittering. I like to use horizon hops for a high AA bittering hop, even though they are hard to come by; I used them for the 9-9-9 so it wouldn't be a hop bomb. Simcoe are very nice for bittering as well, I just don't like their flavor or aroma (too piney).

Designing Great Beers has a nice discussion of the various hops.

I think high AA hops are used primarily for bittering because you need less. (it takes less of a 13%AA hop in a 60 min boil to equal the IBUs of a 5%AA hop). Lower AA hops tend to have more spicy and complex flavors. If you are looking for a super hop bomb IPA, dry hopping with a high AA hop would be good.

I revised my hop charts from probrewer.com and made the following charts

This is just the gathered info from their website, and I calculated out the H/C for all hops.


These next 2 charts pertain to using hops for bittering (60-90 minute boils) and calculate out the harshness(based on cohumulone levels) of each hop. Looking at the one on the right, you can see that for instance using 7.69 grams Simcoe will provide the same alpha acids and IBUs as 11.11 grams of Brewer Gold. But it shows that brewers gold is nearly 3 times harsher than simcoe. So the least harsh hops to achieve your IBUs are from top moving to harsher down.

Have the 2008 Simcoes come out yet? I haven't seen any at my LHBS.

This last chart looks at the essential oil content (myrcene, humulene, caryophylline, and farcene) I guess I would only use this chart for flameout additions and dry hopping.

I've never used Brewer's Gold, nor Magnum at flameout, but think I will give it a try. Also, one other hop really stands out - Santiam. It has a very low myrcene (which is supposed to be a really good thing), moderately high humulene (another good thing), and an unusually high farcene level which intrigues me. The only other hops with a high farcene level are Czech Saaz, Sterling (which is just like saaz), and Tetnnang German. I haven't seen Santiam in stores before, but will be on the look out!

Does anyone have a idea of what mash hoping does for bittering. I mean are some varieties better for mash hopping than others? For example, I have seen chinook used but wonder if cascades would be a good example.