Recent content by OppamaBrendan

Hey all, I'm gearing up to start all-grain brewing again in Vancouver after a shitty year of divorce and moving from Yokohama (a city I love), and an infected batch (of people with covid19). Now that my gear is starting to take shape here and I have reached out to the local community, I was...

Ah, I lost that batch 2 years ago at least. To tell you the truth, I bottled it without noticing off flavors. It slowly developed a ring in the neck of some bottles, so I knew it was contaminated, but by the time I noticed that I had drank half of it. It wasn't intensely off, I checked other...

Its been a while since I have used the bleach/vinegar solution. I don't think it has a safe shelf life, I lost a brew when using week old stuff. I believe the addition of vinegar makes the chlorine more volatile. Think of campden tablets and sulfur dioxide: it off-gasses almost completely in...

Its been a while since I posted! So my A-Frame trellis ended up completely overgrown by the hyoutan and hops, creating a nice dark tunnel between my house and the neighbours. This was really appreciated during the heat of the summer, I think it was a good 10C cooler in the house because of it...

With that wheat it won't really be pilsner but if it tastes good thats really all you need to be concerned about.

Plant diseases are pretty easy to spot, not always so easy to correctly ID. What kind of infection do you think your plant has? Short plants with slow growth sounds more like an environmental issue (nutrients, temps, pH, drainage) My hops have been attacked by aggressive amounts of...

Does your faucet have threads or is it the smooth type? If the threaded type, try to measure it and get a screw on adapter. The smooth type is actually easier and you can often find the parts at 100 yen shops. There are adapters for hoses that slip onto the smooth faucet and grip it tight when...

At 8500 for the tool you are a GOOD ways towards getting a corny keg. Think about how you are going to clean that sanke keg before you buy the tool. A corny keg is accessible to cleaning and that convenience in itself should be worth the price difference.

Here is the site for the manufacturer of most of the pubkegs I have seen: http://pubkeg.com/features/# You can see dimensions on there etc... I do not keep the threaded valve, I ONLY use them for fermenting as they are not intended to be re pressurized. That being said, I have used them...

Really happy you didn't get cut with that glass! See HBT threads about glass carboy safety for some horror stories! I don't think I ever want to use glass for anything unless it is long-term aging. I have been using PUBKEG bottles for my fermenters since September and I highly recommend them...

I didn't go forward with my plan to use the wire rack. One professional brewer I sometimes hang out with pointed me to a very good reason that put a halt on it for the time being. I hadn't thought out the exhaust and had no "hood" to use with the shelf on the other side of my kitchen. I don't...

I dont have good pictures of the trellis sorry. I am not too worried about the hops getting too much sun since they are mostly between two buildings, once the upper canopy fills in a bit the soil will be shaded. I've put out some cucumbers already and the hops are all over a foot tall. They...

I won`t be doing cuttings this year unfortunately. I moved ALL of my plants and they will be under a bit of shock, and lost enough roots during the move. On the plus side, my little `Homestead Hops`have developed a healthy crown! If you go back you can find my story of the little twig that...

For the autosiphon, when you can get one I reccomend having one. Comes in handy for sampling, racking, and if your spigots get plugged you have a backup - one you will hugely appreciate having at that time :) I don`t know about everyone else, in North America plenty of homebrewers mix a 5...

Thanks for the offer! I still don't know when my friend will be down there yet but probably by the summertime!