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To be honest, it depends whether or not you're trying to match a specific water profile, or if you just care to get the right mash pH. The mineral content looks to be on the low side, so in theory you can replicate fairly accurately most cities water given the right additions. If you just care...

Assuming you have well modified malt (I haven't found malt that isn't) a decoction isn't necessary. I happened to be brewing a doppelbock the first time I used my new system, and for testing it out used a step mash and some melanoidin malt. It came out fantastic. That said I agree fully that...

Assuming you have brewed this recipe before on that system, a change in ingredients seems most likely. Malt supplier, freshness, grind, or mismeasurement of weights could all be reasons.

Seems like it should work, but I've personally never seen a beer clear well in the primary.

I'd definitely taste it first. If too sweet, you'll need to keep.it fermenting.

I haven't seen your system but it seems like an easy way to spare only the bottom of your grains. Generally the goal of sparging is to maximize the sparge water flow through the entire grain bed.

It really depends if the beer is finished with fermentation, or if you need to keep the yeast around to process diacetyl etc. Personally I like to use a diacetyl rest, after which I can crash cool the beer to lagering temps and let it sit for a while. But if you need the yeast to work, a slow...

Fat-fingered... If ales, the fermenters go on the warm side (preferably about 65-60F) and your beers to serve are on the cool side (about 50 or 55 depending on style). If you're able to get that sort of temperature difference, you're golden. If the freezer is too evenly chilled, not so...

It's probably doable, as long as all of your beers are ales, and as long as you can figure out which side of the freezer has the majority of the cooling.

Just keep in mind that many breweries ferment with one yeast and bottle with another.

I've read and heard the advice that there is no reason for home brewers to transfer to a carboy prior to kegging or lagering. And, it makes a lot of sense - why does what's going on in the beer care about the yeast slurry at the bottom? That said, my experience is that the beer clears VERY...

Thanks for the tips. I have a tube cut to the right length to put the stone at the bottom of the keg, and will give the slow, closed process a try next time.

I've seen some conflicting advice on using these. One school of though indicates that you put it on some tube attached to the gas line, close up the keg, and slowly increase the pressure from a couple PSI up to your target by a PSI every minute or two. The other is similar, except that one...

Thanks everyone for the tips. I'll have to experiment. Does much hop flavor or aroma carry over if the hop is used for boiling? It doesn't seem like it should, though I brewed a helles with all noble hops a few weeks ago as an experiment. As for yeast, I've been using WLP833 on account of it...

Should have mentioned, both tries used triple decoction, so the maltiness should be there. Might toss in a little melanoidin next time. My guess is that, if using magnum for bittering, more late noble hops than I'm using might be needed.

Brewers hardware sells sanke keg fermenter kits. I just use those for my fermenters rather than trying to make a keggel and then a sanitary fermenter.

Agree. Technically the answer is that a cooler mash tun can be used to bottle beers. Practically speaking, I've abused my mash tun far more than is probably safe for beer on the cold side.

I've brewed several Dunkels, with a similar basic recipe but when comparing against good commercial examples I've been underwhelmed by the aroma of the home brewed version. An appropriate amount (1/2 or 1 oz) of aroma hops at some point in the last 10 minutes seems the logical next try, but...

Interestingly, it turns out that the probe that comes with the Love *might* be water-safe. They have a non-safe one whose tip length is one inch, and a safe one whose tip length is 1-9/16 inches. Even their sales reps don't know which is supposed to have shipped, but I seem to have lucked out...

Given that even well-modified malt has a CG/FG difference, I find it hard to come to any conclusion other than that grind makes a difference. Whether or not this is noticeable depends on how repeatable your efficiency is, or for that matter if you trust your OG measurements to 0.001.