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I recently bought a used chest freezer on craigslist. Stupid me didn't test to make sure it works... and of course, it doesn't. Old ladies can't be trusted. Anyway... I'm thinking now I've got a 16 cubic foot grain storage bin. Right now I have the freezer out in my metal shead, underneath some...

I picked up a 16 cubic foot chest freezer off craigslist for $100. I was uber-excited once I got the thing into my kitchen. Then I became very sad. It ran for 12 hours and never got cool. I have it hooked up to a Johnson Temp. Controller already, and it shuts off when I turn the knob to about...

I've seen a few counterpressure bottle fillers out there for filling up bottles at the keg. Are there any recommendations for which one works best? I'd like to swtich totally to kegging (I do about half and half now) and then just bottle a 6-pack or so whenever I need to. If I bottle off the...

I currently have a converted Sanyo 4911 with a 2-tap tower. I've just purchased a 4-tap brass tower from ebay, and plan on building a new kegerator with a converted chest freezer. My plan was to build a wooden cover around it to mount the tower on. However, in order to get kegs in and out...

I've never used oak chips or anything similar in my brews... but I'm interested in trying it out. Anyone got any pointers? I usually see stouts and strong ales aged in oak. I was thinking about taking my brown ale recipe and applying some oak. Thoughts on "oaking" that style?

...takes a lot longer than 5 gallons. My first shipment of grain & hops got lost by UPS, so the HBS resent. I got the second shipment, then the lost package came up. Those nice folks let me keep both of them! Hooray! So, I figured I'd just do 10 gallons (Victory Hop Devil clone). Man, it...

My second batch of all-grain beer was kegged last week, and just last night we started drinking on it. I've noticed a very significant improvement since I've moved from extract to AG. As in, both AG batches I've finished have been awesome. Of the extract batches, some were good, some were OK...

I just started fermenting a 1.092 OG Barleywine atop 2, yes 2, California Ale yeast cakes from a pair of 5-gallon stouts I just racked to secondary. Fermentation began within minutes, soon making my airlock sound like a hyper cricket (first impression, go with it). Anyway, I quickly fashioned...

A local hardware store is going out of business and is selling everything at 50% off or more. They have multiple sizes of bendable copper tubing selling for 15-30 cents a foot, much cheaper than I've ever seen it at Lowes. Question is this: What can I make with flexible copper tubing??? 1. I...

Working name is "Burnt Monkey Stout" 10 gal, 1.065 OG, 60 IBU, 40 SRM This is my first recipe from scratch, based on some Imp Stout recipes from Beer Captured, but I was aiming for something not quite as strong... I was going for something more chocolatey, with a lot of mouthfeel. Fermentables...

I just completed my first AG batch of brown ale over the weekend!!! :mug: It held steady at 152F for 60 min. My main question was if there is a guide to the effects of the mash temperature on the outcome of the beer. I've heard such things as lower temp. = better fermentability and high =...

Just put my first ever batch of mead in the fermentor. I'm only making a gallon, and I think I used more water than I should have (had too much to fit in my 1-gal jug!). OG was about 1.073 @ 80 deg F. Is this typical for most meads. I would have thought closer to 1.100 would be the target...

I was thinking about trying out mead-making, but didn't want to invest in a full 5 gallon batch. Seems like I could do a 1-gallon batch with one of those $4 glass jugs I see on brew supply sites. Anyone do this? Seems like 2.5-3 lbs of honey would work OK in there. I have just started reading...

Anyone use rye? I'm thinking up a recipe for an American Red Rye, but don't know if rye needs to be mashed, or if steeping works effectively. howtobrew.com doesn't list steeping yields for rye, but it doesn't for Vienna or Biscuit either, and I've used kits that contain them for steeping.

6 lbs Light LME 3 lbs Light DME .5 lb Belgian Biscuit .5 Crystal 40L 2 oz Zeus (14.5) @ 60 2 oz Centennial (9.5) @ 40 2 oz Centennial (9.5) @ 25 2 oz Cascade (whole cones) (6) @ 5 1 oz Cascade (whole cones) dry hopped California Ale Yeast I'm getting 1.074 OG, 120 IBUs. Too many hops? Go...

I couldn't find any previous mention of this on the forum. Has anyone had any success cleaning off the labeling on Stone bottles? The painted-on Rogue bottles I have no problem scraping of the label with a knife... it only takes 4 or 5 minutes. The Stone labeling seems to be impervious to...

Anyone here using Turbinado sugar in their recipies? I know a couple people have made reference to it in past posts. I was looking into adding some for an upcoming Barleywine recipe. At the grocery store, I noticed the Turbinado bag of sugar was 3.99 for 1 1/2 lbs. I then noticed "Sugar in...

It seems my latest IPA, brewed Sunday afternoon, has failed to begin fermentation. I'm not sure what happened really... bad yeast I suppose. I pitched a tube of White Labs California Ale, but then nothing happened. After 24 hours, I made a starter with some of the same strain I harvested from a...

This is the first label I've actually put some time into... whatcha think?

I've heard of lots of people using full size 15 gal. kegs as brew kettles. How does one go about obtaining one of these legally? I assume you *could* go to the store and get one, have a party, and not return it - but I also assume thats frowned upon.