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Hey everyone. I'm in the early stages of making an automated brewery and are currently working on the HLT (modified Grainfather sparge water heater). I have this pretty much working. But I'd like an independent failsafe in place in case my software crashes or whatever. I really don't need that...

So up until now I've been placing the mill on top of a bucket and using the cordless drill, I'd imagine many brewers do this because it's easy and works. I'm building out a new brew room and want to do something better though. What I got so far is the mill mounted in a custom slide out drawer...

Hey everyone, just need some advice on my kombucha secondary fermentation. In my 5 batches or so I've never had good carbonation. I keep increasing the fermentables but the result seems the same. Latest brew was 10 days in primary at room temp for 10 days, around 70-75f. Seemed to go well and...

Looking for a bit of advice from the chemistry folk here please. I'm building a small automated brewery. I'd like to be able to remove chlorine from the water as the HLT gets filled but I don't have budget for water filters or RO. Also don't have enough available kettles to have the full water...

Heya everyone. Quick question. I've got a kegorator with 3x 5G corny kegs of beer and a 1.25G mini-keg of kombucha. Last few days the kombucha keg is freezing and I need to bring it up to room temperature to defrost. The beer kegs are pouring beautifully and never give problems. I've adjusted...

Hey everyone, just looking for some advice on flooring for a little home brewery. I have this little room, approx 7x10', which I'll be turning into a brewery. It's currently got a concrete floor but the surface is very rough and uneven - impossible to mop properly. However it does seem...

Hi everyone, I'm an experienced beer brewer, and are looking to try brewing my first cider on the weekend. I have a cider kit (can of concentrate) and a bucket of delicious ripe dark plums off the tree. And a pack of Mangrove Jacks M2 cider yeast (which included nutrient). I was wondering what...

I went on a tour of a mega brewery the other day and they said they use ultrasonic (or similar) sensors that measure the headspace in their kettles. This lets them fill the kettles to the correct level without using a flow meter. Seemed like a genius idea to me. Has anyone done something like...

Sometimes I'll be hanging around here and people will post pics of foam that sits a good inch over the top rim and seems to somehow stay there. Looks like a marshmallow, rather than a liquid. I've never had that before. My beers typically pour with an attractive inch of foam on top that lasts...

I've got some cans of unhopped extract that I'd like to build some recipes out of. They are 80% pilsner, 20% crystal malt (not sure what lovibond, assuming at the lighter end). This is a lot more crystal than I'm used to. Was just wondering if anyone has experience with this much crystal in a...

Not sure if this is a silly question or not. I got a filthy infection in a plastic bucket - maggots, flies and a good 3" crust on top that looked and smelled like rotten vegetables. Needless to say I won't be brewing in that fermentor again. However I do need something to keep 5+ gallons of...

Just as I was packing the car to go to a brewday my wife tells me that a jar of yeast fell out of the fridge and smashed. Of course that jar was the wlp300 starter for today's brew. Wasn't able to get a new one so I took a 300ml sample off the keg and made a 1 liter starter. Pitched after 6...

Hey everyone, I'm ready to give LODO a try and are looking for some advice from Grainfather users who do LODO already. I've already made some mods to my Grainfather. I've removed the overflow pipe as it splashes wort and restricted the pump flow to a minimum level, plus added a BIAB bag for...

So one of my suppliers ships their malt in paper bags. Normally I repackage into ziplock bags and i've had no issues storing malt this way for many months. Life got the better of me recently and I never got around to repackaging, so the malt has been stored in the paper bags for maybe a month...

Normally I dryhop in the keg using a mesh bag. This seems to work well. Except I had 2 batches needing dryhopping and only one mesh bag. So one batch got the bag treatment and the other got the hops loose in the keg (4oz of pellets in 4 gallons). Now that keg won't pour at all - presumably the...

Hey everyone, looking for a bit of general advice. We have a sweet homebrew comp on at the moment in New Zealand. The idea is that the commercial craft brewer gives out the actual recipe for one of their beers and the homebrewers have to clone it. Then at judging, all the beers are lined up...

I'm staying at my parent's house and they have these huge sacks or wheat and corn in the shed. I have my grainfather with me so of course I'm thinking it would be cool to make beer out of chicken feed. The corn is basically whole kernels of dried corn. The wheat looks just like wheat malt, but...

I was talking to a pro brewer the other day and he was telling me he uses 20% rolled oats in his oatmeal stout. It was really a pretty decent stout, had a nice full body despite being at the low end for FG and no cloying sweetness. Anyone have any thoughts on this? My oatmeal stout which is...

I recently acquired a used Grainfather and a fermenting fridge-freezer. The fridge is one of those ones where you can hack the electronics to control the temp of the fridge but leave the freezer running at full strength.. I was thinking it might be cool to put a large bucket of glycol in the...

I'll be housesitting for a few months shortly and might do some brewing there. The house collects rain water from the roof and stores it in a big concrete tank. Given that we don't have a ward labs or similar in my country and getting a proper report is going to be too expensive to justify for...