Award Winning Beer w/Home Brew Equipment

[DaveTF]

Let me start with, I'm new to brewing. I started back in August of last year with an extract kit like so many do. It came out decent. As an avid reader and learning I jumped in to all grain brewing on my next batch and did a breakfast stout that came out good. So I've done another three all grain batches since then and while they are decent and very drinkable, not to my expectations. I'm picky about good beer and want to achieve that level.

So my thought, and question, is; can you make award level beer with regular home brewing equipment? Who is doing that? I'm not talking about the stainless kits you can buy that are controlled systems like a grainfather or Spike Brewing setup. I'm talking about a mash tun and boil pot with a regular carboy or plastic fermenter. Are my expectation too high using equipment like that or is it just refining the process through experience and I can achieve those award capable brews that I'm after?

 

[GoeHaarden]

The equipment has less to do with success than your process.

Proper fermentation is key. Controlling temp and having adequate pitch rates! Easily done with a minifridge and temp controller. The type of fermentation vessel doesn't really matter unless you start storing beer for long durations. For me, fermentation is the most important aspect to control.

For all grain, I would place water as the next important. Use RO water and one of several free spreadsheets like BrunWater and you're all set. I don't even check pH anymore...

And, of course, a good recipe helps too...

 

[cgoldberg3]

If you look in the recipe subforums, there are a couple of recipes that won their OPs a state fair or homebrewing competition prize. So yes it's possible.

 

[Dgallo]

Yes absolutely you can. I literally only have an igloo cooler and plastic wide mouth carboy as my fermenters and have taken 1 gold and 2 silvers in nys Homebrew comps with 250+ Entries. Your process and attention to detail are far more important

 

[DaveTF]

Yes absolutely you can. I literally only have an igloo cooler and plastic wide mouth carboy as my fermenters and have taken 1 gold and 2 silvers in nys Homebrew comps with 250+ Entries. Your process and attention to detail are far more important

I like hearing that, thanks. That's pretty much all I'm using right now. I'm sticking to clone recipe's that are accurate so I can compare how I'm doing.
I have a cool basement with a small room I can control the ambient temperature. It stays around 61 - 62 degrees year round. Outside of water which I'm refining, I think the fermentation and yeast are my challenge.

 

[marc1]

Yes absolutely you can. I literally only have an igloo cooler and plastic wide mouth carboy as my fermenters and have taken 1 gold and 2 silvers in nys Homebrew comps with 250+ Entries. Your process and attention to detail are far more important

What's your process for fermentation/packaging? Seeing examples with specifics for it can help people move towards making their own amazing beer.

 

[GoeHaarden]

I have a cool basement with a small room I can control the ambient temperature. It stays around 61 - 62 degrees year round.

Fermentation is exothermic, meaning the process creates heat. Some say it's able to increase temperature 10F or more from ambient. Without active temp control it's hard to say what your fermentor temp actually is...

 

[Dgallo]

What's your process for fermentation/packaging? Seeing examples with specifics for it can help people move towards making their own amazing beer.

Here’s my thread on my fermentation packaging. I could answer any specifics if needed Turning your Fermonster into a complete closed transfer system for cheap!

 

[3 Dawg Night]

Like @Dgallo, I mash in a converted Igloo tun, and I ferment in a wide-mouth plastic carboy. I've been brewing less than a year, but I've taken two silver and one gold (and 2nd place Best of Show) out of 250+ entries. Brewing good beer is WAY more about recipe and process than about equipment. Like @GoeHaarden said, fermentation temperature and pitch rate are key! Those two will get you 90% of the way there!

 

[DaveTF]

What's your process for fermentation/packaging? Seeing examples with specifics for it can help people move towards making their own amazing beer.

Wort is cooled down to room temp which is usually 61-62 degrees. Pitching rates are done from calculators and up till my last batch I've done yeast starters to reach the pitch rate required. I leave the fermentation at that temp till the krausen drops flat then I bump the temp in the room up to about 68 which is where most of the temps on the fermenter have been during the active period.
I've only used a few different yeasts so far, wyeast 1056, WLP001 and Nottingham.

I bottled my first batch but went to kegging right after as I didn't like the bottling process or yeast in the bottles. I do closed transfers from primary or secondary which I used on a couple batches.

 

[DaveTF]

Here’s my thread on my fermentation packaging. I could answer any specifics if needed Turning your Fermonster into a complete closed transfer system for cheap!

I'm using a Fermonster; Thanks for that link, I'll get through it tonight ... I'll probably have questions

 

[Nubiwan]

I like hearing that, thanks. That's pretty much all I'm using right now. I'm sticking to clone recipe's that are accurate so I can compare how I'm doing.
I have a cool basement with a small room I can control the ambient temperature. It stays around 61 - 62 degrees year round. Outside of water which I'm refining, I think the fermentation and yeast are my challenge.

I brew all grain biab. I ferment in the dreaded white plastic buckets with an airlock. My my major piece of equipment is the 10 gallon kettle i bought, so i can comfortably make 6-7 gallon batches, That and a hydrometer, are my main tools.

I break a lot of brewing rules in my process, that i just don't think are that vital to worry about. What i do have - like you - is a basement that stays right around 60 degrees all year. It drifts 1-2 degrees during the ferment, but that's not going to cause you issues imho. I am happy with the beer i make. I think your conditions are ideal for what you want to do,

Id say i like simple styles. I haven't made a stout, because i don't particularly like them. Id think this would ge a difficult range to start off in. Certainly if its a Guinness you're hoping to clone. That would be hard i expect. I could be totally wrong.

I do like Ambers, and reds, and i can make variations on those, with just little tweak to the grains, or hops, and i like the subtle changes each time. Make the odd lager and ipa.

Think the keys for me are keeping materials clean, getting a decent recipe, understanding what I'm trying to achieve at various mash temps, ferment at a reasonably constant temp, minimize oxygen exposure as best i can.

I submit, i might not be as picky as you, but hasn't stopped me preferring anything i brew over stuff i can buy in a bar. Might be some bias there too, but I'm not ashamed of that either.

 

[GoeHaarden]

basement that stays right around 60 degrees all year. It drifts 1-2 degrees during the ferment, but that's not going to cause you issues imho

I think you may be surprised with the differential between your ambient room temp and internal fermenter temp...

 

[Bobby_M]

I wrote this for another purpose, but here is my list of game changing things that made my beer consistently start scoring in the upper 30s, low 40s in competitions.

1. Water. It matters. Chlorine sucks. Salts affect flavor. The combination of water and your malt recipe affects mash pH. High mash pH causes astringency. I build my water from 100% RO water and take a minimalist approach using only CaSO4, CaCL, and MgSO4 to get to 50ppm calcium and tweak the sulfate to chloride ratio. I use tools like EZwatercalculator (many people like Bru’nwater) to get it close. If the predicted mash pH is too high (over 5.4), I use the tool to figure out how much lactic or phosphoric acid I’ll need to add to the mash. I do have a pH meter and I check the mash pH but predictive tools are almost always close enough that I’d feel confident in them even without the meter now.
2. Fermentability, Dextrines, Attenuation, Balance. These typical brewing buzzwords are all interactive when it comes to recipe design. The problem is that understanding really only comes from experience. Fermentability, or the ratio of simple sugars to dextrines, is determined by specialty malt choice, quantity and mash temps. The attenuation you ultimately achieve is further affected by yeast strain and viability. A good rule of thumb is that the higher the original gravity target, the less dextrines you want to force. Lower your mash temps and back off on crystal malt percentages. If this doesn’t make sense, just follow known good recipes carefully.
3. Fresh ingredients. It’s no mystery that running a homebrew shop with good grain turnover gives me access to very fresh ingredients. If you don’t brew frequently, skip buying grain in bulk. It may cost you 10% more to buy grain by the batch, but it doesn’t get any fresher than that.
4. Clean your equipment. Think like bacteria. Dirt protects bacteria from chemical sanitizers. If you can’t clean it, or if you can’t see it (like inside a drain valve), use the heat of your wort to heat sanitize before chilling. This works on plate chillers too. I won’t spend much time on this because you should know better.
5. Yeast pitch rates. You are not using enough yeast. There I said it. This is another popular topic of debate. Take it seriously and don’t be so proud of yourself for saving five bucks. Beersmith and other software has pitch rate calculators that take OG and yeast viability into account and tell you how much yeast you need or how big of a starter you need to grow. If you like using liquid yeast (you’ll have to for certain styles), you’ll either have to dig into your wallet for several packs of yeast or get yourself a stirplate and flask. If you want to make lagers, go right for the 5000mL flask. The good news is that a lot of the newer yeast labs are putting more cells into each pack and charge less than multiple packs of the same total cell count. For example, it would take 3 Wyeast packs to match two Omega packs. Just use the calculator and don’t cry about the cost.
6. Fermentation temperature control. This is another major one. It’s not just about keeping the ferment cool enough, which is already important. Temperature stability is just as important. My process specifically is to ferment ales at the middle of their recommended range for 80% of the primary ferment and then raise the temp 3-4F until fermentation is complete, plus another week. This pushes the yeast to the finish line, preventing premature flocculation, and ensuring they deal with any diacetyl before crashing out. Lagers are handled the same way but the temp ramp up is 10F. All of this can be accomplished with a used refrigerator, Inkbird temp controller, and a plug in heat wrap. While we’re on fermentation, I do NOT rack beer to a secondary fermenter unless I plan to reuse the yeast out of the primary (hardly ever).
7. Avoiding oxygen damage. There are two phases to consider, hot side and cold side. Man do people love to flippantly dismiss “hot side aeration” or HSA as a phenomena that does not play into homebrewing quality control whatsoever. The fair assessment would be more like, “in limited testing, it doesn’t appear that hot side oxidation damage is all that important because several people couldn’t tell the difference in blind tests”. There are just as many brewers that swear by an extremely low oxygen ingress process. For now, let’s just say it’s not a good idea to splash the hell out of your hot wort when you can avoid it. Moving on to the cold side, I’m convinced that avoiding oxygen exposure is extremely important once fermentation is about half way done. One reason I do not rack to secondary is that oxidation is almost guaranteed if you don’t use closed transfers and CO2 purging. Speaking of which, my kegs are filled with starsan, then it is pushed out with CO2. CO2 is then pushed into the primary fermentor to begin the transfer of beer into the keg. There is zero exposure to oxygen at this stage and I feel very strongly that this is the only way to package sensitive beers such as NEIPA and have it last more than a few days.
8. Avoid the "that's a myth, X doesn't matter" crowd. Maybe that's a bit too harsh. Take what you read online with a grain of salt. First I'll say that I really like Brulosophy as a blog and podcast. Marshall and crew do a great job and I read every article and listen to every podcast. Their work is valuable but a lot of people take their results out of context no matter how hard they work to avoid it with caveats. Consumers of their content want simple yes/no, do this, don't do that kind of output and that's not what it is and it can't be. The reason why people will tell you a certain aspect of brewing technology is a waste of time, money, effort is twofold. First, the expectation of beer quality, as well as the brewer's ability to perceive beer attributes is highly variable. Many brewers pay no mind to any of the things I listed above and think their beer is amazing. They are right, because it's subjective. I think the lesser reason, yet still valid, is that many people want brewing to be easy. It may take 100% more effort and care to make the beer 25% better and that's the very definition of diminishing returns. In the realm of intentionally objective beer judging (I said intentional, not actual), 25% better is pretty significant. Yes, I'd much rather a 37 than a 30.

How you arrive at some or all of those doesn't have to be expensive. I brew on a single vessel system with no sparging. I ferment in Fermonster plastic fermenters with modified lids. The fermentation is done in mini-fridges. The most expensive necessity is a kegging system.

 

[Barbarossa]

That was a nice read. Cheers.

 

[Nubiwan]

I think you may be surprised with the differential between your ambient room temp and internal fermenter temp...

I have thermometer on my fermenting buckets and, while I understand that might not be very precise, I've never seen a big difference in ambient and bucket temp, which I consistently record. I always expect it to be higher, but have never once recorded a 4-5 degree difference.

 

[CA_Mouse]

You can! I took a 3rd place ribbon in my first competition and a Silver medal in my second competition with an extract kit, a plastic bucket, and a 5-gallon pot. By the next year, I changed to a large plastic 20-gallon cooler, 11-gallon kettle, and plastic 5-gallon buckets, taking a 2nd place ribbon, 2 Silver medals, 2 Gold medals, and a BOS.

It is about recipe, fermentation temps, and patience in letting your yeast do its thing!

 

[Nubiwan]

I wrote this for another purpose, but here is my list of game changing things that made my beer consistently start scoring in the upper 30s, low 40s in competitions.

1. Water. It matters. Chlorine sucks. Salts affect flavor. The combination of water and your malt recipe affects mash pH. High mash pH causes astringency. I build my water from 100% RO water and take a minimalist approach using only CaSO4, CaCL, and MgSO4 to get to 50ppm calcium and tweak the sulfate to chloride ratio. I use tools like EZwatercalculator (many people like Bru’nwater) to get it close. If the predicted mash pH is too high (over 5.4), I use the tool to figure out how much lactic or phosphoric acid I’ll need to add to the mash. I do have a pH meter and I check the mash pH but predictive tools are almost always close enough that I’d feel confident in them even without the meter now.
2. Fermentability, Dextrines, Attenuation, Balance. These typical brewing buzzwords are all interactive when it comes to recipe design. The problem is that understanding really only comes from experience. Fermentability, or the ratio of simple sugars to dextrines, is determined by specialty malt choice, quantity and mash temps. The attenuation you ultimately achieve is further affected by yeast strain and viability. A good rule of thumb is that the higher the original gravity target, the less dextrines you want to force. Lower your mash temps and back off on crystal malt percentages. If this doesn’t make sense, just follow known good recipes carefully.
3. Fresh ingredients. It’s no mystery that running a homebrew shop with good grain turnover gives me access to very fresh ingredients. If you don’t brew frequently, skip buying grain in bulk. It may cost you 10% more to buy grain by the batch, but it doesn’t get any fresher than that.
4. Clean your equipment. Think like bacteria. Dirt protects bacteria from chemical sanitizers. If you can’t clean it, or if you can’t see it (like inside a drain valve), use the heat of your wort to heat sanitize before chilling. This works on plate chillers too. I won’t spend much time on this because you should know better.
5. Yeast pitch rates. You are not using enough yeast. There I said it. This is another popular topic of debate. Take it seriously and don’t be so proud of yourself for saving five bucks. Beersmith and other software has pitch rate calculators that take OG and yeast viability into account and tell you how much yeast you need or how big of a starter you need to grow. If you like using liquid yeast (you’ll have to for certain styles), you’ll either have to dig into your wallet for several packs of yeast or get yourself a stirplate and flask. If you want to make lagers, go right for the 5000mL flask. The good news is that a lot of the newer yeast labs are putting more cells into each pack and charge less than multiple packs of the same total cell count. For example, it would take 3 Wyeast packs to match two Omega packs. Just use the calculator and don’t cry about the cost.
6. Fermentation temperature control. This is another major one. It’s not just about keeping the ferment cool enough, which is already important. Temperature stability is just as important. My process specifically is to ferment ales at the middle of their recommended range for 80% of the primary ferment and then raise the temp 3-4F until fermentation is complete, plus another week. This pushes the yeast to the finish line, preventing premature flocculation, and ensuring they deal with any diacetyl before crashing out. Lagers are handled the same way but the temp ramp up is 10F. All of this can be accomplished with a used refrigerator, Inkbird temp controller, and a plug in heat wrap. While we’re on fermentation, I do NOT rack beer to a secondary fermenter unless I plan to reuse the yeast out of the primary (hardly ever).
7. Avoiding oxygen damage. There are two phases to consider, hot side and cold side. Man do people love to flippantly dismiss “hot side aeration” or HSA as a phenomena that does not play into homebrewing quality control whatsoever. The fair assessment would be more like, “in limited testing, it doesn’t appear that hot side oxidation damage is all that important because several people couldn’t tell the difference in blind tests”. There are just as many brewers that swear by an extremely low oxygen ingress process. For now, let’s just say it’s not a good idea to splash the hell out of your hot wort when you can avoid it. Moving on to the cold side, I’m convinced that avoiding oxygen exposure is extremely important once fermentation is about half way done. One reason I do not rack to secondary is that oxidation is almost guaranteed if you don’t use closed transfers and CO2 purging. Speaking of which, my kegs are filled with starsan, then it is pushed out with CO2. CO2 is then pushed into the primary fermentor to begin the transfer of beer into the keg. There is zero exposure to oxygen at this stage and I feel very strongly that this is the only way to package sensitive beers such as NEIPA and have it last more than a few days.
8. Avoid the "that's a myth, X doesn't matter" crowd. Maybe that's a bit too harsh. Take what you read online with a grain of salt. First I'll say that I really like Brulosophy as a blog and podcast. Marshall and crew do a great job and I read every article and listen to every podcast. Their work is valuable but a lot of people take their results out of context no matter how hard they work to avoid it with caveats. Consumers of their content want simple yes/no, do this, don't do that kind of output and that's not what it is and it can't be. The reason why people will tell you a certain aspect of brewing technology is a waste of time, money, effort is twofold. First, the expectation of beer quality, as well as the brewer's ability to perceive beer attributes is highly variable. Many brewers pay no mind to any of the things I listed above and think their beer is amazing. They are right, because it's subjective. I think the lesser reason, yet still valid, is that many people want brewing to be easy. It may take 100% more effort and care to make the beer 25% better and that's the very definition of diminishing returns. In the realm of intentionally objective beer judging (I said intentional, not actual), 25% better is pretty significant. Yes, I'd much rather a 37 than a 30.

How you arrive at some or all of those doesn't have to be expensive. I brew on a single vessel system with no sparging. I ferment in Fermonster plastic fermenters with modified lids. The fermentation is done in mini-fridges. The most expensive necessity is a kegging system.

Items 1 to 5 are all within control of the OP, and his original request.

#6 he is at the mercy of his basement arrangement, which for many ales, and stouts will be adequate. Lager brewing will open a kettle of fish on HBT, but it CAN still be done.

#7 is something he will have to live with and try to limit as best he can in his process.

#8 is something he can learn for himself, whether everything touted as gospel on brewing forums is absolutely necessary, is open for debate. Many of these things require additional expense / equipment. Something OP clearly states he does not have.

On Brulosophy. That site does pretty decent comparative analysis (on many aspects of brewing) and has it independently tested. Their side by side tests must be in the thousands by now. I'd say their experience is quite relevant. It irks people when their results don't fly with commonly accepted brewing practices. It helps others to see an actual side by side test, and form their own opinion, rather than rely on someone telling then why it has to be done a certain way.

 

[GoeHaarden]

I have thermometer on my fermenting buckets and, while I understand that might not be very precise, I've never seen a big difference in ambient and bucket temp, which I consistently record. I always expect it to be higher, but have never once recorded a 4-5 degree difference

If you are trusting the data from a stick on thermometer with those mood ring crystals then any other statement I make is irrelevant.

However, suggesting that your fermenter temp is stable in a 60F room without active temp control is a little reckless when using such measurement tools.

 

[cgoldberg3]

On Brulosophy. That site does pretty decent comparative analysis (on many aspects of brewing) and has it independently tested. Their side by side tests must be in the thousands by now. I'd say their experience is quite relevant. It irks people when their results don't fly with commonly accepted brewing practices. It helps others to see an actual side by side test, and form their own opinion, rather than rely on someone telling then why it has to be done a certain way.

A lot of things don't matter as much as people want to think they do, like yeast pitch rate and temperature. And a lot of people don't like to hear that water chemistry actually matters quite a lot, cause it's annoying to fix water and doesn't involve buying any fun equipment.

 

[Dgallo]

A lot of things don't matter as much as people want to think they do, like yeast pitch rate and temperature. And a lot of people don't like to hear that water chemistry actually matters quite a lot, cause it's annoying to fix water and doesn't involve buying any fun equipment.

Well you’re 1 for 2

 

[cgoldberg3]

Well you’re 1 for 2

Well temp does matter, yes. Something brewed at 100F will be crap, and something at 40 won't even get started. But they found that 60 vs 65 vs 70 really makes no perceptible difference. As long as the temp is stable it's all good; and even temp swings are ok if they're less than 20 degrees or so.

 

[GoeHaarden]

Well temp does matter, yes. Something brewed at 100F will be crap, and something at 40 won't even get started. But they found that 60 vs 65 vs 70 really makes no perceptible difference. As long as the temp is stable it's all good; and even temp swings are ok if they're less than 20 degrees or so.

Who is "they" that you have referred to? You can't make a blanket statement like this referring to yeast! Many kviek strains will do fine at 100F, and I've pushed a few lager strains in the low 40s without issue. And saying that any temp swing less than 20 degrees is without consequence is laughable.

 

[cgoldberg3]

Who is "they" that you have referred to? You can't make a blanket statement like this referring to yeast! Many kviek strains will do fine at 100F, and I've pushed a few lager strains in the low 40s without issue. And saying that any temp swing less than 20 degrees is without consequence is laughable.

They is Brulosophy. I can't speak from first-hand experience, I'm scared to try the stuff they talk about and stick to conventional temperature controls myself lol.

 

[NewJersey]

A lot of things don't matter as much as people want to think they do, like yeast pitch rate and temperature. And a lot of people don't like to hear that water chemistry actually matters quite a lot, cause it's annoying to fix water and doesn't involve buying any fun equipment.

Lol, I just bought an RO filter and it IS gonna be fun!

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

I have a cool basement with a small room I can control the ambient temperature. It stays around 61 - 62 degrees year round.

You will want to measure the internal fermentation temperature on a couple of batches to find out if the temperature of the fermenting wort is at a good temperature. Add a stick on thermometer to see how much difference there is between the stick on thermometer and the fermenting wort temperature. I've measured this this with less-than-5 gallon batches. I found that the stick-on thermometer I was using was accurate +/- 1 degree to the fermenting wort temperature.

I won't speak to the difference between ambient and fermenting wort temperature as I found it varied based on strain. And, for me, some dry strains (like us-05) seemed to work better than others (like Windsor).

Summary: With less-than-5-gallon batches, I've found that fermenting at ambient temperatures (61-62) can work as long as ambient temperature is stable (day and night) and the 'right' strains of yeast are used.

 

[Bobby_M]

Items 1 to 5 are all within control of the OP, and his original request.

#6 he is at the mercy of his basement arrangement, which for many ales, and stouts will be adequate. Lager brewing will open a kettle of fish on HBT, but it CAN still be done.

#7 is something he will have to live with and try to limit as best he can in his process.

#8 is something he can learn for himself, whether everything touted as gospel on brewing forums is absolutely necessary, is open for debate. Many of these things require additional expense / equipment. Something OP clearly states he does not have.

On Brulosophy. That site does pretty decent comparative analysis (on many aspects of brewing) and has it independently tested. Their side by side tests must be in the thousands by now. I'd say their experience is quite relevant. It irks people when their results don't fly with commonly accepted brewing practices. It helps others to see an actual side by side test, and form their own opinion, rather than rely on someone telling then why it has to be done a certain way.

The question was "can you?" and the answer is "yes I can, and these are the things I believe were the way to get there". I guess I should have disclaimed that you're mileage may vary and in some cases you would do better to spend some money eventually. I'm not really interested in debating each of these points because they were part of my personal journey to "award winning beers" and I stated as such.

#7 is one of the most important in the list. He already has a kegging system so it may be a minor tweak and a very small investment.

We can debate the conclusiveness of the experiments all day long but even Marshall warns against making major process decisions based on their results. Under certain conditions two variable are difficult to tell apart. There is always a question about adequate controls or limiting the two outputs to the single tested variable. All I'm doing is suggesting to be careful with the interpretation of the data. If you consume the entirety of the experiments, one may conclude that literally nothing matters. You can use old malt, oxidize on the hot side, mash for 5 minutes, don't boil the wort, don't chill it, pitch a single 6 month old pack of yeast 20F over the correct fermentation temperature and the beer would be indistinguishable from beers made with unnecessary conventional methods.

Here's the thing. I listed seven process points that I believe all add up to success. If you experiment with each of them as the only variable, you may conclude that they don't really make the beer different or maybe the difference is so small as to not matter. I never claimed that any one of them is the game changer. All of the them put together are what made for success. Sure, I can be misattributing something but I've got a 10ft curtain rod full of medals so I felt qualified to answer the question asked.

 

[Bobby_M]

Well temp does matter, yes. Something brewed at 100F will be crap, and something at 40 won't even get started. But they found that 60 vs 65 vs 70 really makes no perceptible difference. As long as the temp is stable it's all good; and even temp swings are ok if they're less than 20 degrees or so.

I split a batch of IPA and fermented one at 65 and the other at 69 and they were completely different beers. It's one data point but it's completely contradictory to the idea that 20 degrees of variation doesn't matter.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

But they found that 60 vs 65 vs 70 really makes no perceptible difference.

I split a batch of IPA and fermented one at 65 and the other at 69 and they were completely different beers.

Without knowing the yeast strain used, could it be that both observations are correct?

 

[Bobby_M]

If you are trusting the data from a stick on thermometer with those mood ring crystals then any other statement I make is irrelevant.

However, suggesting that your fermenter temp is stable in a 60F room without active temp control is a little reckless when using such measurement tools.

Agree. I *measured* a 10F delta between the center of the fermenter and the air in the fridge during a barleywine ferment. I'm sure a more standard gravity batch would be less, but it's definitely not close to zero.

 

[Brewbuzzard]

A lot of things don't matter as much as people want to think they do, like yeast pitch rate and temperature. And a lot of people don't like to hear that water chemistry actually matters quite a lot, cause it's annoying to fix water and doesn't involve buying any fun equipment.

An RO water system and building your own manifold for water distribution is fun.

 

[Nubiwan]

Wanted this response deleted.... so i did

 

[jerrylotto]

Fermentation is an exothermic process. Early fermentation of a 5 gal batch can easly produce enough heat to raise the wort temperature about 10F above ambient (depends on the amount of sugar, specific heat of wort and mass of wort and to some extent, the type of yeast) and a bucket is a worst case scenario (minimum surface area for cooling and relatively good air insulator). Larger batches are worse. If you float your bucket in a water bath and measure/control the bath temperature, you will have much better wort termperature control than air cooling because heat transfer will be much better and since you don't need to keep the bath sterile, you options for cooling and heating it are much more flexible. Until I built my fermentation chamber from a chest freezer with active control, I used the water bath method with great success. Once fermentation slows down, it is less exothermic so you can trust ambient cooling to be adequate.

 

[bwible]

I haven’t judged or entered competitions for over 10 years but I have about 35 ribbons from local competitions varying 1st, 2nd, and 3rd places and one NHC second place - all using my mash cooler, brewpot, and glass carboy fermenters. Never won a best of show, came very close once. My beer was one of the last 2 standing in the best of show round but the judges were enamoured with the other beer. It was a “Kellerbier” which was the brand new shiny object back then.

 

[bwible]

Fermentation is exothermic, meaning the process creates heat. Some say it's able to increase temperature 10F or more from ambient. Without active temp control it's hard to say what your fermentor temp actually is...

I recently bought a Tilt, really helps with this. And yes, my temps were not what I thought they were.

 

[Nubiwan]

If you are trusting the data from a stick on thermometer with those mood ring crystals then any other statement I make is irrelevant.

However, suggesting that your fermenter temp is stable in a 60F room without active temp control is a little reckless when using such measurement tools.

Think my comment shows that i hardly trust its accuracy. I have no other method to measure wort temp. However, I trust it to a point i might pitch yeast if it stops around 60-70 degrees, not 80-100. That i take cursory recordings from it during fermentation, and yet to see any difference is my experience. I keep a second thermometer in the room which tells me how much ambient temps swing. Its perhaps 2 degrees during fermentation. The fact "both" thermometers give me very similar readings is purely for the record.

 

[monkeymath]

So the question is "can you make award winning beer using homebrew equipment" and the answer is "yes, you can win awards in homebrew competitions" ?!
Well, yes, in a competition between homebrewers, some homebrewer is bound to win. Could you make a beer that wins the European Beer Star or something similar? That's a different question entirely...

So if your question is whether you need a Speidel Braumeister or some other fancy piece of equipment: nah, those things are mostly for convenience. But you do need a fair share of equipment nonetheless (see the other posts).

 

[Nubiwan]

A lot of things don't matter as much as people want to think they do, like yeast pitch rate and temperature. And a lot of people don't like to hear that water chemistry actually matters quite a lot, cause it's annoying to fix water and doesn't involve buying any fun equipment.

I think water chemistry would have a bigger impact than much of the other fast held brewing dogma often discussed, i live in a place where water is only lightly treated and pretty much light on minerals too. I dont treat my water either. I would however suggest the difference in taste of the same beer made where i live, to that of a large metropolitan area, would be much more significant than say, just doing a 5 degree change in fermentation temps.

 

[GoeHaarden]

Think my comment shows that i hardly trust its accuracy. I have no other method to measure wort temp. However, I trust it to a point i might pitch yeast if it stops around 60-70 degrees, not 80-100. That i take cursory recordings from it during fermentation, and yet to see any difference is my experience. I keep a second thermometer in the room which tells me how much ambient temps swing. Its perhaps 2 degrees during fermentation. The fact "both" thermometers give me very similar readings is purely for the record.

Okay, great.

Listen. The OP asked how to make better beer, and some of us are giving advice from firsthand experience. It's a little confusing for people when someone without any experience controlling fermentation is telling them that it doesn't matter. It does! I bet you'd be surprised too, but maybe not. Either way I don't care, just offering up suggestions for what I did that made my brews exponentially better...

 

[Brewbuzzard]

Well temp does matter, yes. Something brewed at 100F will be crap, and something at 40 won't even get started. But they found that 60 vs 65 vs 70 really makes no perceptible difference. As long as the temp is stable it's all good; and even temp swings are ok if they're less than 20 degrees or so.

I have the same question, who are they? A 20 degree swing will make a significant difference in any standard ale and a large difference in a lager. I am a competition brewer and I have a very consistent winning record. I contribute this to tightening down on my process. If you're just making beer to drink that's one thing but if your beer will be compared to several other well made beers and judged by experienced BJCP judges you'll find that little things do matter.

Prost