Old guy returns to brewing?

[Bobup]

Ok folks. I have not brewed since my 26 yr old son was maybe 2. I was digging through my old software and found my 3 1/2 floppy for Brewer's Calculator by Regen Software.
Over the years I have burned up a few PCs and the latest one has Windows 10 on it. I have tried loading/running the Brewer's Calc. and it won't run under this version. I have also tried finding it online and it is apparently no longer made or supported. So what is, I know this is a very subjective question, what is the average person using for brewing software these days? And I guess I have lost my favorite recipes as well......guess i'll have a homebrew

 

[3 Dawg Night]

Welcome back! There are a lot of options out there. The two main ones are BeerSmith and Brewer's Friend. BeerSmith is a program that you download to your computer, whereas Brewer's Friend is web-based. Both have trial periods, so I recommend you play around with both of them for a few days and see which you like better.

 

[bracconiere]

R.I.P. ProMash

i use beersmith now, but i'm not an avg brewer. i bought it because i liked the fact it had costs included.

 

[VikeMan]

BrewCipher is free forever.
http://sonsofalchemy.org/library/

 

[McKnuckle]

Brewfather for the win... Cloud based and modern, beats BeerSmith in usability by a mile.

brewfather.app

 

[Holden Caulfield]

Built my own based on Excel. Through an iterative process it has been thoroughly tested and aligns very well with how homebrewer's build recipes and their systems. Special features include:

• It's free, with quick and easy tech support
• Calculates pounds of grain based on a target gravity, mash efficiencies and the grain's % of total pounds
• Scaling recipes is very easy due to the above - just change the batch size
• Calculates all the water quantities based on your system losses
• It even accounts for the volume changes to kettles and fermenters when adding sugar and syrups to these vessels. In fact, it accounts for these changes when calculating sugar and syrup point losses and factors these changes into the pounds needed to hit your OG. This is very helpful if you make Belgian beers and add your sugars to the fermenter to ensure high attenuation.
• Provides preboil gravities and chilled post boil gravities even if adding sugars to the fermenter
• Builds step and decoctions mash schedules and volumes - allows for doing both step and decoctions within a single mash schedule
• About the only thing it does not do is PH - I leave that to the pros at Brun Water, MMM, etc.

Give it try and if you have any questions, just post them. I will answer.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0vyt6v8pj4y5yrv/Buildabeer v6.4DB.xlsm?dl=0

 

[Nokie]

I use brewers friend. The online version is nice and there’s also an app that’s handy.
I can update my brew day in real time instead of jotting down notes and waiting to get to my laptop

 

[mashpaddled]

You could try running the software in compatability mode. Right click the exe or icon, go to compatability and change from Windows 10 to Windows 7. In older versions you could go back further in time but they've taken away those options in Win10.

But unless you're trying to fish through your old recipes you'll probably find the newer software more accurate and inclusive of modern ingredients.

 

[LBussy]

Brewer's Friend is (pretty sure) owned by the folks that own Homebrewtalk. Its differentiator is that it starts to add your brews to a social platform. You'll also see some of the same folks on their forum.

Brewfather's app is probably the more developed of the "online/app" choices.

BeerSmith is probably the most technically capable. There's a lot of "click and use" profiles but gives you the control to really dial things in.

I use all three actually.

 

[derekp83]

Brewtarget! I love it. Open source, easy to use and pretty accurate. Let me know if you choose to download it and have any questions.

http://www.brewtarget.org

 

[Sundy]

Brewtarget! I love it. Open source, easy to use and pretty accurate. Let me know if you choose to download it and have any questions.

http://www.brewtarget.org

Sorry to post on such an old post but I do have questions about Brewtarget and would like some help. I am having trouble understanding the batch size calculations.

 

[derekp83]

Sure, what's your question? Batch size is the total you plan to ferment. Boil size is the amount in your kettle prior to boiling. As for the calculated lines in red, I think the program is telling you what to top up to it you want to bottle your total batch size (accounting for trub and hydrometer readings) and boil-off, respectively. You can adjust calculations using the Equipment button.

 

[marc1]

Sorry to post on such an old post but I do have questions about Brewtarget and would like some help. I am having trouble understanding the batch size calculations.

If you click on your "5.5 gal - Extract - Ideal" it will let you change the brewing parameters.
You can change your pre-boil volume, batch size, kettle water, top up water, grain absorption, boil time, evaporation, and kettle losses there.

 

[dwhite60]

Losing all your old recipes sucks.

Depending on how tech-savvy you are you can install VirtualBox from Oracle. It's free. With it you can create a virtual machine running Windows 95,98,XP or whatever (you must have a valid install CD) . You could then run your old program.

It sits as an app on your desktop. You start it then run the machine you want. I use it to run Linux under Windows so I don't have to dual boot.

There's also a product called VMware that does about the same thing. It's not free though.

 

[Sundy]

I went to the settings and started playing with the values but they don't respond in a way I would expect.
My equipment: 9.25 Gallon / 35L 220V DigiBoil Electric Kettle
Primary fermenter: 14 gallon plastic
Secondary:7.5 gallon glass.
I keg almost all my beer.

So when I put my equipment in I get the numbers I showed in the previous screenshot. They don't seem right to me.
I have never used the Digiboil, I would like to get accurate numbers so I don't screw up a batch. I am at 100 feet elevation and I plan to do a test boil to find my evaporation rate when the Digiboil gets here.

 

[Sundy]

I changed my equipment to my Digiboil capacity. This is what I got:

 

[marc1]

I changed my equipment to my Digiboil capacity. This is what I got:

Pre-boil volume is your volume of wort you want before the boil, not your kettle volume. If you check the box under it, it will be automatically calculated based on the other factors entered.

Then, I think you need to go to the mash tab and add some water to the recipe.
Hit the + there, and don't worry about temperatures or anything else, that doesn't matter for extract. Hit OK for your generic mash step and then change the "Amount" column to how much water you are adding. Then modify this amount until your "Calculated Boil Size" is the same as your "Target Boil Size".

 

[Sundy]

I modified the mash but I can't find "and then change the "Amount" column to how much water you are adding." I am using 2.3.1 on Linux Mint.

 

[marc1]

I've never used the "Named Mash Editor" from the top ribbon. Use the Mash Tab that's with your Fermentables, Hops, Misc, and Yeast.

You only need one mash step because you're not sparging.

Change the water amount until the calculated sizes equal the target sizes.

 

[robert.balsinger]

Ok folks. I have not brewed since my 26 yr old son was maybe 2.

I too am returning to brewing after not brewing since the previous century. If your recipes are on the floppy, I would be confident they can be recovered. Regarding your question about software, I found the investment in BeerSmith to be useful for me. The program allows me to operate from a high view and just plug and play ingredients and allows me to drill down and set parameters to my nerdy delight. The supporting website is populated by a good forum and many podcasts and articles that have helped me get up to date with processes and theory.

There are many choices online and the ones I have looked at online all seem to be well supported and appeal to brewers of various levels of interest, resources, and ability. This really looks like a "golden age" to be starting again and I am sure you (and I) are glad to be back.

If you are seeking advice, I advise joining (or rejoining) the AHA.

 

[bwible]

Losing all your old recipes sucks.

I use BeerTools, thats one nobody mentioned. Prior to that I had an old program called BrewWizard that came on a single floppy disk and used to run on an old Windows 3.1 laptop. I have a mac now.

https://www.beertools.com/
I suppose you could go buy an old pc or laptop off ebay that runs the software you need, even if you just want to recover recipes. Lots of them out there, usually not real expensive. Truth be told, SO much has changed since then, not sure if your old data would even be worth it.

I use a paper brewer’s log/brewer’s notebook too. I made a paper form that I print out for each brew and I keep them in a binder. I do all the planning on the computer and once the recipe is finalized, I write down all the critical recipe info on brew day. I also have sections on the back for brewing notes, tasting notes and “what I would do differently next time”. I don’t so much enter competitions anymore, but I also inserted any judging sheets I got back into the binder with the recipe sheet.

I have 4 binders full now, going back to almost immediately after I first started brewing in 1997. If my computer crashed or my software stopped working I still have almost every recipe I ever brewed.

 

[z-bob]

I use brewersfriend.com. I really like it, except for the subscription part. (I'd rather pay up front and not have recurring fees)

I keep saying I need to create a paper logbook, at least of my really good and really awful beers, but I never do.

 

[robert.balsinger]

I have 4 binders full now, going back to almost immediately after I first started brewing in 1997.

That is the best recommendation next to "Relax and have a homebrew." My memory gets worse every year and writing it down stores it in a less volatile brain space and when I look back to my old brew logs I often learn something that I apparently already knew. Who knew?

 

[kevin58]

I used ProMash right up until the owner stopped support and even hung on to it for years and years after (I still have a working version on my computer) After that I tried everything else and finally settled on Beersmith. I ran version 2 for over two years and did not hesitate to pre order Beersmith 3 when it came out a couple of years ago.

It takes a learning curve. You have to put in the effort to create your own equipment profile. But once you do it will work well for you.

 

[Reneauj62]

Brewfather for the win... Cloud based and modern, beats BeerSmith in usability by a mile.

brewfather.app

I'll have to look at BF again. I chose BS because, at the time, I found it to be better all around and a nicer User interface...

 

[dwightr8]

R.I.P. ProMash

I still use ProMash!

 

[VikeMan]

I still use ProMash!

Well, someone has been keeping up with the domain name payments. The home page consists of the ProMash logo and the words "Brewing Software For the Discriminating Brewer." So maybe there's a comeback in the works. ~5 years ago, there was a note about an upcoming update, but that disappeared at some point.

I have a friend who still uses ProMash. "Because that's where my recipes are." That said, there have been a whole bunch of discoveries/improvements in modeling since the last update of ProMash.

 

[Sundy]

After evaluating all the suggestions I have narrowed it down to Brewer's Friend and Brewfather. I am leaning toward Brewer's Friend. It seems more intuitive to me.

 

[dwightr8]

Well, someone has been keeping up with the domain name payments. The home page consists of the ProMash logo and the words "Brewing Software For the Discriminating Brewer." So maybe there's a comeback in the works. ~5 years ago, there was a note about an upcoming update, but that disappeared at some point.

I have a friend who still uses ProMash. "Because that's where my recipes are." That said, there have been a whole bunch of discoveries/improvements in modeling since the last update of ProMash.

It still works fine for me. As "they" say, "If it ain't broke, don't break it." I actually still take that advise every once in a while.

 

[bracconiere]

I still use ProMash!

really? been a while for me. but one reformat and reload of windows, a long time ago and i couldn't get it or register it or something....

 

[dbsmith]

Ok folks. I have not brewed since my 26 yr old son was maybe 2. I was digging through my old software and found my 3 1/2 floppy for Brewer's Calculator by Regen Software.
Over the years I have burned up a few PCs and the latest one has Windows 10 on it. I have tried loading/running the Brewer's Calc. and it won't run under this version.... And I guess I have lost my favorite recipes as well......guess i'll have a homebrew

Can you upload the contents of the disk here in a zip? What version of Windows/DOS were you running to use this program? We might be able to recover your recipes.

I have a DOS 6/Win3.1 and a Windows 95 virtual box setup