From the article:
>>Beer competitions have mulled whether to outlaw entries made in a PicoBrew
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That's just flat out assinine if it's true (which I doubt). I've made 65+ batches with my Pico. It's as difficult -- if not more -- to crank out a good batch with the Pico than it was with my old 10 gallon HERMS. There's nothing easy with brewing *good* beer on the Pico. Although, as I've learned, it's pretty easy to brew crappy beer. But the crappy beer is my fault -- not the Pico's.
It's just is a souped up sous vide appliance with a couple of high temp pumps and a precise water spigot. That's all it is. Literally. There's absolutely nothing magical about the Pico's mashing and boiling except temperature control. Sorta like with any brew set up -- electric or propane. (Of course, there's thousands of R&D hours behind it, too -- but in terms of the equipment itself. It's not that different that anyone's electric setup -- just a lot more precise.)
I've brewed my share of bad Pico batches, ruined nearly 10 batches over 3 months due to boil flashing and a potentially flaky pump/PID setup, and brewed easily -- easily -- 20-30 fantastic batches. My successes (to my taste, at least) outweigh my failures -- and my "fantastic batch" batting average is probably a bit higher with the Pico -- but, frankly, not much. If your post-boil process sucks, the beer will still suck. Just like "manual" brewing.
So to say that there's something magical or "automatic" about the Pico is crazy -- and uninformed. It's nice to have the precise control (just like any sous vide appliance), it's nice to have it self contained (but my electric BIAB brew day time is nearly identical to a normal Pico batch -- about 4.5 hours), and it's nice to have the rotating sparge arm to drop water in the Pico's hops compartments and the mash compartment. The Pico's precision is nice, I'll admit that. But it means nothing if your process sucks. One thing the Pico doesn't do is save you from yourself.
But -- here's the dirty secret about the Pico: some folks know are not even using the built-in hopping compartments. They're going old-school and letting the Pico do the wort pumping/boiling -- while bagging the hops and hanging them directly in the boil keg during the boil.
Yeah, nothing automatic about that.
But I discovered -- as have several other Pico brewers -- that if you want big, old-school hops flavor (old school as in "pre-Pico" brewing setups), you can't really use the compartments. Or you can use them, but you need to supplement them with additional bittering or late-extract hops bagged and hanging into the keg -- exactly like any electric brewing setup. You need to bag and drape the hops to avoid touching the boil coils in any e-brewing setup -- and here with the Pico you need to bag and drape to avoid clogging up the pump.
And while the Pico's 207F "boiling" temp -- which combined with the pumping -- is perfectly fine for "boiling" and driving off DMS, it doesn't work well with hop extract (such as HopShot) to increase your IBUs for big, hoppy beers. (My experience only -- but I've seen the hop extract clump back out when I clean the kegs, so I suspect it wasn't fully isomerized -- or utilized -- even when adding it at the start of the 60 minute boil phase.)
So, yeah, there are issues with the Pico. That said -- it's a fantastic machine. And it makes great, consistent beer. But it's absolutely no magic bullet. Most of the reviews assume it is -- and then getting bummed out because they're making crappy beer. Nevermind that the reason they're crappy is the brewer and the brew process, not the Pico. (If i hear one more review complain about "foaming" -- I'll lose it. You can't cool the wort for 60 minutes in the Pico. You just can't do it. For the love of god, cool to 95F in 15minutes with a couple changes of tap water in a 5 gallon bucket, then stick it in your ferm chamber to cool overnight. 12 hours later, you'll wake up to perfectly cooled wort. A 12 hour pitching delay freaks people out -- but it's absolutely fine. And you don't get the crazy foam that everybody is talking about.)
My own process now is to the Pico for more malt-forward beers -- I've had 100% luck with every Kolsch batch I brewed with the Pico -- they have been awesome -- but use my eBIAB setup (with Hydra cooling) for anything > 1.075 or so and anything IPA-related.
BTW -- the Pico has other advantages, though -- independent of the beer it cranks out. Support is superb -- absolutely superb. They'll occasionally replace lost batches (which is fantastic -- especially when you're so close to finishing a batch and then something goes sideways). The support is actually pretty unreal.
And the community -- within the Pico's forums and recipe exchanges -- is growing. So it's easy to get tips and recipes and tricks.
But here's another dirty secret about the Pico -- and I suspect this applies to the Grainfather, too -- is that you can't run down to Home Depot for parts and you don't immediately know what's causing an issue (leak, boil flash, on-screen error, etc).
Most of us, I suspect, have had issues during a brew day -- leaking connection and can't find the teflon tape, march pump gives out, washers lose from kettle connections, ball valve messed up, ball valve handle suddenly breaks off ... etc, etc. Well, if your Pico does something weird, you need to go through a process -- contact support, wait for the response, and then try and figure out if the batch can be saved. There's no way to "pause" a batch. There's no way (that I've found) to "restart" the boil. You can drain it into the keg. You can skip to the next step. You can cancel the brew altogether. You can start the recipe again -- and then skip all the steps until you're right back where you are. But (for me, at least) this is always a dicey process. No guarantees. I've done this -- and then still had the same issues (boil flashing, leaking, etc.). Back in the pre-Pico days, you spot a leaky pump head or a misattached hose or quick connect that won't disconnect or whatever, and you can fix it -- or go to Home Depot or the local homebrew store and get the part or pump you need -- and then start back up. It's a pain, but as long as you know your own equipment, you usually know the problem -- and you can pretty quickly figure out a quick-fix to save the batch. The Pico is sort of a black box. The error messages are somewhat cryptic. And sometimes the error messages don't let you start back up immediately.
Long way of saying the Pico is far from the "automatic" brewing appliance. There are issues. Another issue is the way Pico is framing the appliance: as a kind of "automatic brewer". I find it a *precise* brewer -- but not necessarily (or always) automatic. I suspect this is what throws a lot of folks who haven't brewed. I suspect folks don't understand the importance of cleaning out the wort -- rinsing, at the very least -- after each batch. And because the Pico can't really be taken apart, more experienced brewers start to freak out a little. You can't use PBW in it. You can't use StarSan (but don't really need to). But you can use special Pico cleaning tabs (cheap for the tabs, shipping is killer -- please Pico -- make these tabs available at normal homebrew stores with relatively modest shipping!). You can use dishwasher tabs. This, I admit, freaks me out a little bit because dishwasher tabs are so caustic -- but it works (at least, I think it does). You do need to rinse like crazy after a Pico tab or dishwasher tab cleaning. But you can't check hoses and internal connections to make sure that the cleaning worked. I mean, no taking apart the ball valves here to clean out the gunk that even PBW doesn't clean (the Pico doesn't have ball valves, but you know what I mean).
The Pico has the infamous silver tape over one of the back screws reminding you that, yeah, remove this tape, you void your warranty. And that's when you realize: this thing *might* have a limited lifespan -- but there's no way to tell ... for sure. Except when you have a problem, go through support, and then get the directives to do X or do Y.
So, you clean as directed -- rinse after each batch, full clean after every 3 batches -- but you can't check to make sure that the internals are, in fact, cleaned. That's frustrating. Especially when there's a nagging sense that whatever problems you might have *might* be caused by a regular cleaning regimen that's not quite working -- but you can't check to verify.
Despite all this -- the Pico rocks. The precision and consistency are fantastic -- and when it works -- it really, really, really works.