Tilt Hydrometer software not locating the tilt

[Noob_Brewer]

brand new out of the box, I took my tilt hydrometer out of the tube packaging and placed it in distilled water in a pyrex glass so it floats freely. Downloaded the Tilt 2 app, location services turned on, bluetooth turned on. Yet the app just says "scanning for nearby tilts..." Am I missing something here that is obvious? Emailed the tilt company but hoping someone here has the magic/obvious bullet I am missing. I am using an apple iPhone 7plus with latest updates.

 

[schmurf]

Is the led-thingy on the Tilt blinking when you put it in the liquid? It shows if the battery is OK.

 

[myndflyte]

Is the bowl big enough that if it were upside down it could flip over?

 

[Noob_Brewer]

Is the led-thingy on the Tilt blinking when you put it in the liquid? It shows if the battery is OK.

The led hasn’t blinked once.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

Is the bowl big enough that if it were upside down it could flip over?

Yes

 

[myndflyte]

Maybe the battery is dead? That would be the only other thing I could think to try otherwise it may be faulty.

 

[schmurf]

The led hasn’t blinked once.

It should blink for a couple of seconds when it's not in vertical position, showing that it's okay for use. You don't have to submerge in water to test that, just tilt it some and check what happens. Check both sides if you're uncertain which side the led is located.

 

[Yooper]

The led hasn’t blinked once.

That sounds like something wrong with the battery. Email Tilt right away. As soon as I touch mine, the light blinks.

 

[brewbama]

Test the battery with a multimeter. It should have 3v. If not replace it. Note the + mark on the battery and Tilt. For some reason the Tilt will not work with the battery upside down. ...but don’t ask how I know that.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

That sounds like something wrong with the battery. Email Tilt right away. As soon as I touch mine, the light blinks.

Yeah I already emailed them last night. Thanks

 

[Noob_Brewer]

Test the battery with a multimeter. It should have 3v. If not replace it. Note the + mark on the battery and Tilt. For some reason the Tilt will not work with the battery upside down. ...but don’t ask how I know that.

So before I open this up to change the battery, can you tell me which side of the tilt is the plus side?perhaps factor installed wrong. I don’t have a multimeter unfortunately.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

NVM, just found a video which shows at least my battery was factory installed properly lol.

 

[Yooper]

NVM, just found a video which shows at least my battery was factory installed properly lol.

Sorry we're not more helpful, and it's a bummer that yours is problematic when it's brand new. Mine worked upon receipt, and never had an issue at all so far. It sounds like yours is either stuck in sleep mode, or got a dud of a battery right from them.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

no problem, got a new battery, but cannot for the life of me get the end cap off. The videos from tilt hydrometer show earlier model. Mine only has one end cap. But cannot unscrew it. ugh. any special trick to this? feel like im just going to break it. Looks to be normal threads to unscrew ie counter clockwise

 

[schmurf]

It can be a pain to remove, absolutely. Just find something to get a tight grip on the cap and don't give up.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

Just as an update: it was a bad battery I think. Don’t have a meter to test it but immediately when I placed in new battery the LCD started blinking. My phone immediately identified it too and I calibrated in distilled water. It was a super bummer that out of the box the battery sucked. Well I’ll be throwing this into my first Belgian dubbel I brewed today so pumped that it’s working now! Thanks all!

 

[Piggles22]

Curious if anyone has experience using the Tilt hydrometer in stainless steel fermenters (or kegs or refrigerators)? Are they reliable and what is the range of the signal? I noticed Tilt has a "repeater" on their website, specifically for use with stainless fermenters to increase the range up to ~25 ft. What is the range without the repeater?

 

[jschein]

Yeah it was probably stored incorrectly before you received it. I have a grainfather conical and you can't be more than 2 feet away

 

[CodeSection]

Curious if anyone has experience using the Tilt hydrometer in stainless steel fermenters (or kegs or refrigerators)? Are they reliable and what is the range of the signal? I noticed Tilt has a "repeater" on their website, specifically for use with stainless fermenters to increase the range up to ~25 ft. What is the range without the repeater?

The range is very, very limited in my CF10.....less than a foot or so. In my case, I just balance an old iPhone on one of the CF10's handles.

 

[Piggles22]

Thanks for the feedback! I was considering incorporating a Tilt into my brewing automation but think I will hold off on that for now since I have stainless fermenters. Besides, pulling a small (100ml) sample for testing gravity also has the advantage of being able to taste the beer as it ferments.

 

[Gozie Boy]

The range is very, very limited in my CF10.....less than a foot or so. In my case, I just balance an old iPhone on one of the CF10's handles.

View attachment 687933

This ^^. Connect up via bluetooth, then transmit via wi-fi and you're golden.

 

[GBRbrew]

I us mine in plastic fermenters and the range is only about 10 to 15 feet and does not travel through the floors very well ( basement to first floor is hit and miss)

 

[Snuffy]

When you dropped it into the water to calibrate, what was your initial reading before calibration? Mine was .998 and I calibrated it to change the value to 1.000. Now it gives me SG and also shows the "Uncalibrated Gravity" as always .002 less than each SG reading. wtf?

 

[day_trippr]

Wait - isn't that actually true? You applied a .002 correction factor to the "uncalibrated gravity" to give you the "calibrated gravity", yes?

Cheers!

 

[Yooper]

I us mine in plastic fermenters and the range is only about 10 to 15 feet and does not travel through the floors very well ( basement to first floor is hit and miss)

Weird. Mine is a lot further than that, from my laundry room at the back of the house to the office near the front. I guess that must be 35 feet or so(?), and the bluetooth works fine that far.

 

[Snuffy]

Wait - isn't that actually true? You applied a .002 correction factor to the "uncalibrated gravity" to give you the "calibrated gravity", yes?
Cheers!

If the SG of water is a constant that the other gravities are measured against, then wouldn't the calibration be a correction of error in the hardware? If so, what reason is there to continue to maintain a gravity reading relative to the original incorrect gravity? If you are going to do that, then why calibrate?

 

[Noob_Brewer]

If the SG of water is a constant that the other gravities are measured against, then wouldn't the calibration be a correction of error in the hardware? If so, what reason is there to continue to maintain a gravity reading relative to the original incorrect gravity? If you are going to do that, then why calibrate?

I think this is a legit question but I did it anyways lol. I too used distilled water and the tilt software read .998 so I calibrated it. It’s more of a zero offset to me because when I think of “calibration” I think of multiple points of comparison. So in the end it’s simply a .002 offset. But even when calibrated, the tilt manufacturer states its has a +- 0.002 precision as well. Personally I’m using it though for the trends to let me know when I think I need to adjust temps if I think it’s stalled or when to move on with other cold side processes when the tilt has reached its FG for a couple of days.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

Weird. Mine is a lot further than that, from my laundry room at the back of the house to the office near the front. I guess that must be 35 feet or so(?), and the bluetooth works fine that far.

Mine is in a garage in a fermonster inside a mini fridge. As long as I’m in the garage within ~15ft it will read via Bluetooth. Once I go inside the house it won’t read but I think it’s the mini fridge causing this, not the fermonster specifically

 

[day_trippr]

If the SG of water is a constant that the other gravities are measured against, then wouldn't the calibration be a correction of error in the hardware? If so, what reason is there to continue to maintain a gravity reading relative to the original incorrect gravity? If you are going to do that, then why calibrate?

It's a legit question, the gui designer must have felt it was useful. It does indicate "calibration" was performed (via any non-zero differential), maybe that's a helpful status indication. Otoh, it may simply have been "there's unused space here, let's fill it with something"...

Cheers!

 

[myndflyte]

Personally I’m using it though for the trends to let me know when I think I need to adjust temps if I think it’s stalled or when to move on with other cold side processes when the tilt has reached its FG for a couple of days.

This is how I use the Tilt. I don't assume it's 100% accurate and it usually isn't once I compare the final reading to a hydrometer reading but I use it to at least follow fermentation. Plus I think once hop gunk gets on it from the krausen falling, it tends to throw it off a bit. But I still find it useful enough to use it for my brews.

 

[GBRbrew]

Weird. Mine is a lot further than that, from my laundry room at the back of the house to the office near the front. I guess that must be 35 feet or so(?), and the bluetooth works fine that far.

Maybe it's my the crapy phone I use, might try a different device to see if I get better range

 

[crane]

Thanks for the feedback! I was considering incorporating a Tilt into my brewing automation but think I will hold off on that for now since I have stainless fermenters. Besides, pulling a small (100ml) sample for testing gravity also has the advantage of being able to taste the beer as it ferments.

I use sanke kegs for fermentation. I can get some random readings from it without the spear installed. With the spear installed, I can't get any signal out of it. I have tried a few different phones, different esp32's as well as a number of antennas on an esp32 with no avail. Works great outside of my fermentor.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

just as an update on this thread, I did receive a reply from Marcus at baronbrew regarding my seemingly bad battery. Without any hesitation, he said that there was a "batch" of batteries that weren't working for some reason. To rectify this, in the same initial email he stated he was sending me a new tilt of the same color I had and included a pre-paid postage for me to send my original tilt back to him for testing. The new tilt works great and big kudos to Marcus for excellent and prompt customer service!

 

[segallis]

Used my tilt on maybe 4 or 5 batches. This time it worked for a day, then the app could not see it (even from 6 inches away from a plastic fermonster). Tried several times. Fished it out 2 weeks later and did the batter test. 3 green LED blinks every time indicating a good battery.

If it acts up again I will be trashing it and looking for something more reliable.

 

[Golddiggie]

I tried the standard tilt models last year and ended up going to the Pro version to get reliable connections to whatever I wanted to monitor them (with my Spike CF10 conical fermenters). I did setup a Tilt Pi so that I didn't need to have a tablet right there, running off a power block 24x7. I did have one of the two units fail, which Tilt has replaced. With life, work, and weather getting in the way I've not used the replacement yet. Hope to in the next couple of weekends.

BTW, I did try having my phone, or tablet, all over the CF10 when trying the standard models. Connection stability simply wasn't there. It could, sometimes, connect, then other times there was no way it would connect. I finally gave up on them. I even bought repeaters to try and help, but that didn't work much better. Didn't matter where I placed them on the CF10s either.