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Cheers Joe. What's your choice of insulation?

The usual dumb last minute questions from me, I'm afraid! Brewing at the mo, built a temp controlled brew fridge yesterday thanks to lots of useful info on this forum (cheers all!), and am now wondering whether it is a good idea to put the temp probe into the wort in the fermentation bin (which...

Thanks Anthony. Good point, now I understand the 'insulation' idea a little better. But you're right, presumably inside a very contained (hopefully very clean) space, do I need to keep the lid on tight? I could dangle the sterilised probe in the wort and get away with it?

Thanks to these, and other helpful posts on the forum, I've successfully built myself a temperature control for my brew fridge today and it's working well. However, I remain confused about the best place for the temperature probe... Inside the wort or not? When people mention using bubble wrap...

Now, I hadn't taken that into account. What might be the outcome of initially underpitching? Fermentation seemed to start off pretty well...

To be honest, it could potentially be anything I suppose. Yeast seemed a likely suspect as I didn't have this problem with my kit brews and first couple of AG brews. I treated the water for the last brew and can still detect this 'off'-flavour at this point. Treatment was based on the generic...

I was using a smackpack, for a 5-gallon brew each time, so in theory didn't need a starter (according to the packet). Presumably yeast cell count should have been high enough. Aerated the wort each time. Pitched at around 23/24 degrees maximum. Definitely lower on at least one occasion. Actual...

Let's hope so. Would still love to know what's causing it though.

Not really. That's the problem I'm having - and others have struggled a bit too. I suppose I get the impression it is a little plasticky perhaps, or a little chemically, which fits the phenols profile a little. But that's not what others (including pro brewers) have tasted. Some suggested...

I've had issues with 3 AG beers in a row. There's an odd taste they all have in common that I'm struggling to identify - it usually kicks in early, and is more prominent if you take some air in with the mouthful. One person has suggested fusels, another oxidation, and another phenols. I'm not...

Obviously, for the public record, having received sound advice here on the forum, I am not going to go ahead with it. ;)

:cheers:

True enough. My point there was more about schools and similar not being licenced for off-sales, rather than duty, but being allowed to get away with it. And then wondering whether such blind-eyes might also apply when donating beer to the school for it to make money from.

Well, I can ask the school again whether they're concerned. As I'm not a registered brewery, I don't really have any concerns about HMRC coming calling asking for duty on beer I donated for free for charitable purposes. I mean, has a non-brewery ever been chased for duty on 30-odd pints given...

I think it's up to the school. I'm donating homebrew for free so no issue there. I know of a now pro-brewery who gave their beer away free at a CAMRA beer festival before they'd gone pro, just to raise their profile, and CAMRA fully endorsed that. I suggested to the school that they might do...

That's what I asked them. They seemed to think it was fine. I'm donating it for free. They're selling it to raise funds for the school. So it isn't me selling it... That's if it turns out okay, of course. It may be off, or flat, or both. Not sure I have any CO2 to throw in if it is needed.

My hand was played for me - left it for an hour and came back to find quite a lot of beer on the floor. Transferred to a new, sanitised pressure cask. Just hope that not too much air made contact and that the beer is not ruined. Also, presumably, it will have lost most of its carbonation, and...

Thanks Bob. It's actually looking more like a fault that can't be resolved at the end of the tap/barrel, rather than at the cask end, if you see what I mean. I think I may have to transfer to a different pressure cask (fortunately, I do have one) instead, unless enough people tell me that's a...

I moved a beer from FV to pressure cask on Wednesday, with priming sugar solution added. It's a 5 gallon brew so 80g of white sugar in 250mls of water. However, the pressure cask now seems to be leaking around the tap. Does this mean that air is getting in and the beer is likely to spoil in the...

Thanks both. That reassures me. I've just bottled, using it to rinse the bottles using the scoosher thingy (like the name), and also to sterilise the caps. Fingers crossed!