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With most kits you use tap water, when making from grain you boil or at least take things to a high temperature likely to kill any bugs. So with a kit you need alcohol fast, then that alcohol kills the bugs. Kits do vary in temperature, but this is from a Coopers kit. So with a kit you are...

The K.I.S.S. approach keeping it simple silly is really good to start with. In order to make it easy at least double the times given on the kit. I consider 20 days about right, but even that is too short if I allow the temperature to drop. First I did I took over from my wife, it was in...

Well just transferred into a clean fermentor s.g. 1.012 so must be nearly ready to bottle, taste too much treacle taste not enough beer, and the typical too much sugar or over temperature after taste is too strong. Not a pour down drain job, but not a good beer either. To my mind it is a...

I used two demijohns although you could use one and large pan, not sure about using plastic as it does state use glass bottles to store. I also used a syphon tube with a sediment catcher, and a jug with calibrations on it. No point in having a hydrometer as can't take start reading. So equipment...

Done two Orange Liquors now hard to say which was best, not much in it either way. Both turned out well, but I read where other have had problems. I think swirling regular when at charcoal stage is important?

At last completed. Started 3rd July today 7th August so not that far over the 3 weeks stated on the instructions. And I tend always to leave it a little longer than required. The results are good I can't dispute that. As with all the high Alcohol it does have quite a few stages, basic idea...

There are three reasons to select a kit, one it's an old favourite, two it's on offer and much cheaper than normal, and three suited to climate. I find the Youngs Scottish heavy is slightly better than the Geordie Scottish heavy, but there is very little in it. Following instructions the Youngs...

I have thought about the cool box, to swap from cooling to heating you change polarity. The STC-1000 only has single pole relays, could use external relays, but not sure heating from above will work that well anyway. I would love to see it work, sooner or latter my fridge/freezer will fail and...

I have moved over to plastic bottles for my beer, but came to do a Orange Brandy from Classic Liquors and it states "Store in glass bottles" is there any reason why a high ABV (20%) liquor needs to be in glass not plastic. So much easier with screw caps.

Using simple two can brewing a kit cost approx £20 for 40 pints for 50p a pint, not selecting cheapest, but a reasonable priced kit. So over a year at a pint a night around £182.50 on brewing beer, if the brewing machine allows you to half the cost of brewing that's 4 years to break even...

I calculate at more like 6% ABV but really I think that would be enough. I have found a high ABV does not make a nice tasting beer, better half the ABV and drink twice as much.

Have you tried using a cool box in the car? Back in 1981 in Algeria I had a box for keeping the snake bite serum which since no longer working the desert was used for our bacon and kept it frozen, so they can work very well, it was connected to a large 120 Ah battery and we swapped battery every...

Since answering this post I have also bought a Coopers Stout. Most the UK kits state 18°C to 24°C as ideal temperature range, but Coopers state 21°C-27°C and say the yeast will tolerate 18°C-32°C (64°F-90°F) so it would seem the Coopers Stout should have been OK in our...

I tried experimenting and the results did not seem to follow a patten which I could repeat. Then I found the problem, temperature control, without temperature control you really have no idea if that good beer was because it was cool in the first week, or the bad beer because it was warm in first...

As a consumer I know it is easy to make mistakes when buying on line, so I look for a well known name. Does not matter if that name is Tesco or Amazon I want a well known name. If I am going to buy on line then I want to save money. I don't mind spending a little extra in local brew shop he...

I too tried to raise the ABV of kits. I added more and more sugar to the same kit Scottish heavy then throttled back again. At 2 kg it was a high ABV but starting to get the bitter after taste, at 2.5 kg it was OTT. So returned to using 1.5 kg as the instructions recommend. I tried using Brew...

Ups may be I have over done it then? The krausen has not formed yet, and I am wondering if the supplied yeast was any good, had yeast before from Coopers that was no good. I have lifted the temperature to 19.5°C ~ 20.5°C being set at 20°C with 0.5°C differential. The stick on...

Treacle comes in 454 gram cans, so only 1.362 kg not much over the 1 kg recommended. The s.g. was 1.042 instead of 1.038 which it says I should expect, and with treacle there will be some of the mass which is not converted. The big worry at moment is the krausen has not formed, since I have had...

I bought two Coopers kits, only �£10 each so seemed worth a try, decided to use treacle with the stout and keep the one packet of spray dried malt for the English bitter. However when I came to make the Stout I thought the last one I did was only 30 pints not 40 pints so decided to...

I would not have bought the kit, my idea of home brew is cheap booze, if it is not a lot cheaper than ready made then not worth the effort. I made 6 bottles of wine from a kit, Solomon Grundy I seem to remember which worked out at around £2.30 a bottle, for £3 I can buy fortified wine...