Back after 25 years

[theskipper1]

Hello All
I used to brew Geordie beer kits 25 years ago and never thought I would be back until my daughter’s boy friend recently gave me a bottle of his home brew from a coppers kit and all the memories came flooding back , so I am back using my Geordie kits and I am very pleased with the results ,But one problem I have using a new barrel ( Young’s ) with a lever tap my carbonation was completely depleted after one pint – so this barrel lark is new to me as years ago I used to use Corona pop bottles , I guess this question has come up many times but is there anything I can do to improve barrel carbonation I used 2.5 oz of brewing sugar to prime the barrel , and have co2 cap fitted and once I inject an 8 oz bulb its away and the pint is very nice with a head and is crystal clear , one thought I have is the screw type tap could be better than the lever type , or can I inject Co2 into the barrel on filling with the priming sugar and would it help .
Your views / help will be much appreciated.
Many thanks Steve

 

[CreweBrewer]

Welcome Steve!

I'd say around 85-100g of sugar to prime a barrelled brew would be fine. You may have a small leak somewhere in your barrel - it's hard to get them sealed sometimes. The CO2 bulbs are only really there to fill the empty space left in the barrel as the level of beer runs down. It prevents the beer becoming oxidised and help it keep for longer. In my experience, a barrelled brew won't carb-up like a bottled one.

Dave

 

[terrym]

Hello All
Your views / help will be much appreciated.
Many thanks Steve

Welcome.
Corona pop bottles! With the flip top?? .....
Anyway, sounds as if I'm a bit like you, a return to home brewing after many years.
What I can recommend after several months of kit brewing is that you try some other kits rather than stick with the Geordie kits. Kits have come a long way since we were home brewing years ago, and in fact at the time I used to avoid them if I could. You will find Coopers kits are reliable and there is enough variety to find something in their range you will like with or without experiments. Their Original Stout kit is a definite winner, and I recommend the English Bitter. 'Premium' kits are a step up and if you like that sort of thing, the Youngs American range seem to deliver good results certainly the APA and the AIPA which I've done, as well as the Festival range of which people on here give a good account. And then there is the Wherry which, if you can get one in the Tesco or Wilko sale and can avoid a stuck fermentation at 1.020 (I am trying a substitute yeast), is a good one to go for. Have a look through the kit reviews on here, there are lots of other good ideas.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Welcome to the forum Steve :

 

[clibit]

Afternoon skipper, and welcome.

Are you going to stick with kits, or venture into adapting kits with hops and/or grains? The world has changed since was were kids! As a young man I made pretty rubbish beer with Boots kits mainly, now I make beer I really love, with grains and hops. It's been a whole new lease of a life, a renaissance!

 

[MyQul]

Welcome to the forum

 

[ManseMasher]

Welcome aboard!

 

[theskipper1]

Thank you for your replies.
My intention is to try a different kit next time, I do have a brew ready to barrel now, a Geordie standard ale, the pressure loss I am experiencing at the moment is unsolved at the minute, For the next barrel I have a different make S30 cap and the screw type tap opposed to the lever type which I am told are better, also I intend to try one of the Cooper kits next time.
This brew is not a disaster and has plenty of flavour is clear and is not flat , it just needs help to express from the barrel something I didn’t expect to have to do until the barrel was half full .
My corona pop bottle days I used to use the flagon size with the screw tops with great success
And in the future it is not out of the question to look at alternate brewing methods.
I will let you know how I get on, many thanks Steve

 

[stevej]

Welcome to the forum Skip:drink::drink:

 

[Slid]

Hi Skip,

For me the "go to" kits now are the Coopers kits. Totally reliable, given the limitations of kit brewing.

Principal limitation for me, is that it not possible to get hop flavour or aroma beyond the barrier of the reduction process that turns the initial wort into a can.

You can make good stouts and old fashioned, slightly flavourless, pale ales from the better kits - a one can kit will benefit enormously from 500g (pale) - 1kg (stout) of malt extract.

Modern tastes seem to be for hoppy ales and you can only really get that by adding hops in some way.

The modern version of Corona glass bottles is PET bottles - often 2L - but there are other sizes. They don't break if you drop them, which is a good thing. :thumb:

 

[GlentoranMark]

I've had nothing but trouble from my barrel, so much so I now use it as a FV.

You could try cooling the barrel in your fridge, injecting a couple of CO2 cannisters and shaking the barrel to death. This may dissolve some CO2 into the beer but remember if the barrel is leaking then the CO2 will still still escape.

 

[theskipper1]

Many thanks for your replies and I take all the suggestions / advice on board,
My next brew is a coopers Stout and have it on the go now – To be fair I do like the Geordie kits
And many of my friends are real ale drinkers have sampled my brew and are impressed with my creation going forward though I do intend to experiment , I have I believe solved by barrel problems and will put another thread up on this shortly ..
Many thanks Steve ..

 

[cheapbrew]

hahaha yeah I remember doing a geordie kit many moons ago, I've just joined here myself, it seems like there are a few of us old time brewers getting back into it, one thing I have noticed with wine making is that brewers these days seem to want to drink it quickly, there seems little patience to mature a good wine, don't get me wrong I am trying out a quick wow variant at the mo but have others on the go started two or three weeks before the wow and still going well, and I like to leave at least 3-4 months before first taste. I'm never surprised at how a few months can make a real difference.