Neon Raptor Bash AG kit

[Mash Monster]

Looking for help on this one
Just wondered if any one else has brewed this kit from Brew Day ? I gave it a go yesterday and missed my OG by 14 points and I am trying to understand why. Not whinging about the quality of the kits as they look to be great but genuinely interested how it went for others
Anyone ?

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Presumably 14 points under?
Not familiar with the kit, but does it enable you to check the pH of the mash? Having that (or indeed the temperature) wrong could certainly cause you to undershoot.
However I'm sure the beer will still taste good :-)

 

[Mash Monster]

Yep sorry 14 points under
Recommend mash ph for this one was 5.4 I hit 5.37
Recommend mash temp was 70°c for 60 mins I didn’t go above this
Water volumes were slightly under if anything as well just trying to understand why
I did add 140g of dextrose to bump it up a bit to 1.051 hopefully I’ll get a drinkable brew
Thanks for the advice

 

[fury_tea]

Yep sorry 14 points under
Recommend mash ph for this one was 5.4 I hit 5.37
Recommend mash temp was 70°c for 60 mins I didn’t go above this
Water volumes were slightly under if anything as well just trying to understand why
I did add 140g of dextrose to bump it up a bit to 1.051 hopefully I’ll get a drinkable brew
Thanks for the advice

70c is high for a mash, surprising they suggest that temp. They must be aiming for a higher body beer. It's on the edge of denaturing the enzymes as far as I know. I know you said it didn't, but if it's possible the mash got above 70 at all that could be your problem. I usually mash at 65-66 with a Brewzilla but often the wort coming out at recirc can be a couple of degrees above that due to the way these systems can sometimes overshoot. Not much of a problem at 65c but at 70c it could be.

 

[Mash Monster]

I have very little confidence in the temperature control of the BZ and constantly check my temps. That said it is possible I overshot!
Also that added to the fact that 40% of the grist was Oat and wheat malt it might be where my problem lies.
Thanks for the input

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Yes 70ºc is a pretty high mash temp - in fact I would expect it to give you a rather high OG but a fairly low fermentability (i.e. high FG / low abv) due to a lot of alpha amylase but not much beta.

Looking for other possible factors that might effect your efficiency, did your water have a decent amount of calcium in it?

 

[fury_tea]

I have very little confidence in the temperature control of the BZ and constantly check my temps. That said it is possible I overshot!
Also that added to the fact that 40% of the grist was Oat and wheat malt it might be where my problem lies.
Thanks for the input

I bet the beer will be great anyway. I was drinking a couple of Neon Rapter beers at the weekend and they were all really good.

If you try brewing it again, you could try adding some rice hulls, lower the temp a couple of degrees and see how that affects it. My guess is gummy mash plus high temp has led to your efficiency problems.

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Also I imagine it's possible that if you mashed in at a high temp, you may have got a lot of dough balls [crossed message with above - yes gummy mash]

 

[Mash Monster]

I struggled with the water profile on this one the suggested profile was a high chloride to sulphate ratio of 2.5:1
Here’s what I went with :-
Ca. 120ppm
Mg. 5ppm
Na. 5ppm
Cl. 184ppm
SO. 75ppm

 

[Mash Monster]

I bet the beer will be great anyway. I was drinking a couple of Neon Rapter beers at the weekend and they were all really good.

If you try brewing it again, you could try adding some rice hulls, lower the temp a couple of degrees and see how that affects it. My guess is gummy mash plus high temp has led to your efficiency problems.

Yea I will give it a go but I always use rice hulls in ‘Problem’ mashes and this one was no exception in fact the mash wasn’t too thick at all and the sparge went well.
I will definitely lower the temp next time though

 

[fury_tea]

Good luck, I'd be interested to hear how it turns out and what the FG is too.

 

[Zorro]

I have this kit for my next brew and I will let you know how I get on.

I have mashed at this temperature with Kveik before for a session IPA and it worked really well. The yeast rips through the sugars. I wouldn't worry about the beer. I have some rice hulls and I am planning to add them to the mash, if there isn't any included.

 

[Mash Monster]

Thanks you are right about the Kviek it’s my first time in using it and it’s ripped through the wort and nearly finished after 3 days !
Hope you have better luck than me reaching the expected OG let me know how you get on !

 

[Zorro]

Brewed last night, all good except my tap blocked on my brewzilla during transfer. Managed to sort it though, on brew father it said I should hit 1.057 not 1.059. Achieved 1.055, so slightly under however I'm sure it will be fine. I added 4 handfuls of rice hulls to the mash, I noticed loads of dough balls mashing in.

I tried the under pitch and added some yeast nutrient too

Fingers crossed it turns out all good

Great kit and service from brew day, it arrived really quick, good instructions and decent value with the yeast and 255 grams of hops. Maybe including rice hulls might help some people

 

[Mash Monster]

What was your grain bill?
I know that it has been upped a little since the first iteration and I wonder if mine was before or after the change . If you don’t want to post on open forum could you pm me if you’ve got time ?
I’m now regretting adding the dextrose to make up the OG. The yeast is a beast and I’ve fermented right down to 1.012 in 4 days I’ve dropped the temp and dry hopped now so hoping to keg on Monday fingers crossed that I’ve got a drinkable beer even if a bit thin

 

[Zorro]

Pm sent

 

[ChilledGecko]

I just brewed this last week from a purchase I made when it first hit the shelf.
I use a G40 and I'm used to experiencing higher than usual efficiencies when using it compared to brews produced on my old kit.

I hit an OG of 1.044 8 points down from the expected 1.052.
My FG hit 1.014 6 points further down than the expected 1.020
My ABV ended up as 3.9% rather than 4.2%
pH was 5.4

I was so surprised I checked my hydrometer in water to ensure accuracy, I couldn't believe I missed the target so badly!

When I brew it again I intended to add some extra base malt to lift it by it's boots a bit, interesting that it looks like Matt has already done it in the recipe

I'm fortunate to have a fridge/heater/inkbird to provide decent temperature control the fermentation so holding 36C wasn't an issue, concerning - never fermented at that temperature, but it held steady.

I've kegged it and it's carbonating at the moment. Preliminary sampling promises a good brew.

I pumped the recipe into Brewfather ahead of my brew day and it did confirm an OG of 1.052 with a FG of 1.020, so I wonder if this was used to 'hit the numbers' but it has issues with the non standard items?

I'm glad others have hit the same issue, disappointed we had to hit it in the first place.

ATB

Kevin

 

[Mash Monster]

I just brewed this last week from a purchase I made when it first hit the shelf.
I use a G40 and I'm used to experiencing higher than usual efficiencies when using it compared to brews produced on my old kit.

I hit an OG of 1.044 8 points down from the expected 1.052.
My FG hit 1.014 6 points further down than the expected 1.020
My ABV ended up as 3.9% rather than 4.2%
pH was 5.4

I was so surprised I checked my hydrometer in water to ensure accuracy, I couldn't believe I missed the target so badly!

When I brew it again I intended to add some extra base malt to lift it by it's boots a bit, interesting that it looks like Matt has already done it in the recipe

I'm fortunate to have a fridge/heater/inkbird to provide decent temperature control the fermentation so holding 36C wasn't an issue, concerning - never fermented at that temperature, but it held steady.

I've kegged it and it's carbonating at the moment. Preliminary sampling promises a good brew.

I pumped the recipe into Brewfather ahead of my brew day and it did confirm an OG of 1.052 with a FG of 1.020, so I wonder if this was used to 'hit the numbers' but it has issues with the non standard items?

I'm glad others have hit the same issue, disappointed we had to hit it in the first p

ATB

Kevin

Hi Kevin
Looks like we had similar problems .
I also use Brewfather and my numbers came out almost the same as predicted using the BZ profile with a brew house efficiency of 72% (mash eff @ 78%)
OG 1.059
FG 1.022
I’m with you I will up the base malt too when I next brew it
MM

 

[Mash Monster]

Hi Kevin
Looks like we had similar problems .
I also use Brewfather and my numbers came out almost the same as predicted using the BZ profile with a brew house efficiency of 72% (mash eff @ 78%)
OG 1.059
FG 1.022
I’m with you I will up the base malt too when I next brew it
MM

Having read my last post I need to clarify when I said ‘ my numbers came out almost the same as predicted ‘ What I meant was Brewfather calculated my numbers almost the same as the predicted recipe as supplied by Matt ! of course as previously stated the numbers that I achieved were way off !!! Hope that makes more sense

 

[ChilledGecko]

Hi MM,
yeah, totally got where you are coming from!

It's early days but I think it is a repeat brew I have here, do you know what changes Matt made? Has he just added some more base malt to lift the brew up or has he perhaps increased by a percentage across the piece I wonder.
Adding extra to a kit that has already had modifications could be interesting as it could over compensate.

cheers