Fermenter was empty so time for a brewday. Another try at the Tribute clone recipe. Following suggestions from forum members I increased the flame out hop addition. Also, decided to add some carapils. Today's recipe was
3.2 kg Maris otter pale malt
1 kg Munich malt
0.4 kg carapils
1 hour mash at 66C
16 grm fuggles @ 60 minutes
19 grm Willamette @ 60 minutes
15 grm Fuggles @ 15 minutes
12 grm Willamette @ 15 minutes
25 grm Celeia @ 0 minutes
50 grm Willamette @ 0 minutes
1 sachet Nottingham Ale yeast
Brew day went without incident. However, my latest mad idea proved a total failure and non-starter.
What was it?
Encouraged by another forum member that will remain nameless, a brewing engineer, I came up with this arrangement to monitor wort continuously during the mash.
The idea was to include a chamber that housed a hydrometer in the HERMS plumbing. The chamber had a window so the wort surface could be seen and the hydrometer reading taken. This is what I came up with...
This shows the hydrometer bobbing around in the chamber.
After much testing the issues identified were, and in no particular order, and they are a bit obvious,
The flow of the HERMS circuit lifts the hydrometer so has to be stopped to take a reading,
The chamber had to be fitted with a temperature probe so the SG reading could be corrected,
Both of those were easily addressed. However, the killer was the gradual movement of the liquid level upwards and disappearing from sight.
The chamber needed a space for the hydrometer stem to rise into as the SG increased. This created an air pocket above the chamber exit port. Unfortunately, this air pocket gradually became a vapour pocket and, as a consequence of the vapour condensing, the air/vapour pocket became smaller, sucking the liquid level upwards and caused the liquid level to disappear eventually. I considered.....but then decided it was a crazy idea and stopped. Enjoyed trying though
). Wort is currently chilling on the patio. I'll transfer to the fermentation bucket and pitch the yeast tomorrow.
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