Thermapen vs. CDN/ProAccurate Thermometer Test

I was at the very end of my last brew day and cleaning up all of my equipment when I shattered my floating glass thermometer. This is the second one I have shattered in 3 years and I always worry about breaking it off in a mash or in a kettle. I was also a little suspect of the accuracy.

Besides the floating glass, I also own a CDN ProAccurate Digital Thermometer. Though I love how quick it gives you reading vs. the glass, I was always suspect of the readings because of the need to constantly recalibrate and sometimes its differences from the glass thermometer (Which one was wrong? Who knows).

I have become tired of the fear of accuracy as well as breaking the glass so I ponied up ($96) and bought a Thermapen. Everyone that has one raves about them so I figured why not. Even though they are supposed to be one of, if not the most accurate thermometer on the market, I ran my own test to verify. While I tested the Thermapen, I decided to do a side by side with the CDN to see if it was also accurate. Thought it would have been nice to test a glass thermometer as well that was not an option.

I made the ice bath just as the Thermapen directions suggested. The estimated temperature of the solution should be very close to 32. The Thermapen gave me a reading of 32.3 in a few seconds. Very happy about that. I put the CDN into the same solution.

Now I knew I'd have to calibrate the CDN for best results and temperature must be in the 32-34 range to do so. Well when I put the CDN into the ice bath, it read 29.6. If you try to calibrate at the temperature you get an error. So right away I was concerned with the accuracy. That almost 3 degrees could make a big difference in an hour mash.

I also had some water boiling. Based on my elevation and air pressure at the time of the test, water would boil at 210.6 degrees. I put the Thermapen into the boiling solution and it read 210.5 degrees. After both test I was now a Thermapen believer! I put the CDN into the boiling water and it read 208. Again, was around 3 degrees off in the same direction.

I then put the Thermapen and CDN back into the ice bath. The Thermapen again read 32.3. The CDN now read 32. That bugged me that it read a different temperature in the same medium. However, I'd now be able to calibrate the CDN. So I did and it read 32.1, very close to the Thermapen and expected temperature of the solution.

The CDN and Thermapen went back into the boiling water. The Thermapen again read 210.5 and the CDN also read 210.5. Interesting results.

So what this tells me in this very limited test is that the Thermapen and the CDN are very close to each other as long as the CDN was calibrated. However, as I said the first time, in the ideal ice bath solution I could not get the CDN to calibrate.

Though the Thermapen is around 5x the price I think over the long term I'd put my faith in it over the CDN. However, if you don't have around $100 laying around the CDN is a viable option as long as you can calibrate it. That's the key!

5% Better Brewer!

When you are an all grain brewer, besides trying to make tasty beer, you are also judged on how well you convert starches to sugars. This is know as your brewhouse efficiency. According to Brad Smith over at BeerSmith, "Brewhouse efficiency is defined as the percent of potential grain sugars that are converted into sugar in the wort."  I'm not going to reinvent the wheel by writing about efficiency but if you want to learn more about it, here are some resources.

BeerSmith
How to Brew

I've historically averaged around 65% efficiency by batch sparging. There have been some batches I've been in closer to 70% and some in the upper 50%.....yes, all over the place! I've been closer to 55%-60% my last few batches and I was starting to talk to some fellow brewers about it. They were also seeing some lower efficiencies and we found the common link was where we got our grains. It appeared that our local homebrew shop was just not giving a good crush (note: last time I was there I looked at the gap on their mill and I think I could fit my wife's mini van through it!). So with post Christmas money/gift cards I decided to buy a mill. 

I opted to go with the Monster Mill MM3. Really nice mill. I'd highly recommend it. On the maiden grind before my last brew I ground 1 lb of my grain bill to see how it worked. And right away I noticed how much finer the crush was compared to what I was getting from the store. I have my mill set at 0.045" gap.

I ground the rest of the grain and I went through my mash process as usual. At the end of the brew day I calculated my efficiency and it was up to 70%. This is the best mash I've had in a while. Yes, it was only 1 test so far and I know 70% isn't wonderful but its a step in the right direction. I'm very hopefully that I can be more consistent now that I'm grinding my own grains. I plan to do a few more batches at the current gap setting and then start to mess with it to see how it impacts my efficiency.

Not so Robust, but Pretty Brown.

A few weeks ago I posted about a Porter I brewed. I think the beer came out well and folks who've tried it have enjoyed it. But its not as robust as I expected based on a previously batch. The first time I made this beer it was pretty roasty and even borderline stoutish. As it aged the roastiness faded some and it became a truer robust porter. A nice beer overall.

To compensate for some of that roastiness this last batch, I decided to add the roasted grains toward the end of my mash to extract the color but maybe not as much roastiness. Mission accomplished. However, I don't believe I have a robust porter anymore.

I plan to enter this beer in my club's next competition . To see if it fit the Robust Porter category, I did a side by side comparision with Smuttynose's Robust Porter. Right off the bat, I can smell that the Smuttynose was much roastier. The head was also much tanner even though the color of the beer was near identiccal. To the BJCP guidelines I went.

On reading the Robust Porter guidelines it was clear to me I should not enter this beer as a Robust Porter. The Brown Porter guidelines though seemed very close. In reading the Comments section of the Brown Porter, it actually highlighted the differences I was seeing in the two beers side by side.

I've learned two very important things from this batch of beer.

1. Minor tweeks in your mash schedule can have signficant impacts especially when using dark grains.
2. If entering a competition, be sure to enter a beer into the category of the style the beer finished as, not as the style it was intended .

Having judged several competition, I've seen how people ignore #2 because of either, not knowing, not caring or just being flat out being stubborn since they planned their beer to be a certain style. I've put in the comments section, "would be better in 'X' style category". I've seen it in Porters and with IPAs. Either the Porters are more brown than robust (like in my case) or the IPA's come up short on hop aroma (maybe Pale Ale vs. IPA?).

I know if I entered this beer as a robust porter I'd get dinged for not being roasty enough. So as a competition tip, enter your beer in the category the finished beer as, not in the style you may have intended to brew. Some categories have fine line.

StarSan - Sanitizer and Leak Finder

I'm not sure if its bad luck, carelessness or a combination of both that has caused issues with CO2 the last couple years. I’ve had issues with a keg lid, o-rings and a hairline fracture in a regulator that all lead to leaks in my kegging system. Those I don’t believe I did anything wrong. However, not fully tightening the gas socket on the keg was my fault.  

I went to check on my 10 lbs CO2 tank today since I just filled those Porter kegs and to my disappointment it was empty. I filled it just 2 months ago so I know something was wrong. Now it became a game of find the leak. This is where StarSan comes in! 

Because of how easily StarSan foams up, it’s the perfect medium for looking for leaks because it bubbles like crazy. So I carefully went through each connection on my system looking for leaks. Nothing after 3 kegs. Finally I got to the gas socket on the 4^th keg and it started to bubble. I tightened it up and the bubbles stopped. Problem solved. This does teach me to check all of my connections one last time after filling a new keg. 

I learned a trick today when I talked to the guy at the CO2 place about my leak. He said, turn on the CO2 tank, lets it fill the entire system and balance out and then turn off the gas at the CO2 tank. If there is a leak, you’ll see the pressure slowly start to drop on the regulator since you are not forcing in any more pressure from the tank. If there is no leak, it should hold pressure in the regulator.

So I hope I go downstairs later or tomorrow and still find that everything is still OK.

SMaSH Brewing - Is Simple Better?

Drew Beechum of the famed Maltose Falcons did a talk at this years NHC about SMaSH brewing. SMaSH stands for single malt and single hop. Many of us spend so much time trying to load our beer with various malts and hops in search of that perfect homebrew. Does it really make a better beer?

That is open for debate. But Drew makes a case on why simple is better and I thought I'd share it with the group. It was enough to convince me to give it a shot and maybe I'll do some write up on what I find.

Air in your beer lines?

Though I don't have the collar on or the shanks installed yet, I have a chest freezer stocked with 3 kegs right now. They are all connected via picnic taps.

With the newest keg that I put in, it poured mainly foam and there was a ton of air pockets in the beer line (clear so I can see them).  I know many first think "you need to balance your system". I'd agree with that if it wasn't for the fact that the other two kegs work just fine. The air pockets in the line really is what confused me too. If the system was unbalanced, it shouldn't foam up until you pour and the resistance kicks in and not leave air pockets in the beer line.

I posted a question on the Northern Brewer forum (my go to forum) and someone gave me a suggestion to check my o-rings. I took the keg apart and I was missing o-rings between my dip tubes, both gas and beer lines, and the keg. It had been a while since I used this keg and I remember after the last batch in this keg I pitched the o-rings because they were worn out but never replaced them.

I had some extra o-rings laying around, replaced them and BINGO we have a good pour.

So the next time you have foam in your beer lines and you know your system is balanced, the o-rings may be worn/damaged or in my case, just fully missing.

So Important to Keep Track of Your Brew Day Stats

I'm a number's guy. From the time I was a kid I always loved organization and keeping statistics. I'm not talking like hardcore college level crazy stats that drive you mad, just basic stuff like keeping the baseball stats of all of my friends when we played in the street or keeping a list of my baseball cards. Yeah, I know kind of weird, lame, nuts and maybe even a little scary.

Now that I'm a brewer, keeping my brewing stats has become a bit of an obsession. I'm slowly building out the tabs on my spreadsheets with new calculations. I've really only been keeping good stats for the last 4 batches or so (I'm 14 batches into the hobby). Batch 8 was my first AG batch and my first few AG batches I was so focused on process that I didn't really care if I hit my numbers. I just wanted to not screw it up and make drinkable beer. Now that I feel comfortable with my equipment and process I'm really trying to do a better job about keeping good stats so I can learn from each batch and include that knowledge in the next batch.

My last two batches I've come up a little short of 5 gallons for the fermenter. I see now, its due to trub loss. I choose not to put all of the "junk" into the fermenter just to make volume. I account for trub loss when I calculate what I need for pre-boil volume. But the trub lost from this last batch was higher than the trub loss from the previous batch. I also used an ounce and a quarter more of hops, so I'm going to watch this situation to see if the amount of hops I put into the boil dictates how much trub loss to anticipate. It won't be perfect, but it should be better.

To get better volume estimates in my kettle (aluminum 7 gallon pot with no marks), I bought stainless steel BBQ skewers from Lowes. They are 24" long, cost like $5 for 4 of them and fit perfectly into my kettle. I just measured out the volume and marked them with a permanent marker. I used to us a wood stick, but I found I was missing volumes and I think it was because the wood would expand as it absorbed some liquid.

I'm also finding my efficiency is coming up lower than I'd hope for. So I need to adjust for that and see if I can improve there.

Again, I wouldn't know if I could improve my process and quality of product if it wasn't for keeping good brew day stats. For those of you that don't care, that's fine. Just wing it an enjoy like you are doing. For you folks that are very process oriented like me and want to know why you may or may not be hitting your numbers (OG, volumes, etc), I urge you to keep better track of your stats and learn from it.

Last time you checked your gas connections?

Last night I went down to the kegerator to get a nice refreshing home brew off the tap. Something didn't seem right about the pour so I checked the co2 pressure. To my surprise, my 10 lb tank was empty! This tank was on its 5th keg and at 10 lbs there so be no reason why it would be empty already.

I went down tonight and found I had a leak in the tube going to my manifold from the regulator. This may have been the first time I checked the gas lines. I check the beer lines when I change out kegs, but never the gas lines (this was only the 5th keg I've ever had on tap)

So this is you PSA for the day, check your gas lines and make sure everything is tight and sealed.