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Six Common Problems In Home Brewing And How To Fix Them

By Chris Haycock

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Published: 08Aug2008
Word count: 680
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Whilst it is true that home-brewing can be a very satisfactory and pleasurable pastime, producing good quality beer at economical prices, it is also true that problems can, and do, arise from time to time.

The purpose of this article therefore is to describe six of the most common problems that can occur, and how we can fix them.

A fairly common problem for the beginner especially is that of "Set mash." This is where the mash actually starts to set, maybe get a crust, and generally develop the consistency of very thick porage oats. This is not good, we need to maintain a liquid consistency. Causes can be the over enthusiastic use of an electric grinder to crush the grist, or poor quality malted barley.

The remedy here is to initially dilute with water. If this fails i.e. it just breaks into lumps instead of reducing to a nice even consistency, the only recourse is to discard it and start again. If you feel the quality of the malted barley is not up to scratch then you can add up to 10% of a highly diastatic malt extract. This is an extract that contains a high proportion of the enzymes which convert starch into sugar, and also break down long proteins.

Another hiccup can be when fermentation fails to start. The usual causes of this are an environment that is too cold, the use of poor quality yeast, or the specific gravity is too high.

The fix here is to get the temperature to a minimum 60 degreees F. And if the specific gravity is too high, warm the brew, stir well, and add more yeast.

Slow fermentation is another nuisance, again the temperature could be too low, poor quality yeast or malted barley may have been used. There may be excessive nitrates in the water or the hop content could be too high (this shows by the lack of a nice yeasty head).

Depending on what you think the cause is, the usual course of action is to use fresh yeast at least every third brew, and make sure it is a quality yeast of the correct type (brewers yeast) Using a yeast starter can be a good idea to get the process off to a good start. If high nitrate levels are suspected, you should be using normal tap water, possibly run through a nitrate filter if you are in a known high nitrate area. And sometimes just a good stir will get things going, especially if you think you may have overdone the hops.

If your beer turns out to be flat and lifeless, you should look at such things as faulty bottle closures, make sure there is a good seal. The fermentation temperature could have been too low, you need a minimum temperature of 60 deg. F. Or you may have left it too long between end of fermentation and bottling. Just try shortening the interval next time.

A sour tasting beer can be caused by the same causes as those that cause flat beer (above), with the addition of maybe insufficient sterilising, make sure you are scrupulous in this regard, use campden tablets or similar. Also the fermentation process may have been compromised by the yeast being killed off by extremes of temperature. Make sure that your brew stays within the limits, i.e. no less than 60 deg.F and no more than 85 deg.F.

The final problem in this article is that of the beer being just too bitter. This can be due to the excessive use of hops, in which case just reduce the amount used. Or not enough air circulation during fermentation. A good practise to avoid this is to remove the cover daily and skim the debris off the top.

So there we are. Just a little knowledge and attention to detail can save us from many of the common problems that beset the home-brewer. Don't let a few setbacks put you off, use them as a learning experience and you will be a better brewer for it.

Chris Haycock is an information publisher. One of whose many hobbies is home brewing. Preferring the taste and variety of his own product to those commercially available. For more information go to: http://www.secretsofhomebrewing.com

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