The BeerBug folks were kind enough to send me a replacement BeerBug (with a green LED instead of blue) in view of the problems I had with my early model. I happened to have a beer fermenting so I tried it right away, but had some issues likely related to the line holding the torpedo weight being too long so that the weight partially rested on the fermentor. And the … Continue reading
About a two and half years ago I put a 2 TB hard drive in our TiVo Premiere (link goes to the recent equivalent of our model TCD746320 Premiere). Lately it started to show symptoms of hard drive failure: random skips and unplayable portions in recordings, which isn’t especially surprising considering it is running almost all of the time. I decided to replace it with a WD20EURS drive of the … Continue reading
Mrs. Nerdly Endeavours had a LED bicycle tail lamp that had stopped working, even with fresh batteries. It looked very simple so I opened it up to check it out. The LEDs are mounted on a circuit board that had contacts on the back for the on/off button and the spring clips to provide power from the batteries. I didn’t take a “before” picture, but the contacts for the battery … Continue reading
UPDATE: a newer BeerBug unit seems to have resolved these problems – see Another BeerBug, Another Review. To follow up my first impressions, here are my experiences after using the BeerBug hydrometer to measure the gravity of a batch of beer as it brewed. As one of the first recipients of the device, I understood that there might be some snags, and so far the people at BeerBug have been … Continue reading
I just took my Flanders Brown beer out of primary after 27 days. It fermented with the Wyeast 3763 Roselare blend which has a mix of yeast and bacteria to make a nice sour beer, though it requires aging for good results. I mashed on the warm side to produce relatively more food for the Brettanomyces yeast and Lactobacillus and Pediococcus bacteria as compared to the brewing yeast. As a … Continue reading
Today I received my BeerBug Digital Hydrometer as an early backer of their Kickstarter. I had some minor issues with the setup, but they were quickly resolved by email from one of the project’s principals. The device is pretty elegant, with a weighted Teflon “torpedo” suspended in the fluid, connected to a head unit by monofilament line. The head unit has a strain gauge (correlating the weight of the torpedo … Continue reading
To try the BeerXML Shortcode plugin here is my “Dank Knight” recipe for a dark amber IPA with Columbus hops and English yeast (the odd mix of base grains is what I had on hand). As advertised, the yeast isn’t very attenuative, which isn’t something I’d planned on. We’ll see how it tastes – it’s on the dry hops now.
First, if you’re going to work on installing a light fixture above the kitchen sink, I suggest that you first cover the drain with a towel, newspaper, etc. If you disregard that advice, in the alternative I suggest that you run the garbage disposal first to clean out nasty gunk that might be lingering there. After I dropped a screw into the garbage disposal, I couldn’t initially locate it among … Continue reading
From the beginning, using my Blichmann BeerGun bottle filler was an exercise in frustration. It is top heavy and I mistakenly trusted it in a heavy glass pitcher, but the weight of the beer and gas lines knocked it over and broke the pitcher: it really needs to rest in a plastic bucket on the counter or tabletop, which takes up a lot of space I don’t have to spare. … Continue reading
Since I’m a lazy brewer and make 10 gallon batches with typically over 20 pounds of grain, I use a drill to power the grain mill used to crush the grain. Cranking the grain through by hand would take much longer. My new 1/2″ corded drill (replacing an old 1/2″ cordless Makita with tired NiMH batteries) was powerful enough to slip off the small flat on the drive shaft, polishing … Continue reading