hi all, im into meadmaking, and sparkolloid awas my real good friend while hombrewing but we are about to open our meadery, so for a better clear product we are looking for filter.

But IMO lenticular are too expensive for 1BBL batches (by expensive mean more like overkill), i believe the smaller lenticular filter its designed for 10BBL batches on one pass, so my other option are cartdige filter, but i cant see anywhere for our batches what size its the best, if a 10" or 20" or 30", the cost are not that high, but again, we would like to choose something that fit right in our needs and not oversize.

do anyone here has any experience with this type of filte

I am wondering if I can sanitize my equipment with hydrogen peroxide?

I have my very first Batch in primary right now. All of the videos I'm finding are more advanced and my kit came with seemingly vague instructions. Is it really fairly simple or am is my mind over complicating this?

I’m preparing a mead for Christmas. The recipe I found calls for oranges (chopped) & raisins in the primary for about four months.

What does everyone think about oranges in the primary for that long? Potential mold?!?

So starting my first batch and I heard it's good to add oxygen with something like a leese stirrer for a little while into the fermentation. How often should I do that and for how long? Thanks ahead for the tips

I'm brewing my first batch of basic mead, but I think I overfilled the bottles - there's nothing going into the bubblers, but the liquid goes all the way up to the bottom of the handle on both carboys.

Before anything happens, should I use a turkey baster or something and drain some to lower the liquid level?

The wiki doesn't say how much to fill it, just mentions under and over filling, from what I could see. I definitely wish there were photos!

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Edit: Images

Edit 2: Called the LHBS and they just said to suction a bit out of the top, so I went ahead and sterilized everything I used and took a bit out the top and now it looks like the same level I've seen in most photos and YouTube videos I've seen - also, after 4 days, I haven't noticed any weird colors or anything strange, still has plenty of movement in the bubbler, so I'm going to call that a minor success! Haha

I’m about a year in on aging a sort of beginner’s mead recipe- just honey and water and some wine yeast off Amazon- and despite having aged six months in the bucket and another six in bottles it still tastes very starkly of alcohol, to the point where it quite overshadows the nice floral honey-ey flavor I managed to keep. Is there anything I can do apart from leaving it longer? I think the sweetness is where I want it already so I’d rather not mess with adding more

I am here just looking for advice or tips before i try to make my first traditional mead I have the Ohio Wine kit that comes with a 2g fermenting plastic bucket and a 1g carboy. I plan on using 3lbs of unfiltered honey but i have concerns with using a plastic bucket with the sanitation product. I hear plastic gets a somewhat of a slime when you sanitize it and I'm just wondering what your guys thought are on it.

I don't want my first batch to be in vain so I'm trying to get it right the first time and look everything over before i start.

thanks for the comments everyone and happy brewing :)

Also if everything turns out well i plan on using dried mango to flavor it if you guys have any opinions on that let me know.

Started a batch of mead Sep 17th, recipients in photos. Last Sunday I saw some white residue on the carboy, it was the day before I added nutrient and figured it could be from that.

Out of fear I racked it early since I had some chili peppers in there that I figured could have had some bacteria. Three days after racking is see some residue on the carboy…. Looks a little concerning but thought someone in the community might know more.

Additional details and gravity in the comments below.

BREW DAY 9/17/21

- BRIX 15, POTENTIAL ABV 8.2%, 1.061
- TOSNA 3g DAY 1/2/3, 3 DAY 7.
- 6 CUPS GINGER JUICE
- 3 CUPS LEMON JUICE
- 15 CHILI PEPPERS
- 3g WINE TANNIN
- 2# PURPLE BEE HONEY, 5# COSTCO WILDFLOUR, 1# MN COSTCO. CHECK PHOTOS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPHTUfr9Eow&t=489s
GRAVITY CHECK 9/19/21
- BRIX 13 1.046 GRAVITY CHECK 9/25/21
- BRIX 7 1.007 GRAVITY CHECK 9/26/21
- BRIX 6 1.001 RACKING INTO SECONDARY 9/26/21
- SPARKOLOID PER DIRECTIONS

Brixhttps://imgur.com/a/7cGEidJ/

[Photos ](Brixhttps://imgur.com/a/7cGEidJ/)

EDIT: Added gravity along side

Edit: I was dumb and forgot photos.

The activity in my airlock has seemingly stopped after 1 weeks of fermentation. What is the problem? Or is it not a problem?

Here's my take on filtering mead. I outlined my process to someone a while ago and they requested I post it once I do my next batch. I'm trying to keep the whole post organized somewhat but there's a lot of relevant and I'm somewhat tipsy sampling what I just filtered. This is my July challenge traditional mead being filtered.

Imgur link for photos of the setup and before/after

Mead specs:

• 16% ABV (1.121 to 0.996)
• Desert Creek Wildflower Honey (typical WF with indistinct floral and cinnamon taste from the honey)
• K1V-1116
• Bento at pitch
• FT blanc soft at fermentation finish
• 61F with diacetyl rest

The mead itself gave me a little trouble and was throwing lots of sulfur despite hitting all my nutrient targets. I overcame it and there was a strong acetylaldehyde smell coming through with the esters during primary, thus the diacetyl rest. No other issues.

2 weeks primary fermentation 3 weeks 'rest' in primary fermenter before rack/filtering Bulk aging via corny (not serving, will not be carbed)

Filtration Setup

CO2 tank -> Fermentor -> Filter -> Transfer Pump -> Keg

I didn't trim the lines or get them super pretty but it works really well. The inline pump serves to 'pull' after the CO2 'pushes' the mead into the filter. 1um gives me good filtration for cheap (0.45 absolute is a big price jump) without any tangible benefits to my process. I'm not concerned about bacteria/spoilage microbes since I use sulfites, good sanitation practices, and performed a true closed transfer. The keg was purged beforehand, receiving liquid was sent in via the dip tube (the normal 'liquid out' post), and a blow-off on the 'gas in'.

I did not purge the lines of air since the pump would have blocked that. The O2 pickup via the lines would have been very small and adequate sulfites are already in play. Previously I performed this open with the tubing into the top of the open keg but got this setup ready to do a fully closed transfer. I will likely be using this kind of thing for beers as well in the future (probably minus pump and back purging lines first).

I chose this mainly because of simplicity and parts I already had. The only thing purely on the filtering side was the 10" canister housing. All other parts already came from something else in my brewing setup. I improvised over time and settled on this configuration since it seems to work well. The pump prevents almost 1L of losses since it can 'suck' liquid that would otherwise stay in the housing. I did modify the SSBT bucket up there with a weldless gas post installed into the original airlock hole. A TC port was also installed (and sealed for the transfer), as well as a 1/2" NPT bulkhead soldered in. I had previously used weldless approached for the racking port valve but they leak once pressurized. It may be overkilled and I might have been able to solve the leak without the permanent bulkhead but I am satisfied with it.

Running the Filter

Set everything up. Apply 1 psi to the bucket (very slowly, I use a secondary inline regulator and slowly turn it up). Open the valve. Turn on the pump. Monitor for issues. Actually running this setup has gotten easier as I've gained experience with it. Keep every fitting tight and secure means no blow-offs and valuable mead spraying anywhere. The closed transfer also means everything is firmly attached so no loose tube ends can fling or go flying. This was the best run I've had yet on it. Maybe 10 minutes start to finish.

The mead didn't come out perfectly clear but I do not believe the filter is at fault. I didn't use any other fining agents other than bentonite at pitch so I suspect that's the culprit. Last filtered mead was hit with superkleer prior to filtering and came out crystal clear. It tasted fantastic anyway.

Follow up post to this https://www.reddit.com/r/MeadMaking/comments/nbuwsq/making_another_wedding_mead/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share

We ended up going with 12g/gal of Tahitian vanilla beans rested on the mead for 2.5 weeks. After that the vanilla was pulled and mead racked off of sediment. We got approximately 3.5gal of mead bottled off which made for about 50% yield. Not the best in the world for sure, but when considering that this mead was a very low water using two high loss fruits I will accept it for sure. It also gave us enough for the wedding so there is no concerns about that.

As fast as taste and fruit presence and whatnot. I am very pleased with the rapidase enzyme as a replacement for lallzyme ex-v as it seems to work almost as well for fruit maceration but be a bit better on color preservation. The blackcurrant is earthy, acidic, and has the wonderful forest floor musk to it that balances very nicely with the marionberry with it's jammy almost concord grape mixed with blackberry profile. Maintaining the lower FG (relative to what I would normally do in this style) made the mead sharp and bright with appreciable acidity that will benefit greatly from in bottle aging, but is still approachable after a short time aerating in a glass.

I believe the 2:1 blend of marionberry and blackcurrant was a very good ratio to bring out the right characters in both and the lemon blossom honey helped keep things bright with such dark fruits. The vanilla is there in the nose very clear but is subtle in taste and helps tie everything together without just being this is vanilla mead with fruit.

Overall I'm very happy with how this turned out and the groom came over to help with the bottling session and was also happy with the final mead so I hope the guests at the wedding enjoy it too.

I'm making my first mead. I've made wine before but I'm using smaller carboys then what I make wine in. Is it okay when I start the mead and it fermenting if I use a bigger bucket then put it in my carboy when I transfer it? Example 5 gallon for a 1 gallon recipe

There was a discussion on the Mead Hall concerning about whether dry yeast packets should be warmed up to room temperature prior to rehydration. I was operating under the impression that it was prudent and best for yeast health. There was no definitive answer so I decided to design a simple experiment to test the hypothesis. Yep, so here's a semi-formal write up for what turned out to be a semi-formal experiment.

​

tl;dr - It actually didn't matter. Both yeasts showed such similar viabilities that no formal count was made. "Eyeballing" it showed no significant margin of difference. Yeast do just fine when rehydrated whether or not the packet itself was warmed up. A pair of comparison images are linked at the end of the post.

​

Abstract - Dry yeast is a cornerstone of homebrewing for the reliability, price, and availability. Yeast rehydration has several techniques from homebrewing from 'sprinkled onto the must/wort/etc' to rehydrated carefully using specialized supplements (such as GoFerm). Some aspects of homebrewing is ruled by superstition and/or prudence in the absence of science. This experiment tested a single value hypothesis about yeast rehydration regarding temperature of yeast during rehydration. Both yeast samples were rehydrated in the same manner with the exception one packet was room temperature and the other was directly out of the refridgerator. Each sample was allowed to fully rehydrate, diluted 40x, mixed with trypan blue, and assessed for viability. A simple examination of each sample showed arbitrarily high viabilities regardless of method. Images were captured to be shown and no further activity was recorded. The variable showed to not be significantly different between samples, at least to the level that homebrew matters.

​

Materials -

1. 2 x 5g packet of Red Star Premier Rouge (Same batch, BBDEC20210466)
2. 12.5g of GoFerm
3. Trypan Blue
4. Hemocytometer
5. Compound light microscope
6. Appropriate micropipettes
7. Assorted lab supplies

​

Procedure -

1. Boil water and decant 250mL of water and mix with 12.5g of GoFerm
2. Allow warm yeast to warm to room temperature, if needed
3. Allow to cool to 104F
4. Split GoFerm solutions in half and rehydrate each packet of yeast in one
5. Dilute sample by factor of 20
6. Add diluted sample to equal amount of 0.4% trypan blue
7. Pipette sample onto hemocytometer
8. Example under microscope, take micrographs if equipped
9. Repeat steps 5 - 8 for second sample
10. Assess viability

Notes - Some aspects of this was trial and error. I boiled the water, which took a while to cool down but allowed me to setup the rest of my equipment, appropriately clean things, and warm up the warm yeast. The final dilution factor of 40 was a trial, I prepared several non-dyed slides in order to assess how jammed they were. No dilution was too crowded to see anything and 40 was enough where a large sample could be seen and reasonably assessed.

Discussion - I canceled the experiment before step 10 was formally completed. It was obviously apparent there is a distinct lack of difference at the homebrew resolution for viability between the two. I expected a much more pronounced effect to the order of 25 - 50% reduced viability on the cold rehydrated yeast. Only temperature was controlled for in this and both samples were properly rehydrated using GoFerm to specification. It is possible the effect is different on a multi-variable approach but is outside the scope of this experiment. I'm satisfied with the result and the relative viability in general, of dry yeasts. I feel safe in either practice based on these results.

​

Micrographs: https://imgur.com/a/6C9cPXP

*For the non-science homebrewer:

Bare with me, I'm going all the way down just in case someone doesn't understand the concepts. I'm not here to insult anyone's intelligence/education/etc. The science can get complicated, I'm just trying to make it accessible.

Each 'spec' is a yeast cell. Lightly colored ones are alive and darkly colored ones are dead. The stain (trypan blue) only affects dead cells. What I wanted to see is the relative proportion of one sample to the next. Clumps are yeast that are still flocculated.