Rebellious Lambic - AKA Old English October Beer...

[mr hoppy]

Obviously, Paudie's talking from the perspective of a commercial brewery and while there's clearly risks there are also ways to mitigate them.

The Liffey Valley guys have been passing round a BYO article that discusses how to keep the barrel clean between fills.

Where is the barrel now and is it empty. If it is, or when it is - we need a plan to keep it sweet between fills just as much as we need a plan to fill it again.

[Garry]

John, can you bring some amber on Saturday please? I thought I ordered some, but I didn't  I'll try join you on the mad monk brew if I can.

[johnrm]

Good man Mr H, just scuppered our chances of a peek at it...

[mr hoppy]

Sorry Tube, slip of the keyboard there.

[mr hoppy]

Where is the barrel now? Was doing a bit of research last night, and I reckon we probably need to fill it with a campden tablet solution ASAP if it's not in use any more.

[johnrm]

Sam has BIPA in it in Kinsale AFAIK.
He'll be in the Well on Saturday.

[mr hoppy]

Cool.

Only concern is if he were racking it off a keg at time, and leaving ullage behind but I'm sure that's not the case.

Big thing is not to let it dry out. (Lots of) campden tablets are the answer!

[Dr Horrible]

I can get some (pharma grade) metabisulphite from work if needs be - how much are we talking about?

[johnrm]

About 2hl 

[Dr Horrible]

Yeah, US units really are ridiculous (who's actually going to measure out 75 teaspoons?)- I went and did the sums and figured out how much we'd need for a 200L barrel.  I have it all in a bottle, will bring it to the comp tomorrow.  No citric acid at work unfortunately, they use either HCl or acetic, none of which we want near the barrel I'm guessing!

[donnchadhc]

Except for Fahrenheit, that's a more accurate unit than Celsius.!

[mr hoppy]

I've some citric acid at home. Probably <100g though.

I assume 75 tsp is around 375g?

[Dr Horrible]

Yeah, close enough.  1 teaspoon is 5mls, so if the density is around 1 then 375g is pretty close to 75 teaspoons.  Just to be sure I measured out by volume rather than a weight.
Think the citric needed is 1 teaspoon per gallon, so that would be around 250g.  The citric is for bringing the pH down, so we might get away with less depending on the water used.

[Garry]

I have a tub of citric acid too but there's only around 60-70g in it. I can pick some up in the pharmacy if we're short.

[imark]

Think the trick with the citric acid is to release sulphur primarily. Beware when you mix and I'd advise doing it outdoors. It's not pleasant.