Oh, I wish I was your neighbor. 
Oh, if you don’t align it right, yeah, the cap will crimp wrong. I probably get one cap like that in a batch, on average, because I try to go quickly. (Bottling is no fun and the quicker done, the better. Most serious brewers seem to graduate to kegging and never look back. I haven’t gotten to that point.) But you said your capper was actually breaking your bottles, right? Or did I misunderstand?
Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
I restarted homebrewing last June as I want 3-4% alcohol beers which are tasty. It’s a challenge to get anything commercial that is closer to 4% than 5% ABV, much less 3% or less. BTW, I’ve dropped 20 pounds by doing this. But I’ve gone the opposite direction for how to optimize on the greatest time efficiency (15 minute brews, use DME, partial mash the day before, yeast starter in advance, let the wort cool over night, and the best is a power drill to aerate the wort)
Do you have any favorite recipes for lower octane brews? I’ve been meaning to try something like an ordinary bitter or English mild for quite some time, but haven’t been able to. As far as beers closer to 4% than 5%, all I could think of is the light beers (which leave much to be desired on the flavor front), Guinness (4.2%), Bell’s Oarsman (4%), Pilsner Urquell (4.4%), and Shiner Bock (4.4%). One of the reasons I like going to Goose Island’s brewpub here in Chicago is that they usually have a beer or two in this range, sometimes even below 4% (when they have their English Mild on tap.) I mean, I enjoy my high octane beers (and I tend to brew in the 7% abv area), and I handle my alcohol pretty well (it’s the Polish ancestry in me ), but sometimes I just want to chill with some of the lower alcohol British style session brews.
Oh oh oh, I know this one. BTW, I spent a few days at the goose island Vegas edition at the Hard Rock Café ain January nd their Mild is pretty good.
So, here are my low alcohol keepers:
Orfy’s mild mannered ale. Orfy by the way is a brewing god. All of his recipes are bullet proof.
Here is Orfy’s boddington’s clone- very nice. His English porteris nice too. Did I mention Orfy is a brewing god?
Extra ordinary ordinary bitter- this is a go to
2.5% wheat beer - pretty mild. You’ll need to PM me for this one as the linky no longer worky. It is very mild tasting…almost more like beer flavored Evian…
O’Flannagan’sstout is good but I’ve only done one batch. I can’t wait to do the sour version.
James Spencer of home brewing radio (he has some really good podcasts) has played around with Rye for a while to give mouth feel to low alcohol brews. He has a rye wit. I’m not a rye fan, and these don’t taste like traditional beers, but I have been doing this or variations for a while. One glass at the start of the evening is pretty nice. I think the Tettananger hops are key.
I’ve done 33 batches since June. Tried more than a few lower alcohol recipes that were not for me. The above are all pretty good. Plus, most are traditional, battle tested traditional English style recipes are just regular beers rather than “session” beers.
Enjoy
Also, you can reduce the ABV by 10-20% simply by using a low attenuating yeast (White Labs English Ale yeast WL02) and a higher mash temp of say 158-160 for partial or full mashes. Play around with any of the brewing calculators and do the WL02 versus Nottingham or other English ale yeasts. There can be a dramatic difference in ABV. For example, if I plug in a 5 gallon batch with 5 pounds of amber DME using Notty, it is 4.24% ABV; whereas with WL02 English yeast it is 3.67%. Net net, this translates into ~ 15% lower ABV. Not sure how to show the difference between mashing at 150 versus 160. That said, you can reduce the ABV pretty dramatically just by tweaking the recipe via yeast and mash temp.
Naturally, the taste may not be the same (and by the same token you may not notice a difference). For example, I tried the SF Lager yeast because it results in low alcohol, and I’ve decided it tastes like ass even though Anchor Steam is definitely in my top 3 pantheon of go to beers. Go figure. Next on my list of yeasties to try is Chuck Papazian’s Cry Havoc Bud derivative.
you understood. It isn’t a failed crimp, it actually snaps off the bottle rim. I use what was the old standard all steel version of the newer link you shared. I found I really like the 1 liter swing top bottles - it’s about as easy as it gets to bottle up a big batch of beer. I also found I kinda enjoy capping my own bottles for about a case worth. Best of both worlds. I haven’t gone to kegging. Expense, space, maybe a little too easy to lose track of how much is imbibed. Plus I want some variety so would need 2-3 kegs. My understanding on sanitation is that kegs net-net may not save time vs a slew of 1 liter bottles.
Back to the OP, someone up thread suggested going to your local home brew store for advice and your first starter rig. +1. It might be $10 more expensive than an on line deal, but any decent store will give you a lot more than $10 worth of advice! Starting out is a little overwhelming as you can get way too much advice or far too much advanced brewing techniques when you just want to brew up a batch or three and decide it is fun, tasty and satisfying. Again, your local home brew shop should be experienced in helping a newbie through the crawl walk run phase.
One of the 3 local brew shops in my area sells both liquid and dry malt extract ($2.99) really cheaply. My lower octane beers use 4-5 pounds per 5 gallons, I buy hops by the pound, specialty grains like crystal are cheap, enjoy reusing my yeast (and got sucked into a magnetic stirrer), so my 5 gallons of beer is more in the $20 range. I enjoy my short brew times and drink beer I’m proud of that is pretty much unattainable even with craft beers as big as they are.
Thank you for all the answers. This thread is exactly what I was looking for.
Just a hint - run any advice you get from the homebrew store by us first. I’ve encountered too many shop people who don’t know shit or are just trying to sell you something. Better is to find a shop that sponsors a homebrewing club. Check out Zymurgy for a listing of clubs in your area and go to a meeting or three. That’s where you’ll get the best advice.
Extract brewing, where the first step has been done for you is very easy. There are a million or so ways to make your recipe unique. I have made excellent beers using extract. Nevermind soapy water and tedious cleaning chores, most brewing cleansers/sanitizers are soak and maybe rinse. Bottling can be a bit of a chore, but you do that while enjoying a beer, so it’s not too bad. Did I mention that it was easy, and that the beer is excellent? I am partial to Northern Brewer for supplies, as they have always come through without dissapointment.
Actually, if the bottle is funny-shaped, you can break the necks without much trouble.
If the bottle is oddly shaped, you’ll put all the force into the jaws instead of into the capper bell, rather than having the jaws just stabilizing the bottle in the neck while the force actually pushes the cap on like it does for a normal bottle. The necks only need the wrong profile, or you just need to be a tad careless in how you cap them. I haven’t broken many- maybe 5-6 out of probably 800 bottles capped, but that’s why I broke all of them.
As for recipes… I’d aim for a bog-standard pale ale of some kind. I would aim to use dried yeast, as getting a good pitching rate is super easy. Something like a dried 1056/ US West Coast ale would be good- it’s pretty forgiving and not too funky.
Why are you guys using that cheap-ass capper? A decent bench capper is $50, and you never break the necks off your bottles.
'Cause that’s what I got from my original HBS dude in the 90’s when I went for my second round of homebrewing, and I’m kinda attached to it (it’s lived in Arizona, California, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Seattle). But I’m tired of snapping off the rim.
You have a brand you recommend?
Mine’s an Agata, for what it’s worth. Had it maybe 25 years and it’s never let me down.
Because I’ve never had an issue with it (literally, never broke a bottle, no matter the shape) so why upgrade when it works?x
Cool.
As a new brewer, take to heart Charlie Papazian (The Joy of Home Brewing and magazine Zymergy founder) – Don’t worry, relax, and have a home brew.
Beer is very forgiving. A pound more or less malt, a pound of honey, using a different hop than the recipe calls for, amber malt extract instead of light, yeast starting slow/fast, etc may change the taste of your beer but won’t ruin it. In fact, might even be better than your original recipe.
Take good notes of what you made and then you can trouble shoot by backing out the variables.
We should start a list of common mistakes:
- partial mash/specialty grains should not be boiled.
- Your wort will probably boil over. You have to watch it like a hawk when it gets close to boiling temp. Keep a glass of water handy and put it in as you turn down the heat if you see the volcano erupting. Once your wort boils the first time, then the risk of boiling over goes way down. Also, once you add hops the boil over risk lessons. Finally, you can add three drops of fermcap does wonders to prevent boil over and fermenting out of your fermenter.
- If you use a brewing bag, make sure there is a cooling rack or something on the bottom of your brew pot otherwise it will scorch and ruin the wort.
- there are many more so let’s make this a group effort…
One thing to get is a good long digital thermometer if you’re going to go all-grain. I have one of these, and it’s freaking awesome. I can get down into the mash and see what the temps are easily.
I’d also say that fiddling with a hydrometer is probably unecessary and distracting for your first few brews, unless you’re just absolutely obsessed with knowing what your OG and FG are, and by extension how much alcohol you ended up with. In general, if you’re using extract, that kind of thing is going to fall into a pretty predictable range.
As for cleaning, I just run everything through the dishwasher using the "sanitize’ option. Never had a batch go bad.
Living in the desert helps, too, I suppose.
Unfortunately, my “local” (2 within 50 miles) brew shops are crap. One is run by assholes, and the other is too expensive. I order all my stuff online and it gets shipped to my door.
I think I learned this tip from you, so Thanks as it has made brewing and bottling much easier.
i will echo what others have mentioned, and find a reputable brewshop in your area. If you tell them what you are looking to do, they should be able to help you decide on equipment, set-up, etc. If you are going to go all-grain (a little more tedious, but IMHO gives flexibility), I recommend getting a good digital scale for measuring ingredients, and purchasing the BeerSmith program, which can help you form recipes, and archive your brewing sessions. I have transitioned from brewing a gallon at a time to doing 5 gallon batches, and I would say plan on getting the equipment to do the bigger batches up front, they can do smaller batches if need be. There are a ton of great recipes online, and if you ask your favorite local microbrewery for their recipe for your favorite brew, they may be able to give you a scaled down version. I know that MadTree here in the Cincy area has almost all of their recipes online, scaled down to 5 gallon batches. Even if you want to tweak these to make your own, these will give you an idea of which grains and hops will provide certain flavors.