Never buy one hydrometer. When you have only one, it will rapidly commit suicide. If you have 2 they will last forever.

Jesse, I was scouting around and looks like you totally answered my SOS from yesterday. Cheers!

Loved the video. Only one out there actually answering my questions. Subscribed. I'll stick around for now.

Love this it was just what I needed to know about the mash and ferment process thanks so much.

Good stuff Jessie. I often get lazy and test the FG after I already kegged it. I almost got caught out last week on a new recipe, but decided to measure and it saved me from from drinking 1030 beer. Left it for another week.

Thanks for this. I found that when brewing beer or ale, aggressive primary was over in a week. I let secondary go for 3+ weeks or more. When both FG and bubbles and a good layer of lees indicated that secondary was REALLY (pretty much) done, it's then and only then that I started bottling. A carbonation drop, in each 12 oz bottle, and leaving these bottles for yet another 2+ weeks, before chilling and drinking, had reliably resulted in a PLEASANT TASTING brew. Having said THAT, I'm finding that fermenting 'hard cider', using natural, cold-pressed, unpasteurized, unmolested apple-juice, is truly a waiting game!

PSA. There are 177,423 topics Jesse could do about distilling however I will wait as they come out however being a patreon has great benefits and some voting opportunities for future endeavors. Thanks for ALL the efforts you do for the gang.

Another great video Jesse. Something all new or distillers should remember is that not all sugars are 100 percent ferment-able. Table sugar is only about 85% according to the Lovibond tables, where as corn sugar is 100 % ferment-able. This may throw off a beginner when it comes to understanding why their wash didn't get 1.0 or less. The difference may not be a lot, but it could be frustrating to someone thinking they are going to get to 1.0 or less. Experience, experience, experience !!! I think I mentioned to you before, that I spent a long time learning about this whole thing before I ever tried it, resulting in ots of stupid questions I never had to bother anybody with. Thanks again for everything you do to make the community a better one !!! -- den

Thank you much. I found many videos on how to make a sugar wash. Finally I know when it's finished.

A must have item for sure! Thanks for sharing!

Good tip on the refractometer.....I literally battled my brain over unfinished fermentation until I realized that I needed to use a calculator to get the real numbers at the end!!!!

i just plonk the hydrometer in my fermentation vessel at the start and leave it there having a sneek peek now and again. Saves any dribbles and contamination. not that anal to be worrying about parallax error or capillary action.

I let my inner nerdy hillbilly out and made a hydrometer. I love the understanding of how things work and being able to apply it to “make toob heavy at the bottom, mark on it SG of petrol, water and glycerine.” (0.72, 1, 1.26), and, because glycerine is miscible, I can mix in water to 1/4, 2/4, 3/4 ratios to verify my scale

Excellent help, thanks 👍

Thank you Jesse! Great advise! I value and admire your work

Even with a correction factor, cheap refractometers are pretty with less for calculating final gravity. Use an hydrometer and correct for wash temperature using the sheet that comes with your hydrometer. Refractometers are handy for Original Gravity since no alcohol is present, just make sure to get a clear sample.

actually really good to know, I have a black strap rum wash in and has been sat at 1020 for a week or so now. I've just popped it into the ferm chamber at 32'c to push it right upto the yeast limit, then crash down before running.

Hi Jesse, will a TPW wash Degas itself if left for a month or two? Also can it be left in the primary or does it need to be transferred into a secondary while the natural clearing and degassing process is happening? Cheers.

I'm making some bourbon to fill a 5.28 gallon barrel. Mashed in grains as needed. Drained off liquid and sparged. Repeated that process for second fermentation. Most of the grains I used again but added some sugar to it. There is 3 fermentation containers going with 2 off the grain and 1 on the grain with sugar. All 3 are done fermenting. Each container comes to 1.010, does that sound right? You mentioned 1.002 to 1.008 being right there. Thanks

If you are using turbo yeast or some strain that doesnt flocculate as well how much influence does the yeast that is still in suspension have on the hydrometer reading.

Great video, couldn't agree more.

Thanks for the info. I need your help as I am stuck with a failed fermentation. I have made good wines before but this time I thought I would try making a Fortified Wine. The biggest mistake I made ( which I realized later ) was adding Brandy at the very start of fermentation. This has 'killed' the yeast I suppose. Its 10 days now and there's no fermentation. Initial gravity was 1.076 and today it's 1.056. Do I add the Yeast and yeast nutrients once again? I really need your advice / help. Thanks in advance.

Hi Jessie do you get Milo hot malt beverage in NZ if so what are your thoughts on using that to make a "whiskey/beer"

As usual awesome video

So if SG has been the same ever since it dropped from the first reading and the air lock bubbles once in a while and you have been fermenting a beer for 14 days does it mean its ready if the SG is the same? Or must one wait for the air lock to stop bubbling

l like the info, I was almost sure you hand and arm speak was going to knock it hydrometer off the bar LOL.

Well you told me what I needed to know..i made my first batch of honey mead. Im at .002 or .02 after brewing for 8 days.. Started it the 29th of nov.. But my bottles have not come in yet so they'll sit alittle longer and I'll tske another reading. Its a very light body mead with light flavor

Exactly what I want to know, thanks

Jess were do you get your different yeast from? I really struggle to get in Australia!

have a apple mead i ran for 4 months of ferment, added in some firmfast/dualfine clarifying agents and for 2 days it has had a wierd central cloud....is this normal?

Well explained sir.

Sir I kept fermention until three month so can I distill or not, malted barley, dates, cinnamon, raisin.

good vid like always! i normaly do rum,and use a the mix off calculator table, expected alchohol %, starting gravity and end gravity if the final number is close the the expected % and all look like is stop! is time for destilling!! now i got 2 questions!!! 1, what to do if stop early!! and 2, what about leaving it longer! any advantage or disadvantages to leaving fermenting longer!!! keep the videos coming!! and gretting from puerto rico!!!

If your strike temp for grain is at 70 to 74c and your mash sits at 65c for 90min is that normal , or does that strike temp give to many unfermentable sugars?

Question...if we get to the point where we can not buy yeast...I'm a prepper. Can I take some sediment off the bottom of the fermenter and feed it with sugar to keep it going like sour dough bread?

What should I be aming for on a slivoviz /plum brandy

Thank you!

Aha, “it’s not bolox but” made me smile again, thanks dude :-) molasses run now a month on... still running “slow, very slow” I’m not stressed :-) Thanks again dude, your ace

Hey Jesse, can you do a vid on pH management during a ferment. I’ve done a few TPW washes now and follow the recipe but each time have had to manage pH in varying degrees. The 50l batch I have on the go now dropped to 2.8 after about a week. Is sodium bicarbonate better than calcium carbonate and what’s a good level to adjust back too? I think I used 5 teaspoons of bicarb to get it back into the mid 4’s so can you add too much? Does not seem to be much IRT clear guidelines around this subject.

Hi, is there any way to know when to start distilling without those tools? I dont care for exact measurements of alcohol its my first wash and i just dont want to he too early or too late, i made it with brown sugar and white bastard sugar Caramelized it before adding the water, added some honey and spices And bakers yeast

how long can u keep it on the yeast as say u broke your leg and cant brew should u decant into 2nd barrel and store it ?

My rum fermentation is complete but my still will not arrive u til one week how long can I wait before I have still it

Say I hit my pure grape juice with my yeast and moved ,so never put the sugar to it ,6 months later I seperate the juice away from yeast , remember there was never any sugar added. And now I'm pouring that juice in with about 400 smashed grapes and will add sugar now, should I put fresh yeast in ,even though yeast sat upon that grape juice for 6 months

In the wine kits, Winexpert et al, they include a sachet of 'stabilizer' which when used seems to kill the yeast. That stops it fermenting - so no burst bottles. However, with beer I don't think it ever does stop, it may become dormant , lack of food, temp yet it isn't dead. Transfer fermented beer into a keg with priming sugar and off it goes again.

I LOVE THAT SHIRT!

It’s a hard call... I’ve given up on a mash. It came down about 5 points in a week... So I just put a lid on it. Lo and behold the lid kept bulging... so I’d vent it. Slowly it keeps going. 👍🥃

Thank You :)

made 2 pale ales both started at 1.060, one finished at 8 brix the other at 6. i liked the one at 8 better(less dry and less alcohol). i ended the fermentation early on the 8 because of an error, but when i put into plastic bottles to condition ,(which i do all the time and then force carb) the yeast had not settled out and started fermenting. how do you stop fermentation early, but get all the yeast out?

thanks mate, timely video. I did a reading on my FTT last night however it was still a little warm when i did the reading ~30 deg, I've adjusted to take this into account and im sitting at 1.0653 for a 190ltr wash, should I a) take the second sample at the same temp or b) just try to hit the guidelines on (mostly) sugar wash ot st or below 1? Cheers and keep up the content mate

If you are an impatient person, this maybe the wrong hobby for you. One spends a lot of time waiting...waiting for fermentation, waiting for the still to produce, and waiting for spirits to age...but in the end it is all worth it!

how long do you let yor mash fermentation ? 6 hours later I still asking //outstanding

You can try to help the yeast chew through the remaining unfermentable sugars and some of the soluble dietary fiber by adding Beano or a similar product to your wash.

I fermented a IPA Beer and I used a hydrometer at the beginning and it was 0. And I tested it in a week and it still is 0! What did I do wrong?

Question: does it really matter if fermentation is complete? Hypothetically if kick off a mash or wash on a Saturday at 1.07 and I want to strip on the Sunday 8 days later and my SG is 1.006 does it matter? Time is more important that trying to squeeze out another 0.1% potential ABV.

Good lord has my hydrometer saved me from more than a few awkward conversations when homebrewing. Love it, learn it, never leave a brew without it.

Jessie a nice simple explanation but you forgot about Murphy. 🙂 Murphy's Law states: If you buy one Hydrometer you'll drop it and break it just when you really need it. However if you buy two Hydrometers you'll never break one. 😜👍

You should do a video about different solutions to stuck fermentations! Next time you have a stuck fermentation you could split it and try different methods... For science.

How did they know before the new fancy tools?

Your timing on this video is amazing. I just did my very first wash. First night, it developed a bubble and a "cap". I checked it the next morning, and the cap was gone because my buckets weren't sealed. Watched this video, and now it's bubbling again. I was wondering if something went wrong and the yeast did die because of the temp or something... technically, couldn't you just add a bit of sugar and new yeast to restart it?

WHEN AND HOW OFTEN DO YOU STIR YOUR MUSK?

I bought mine from Brewing America , yes it was expensive. But you get what you pay for. I have no regrets.

Will using brown sugar be the same as using molasses because that’s the main ingredient?

I found a batch of fruit and grain that had been pushed to the back and overlooked for 6 months. It smells good, no mold. My question is can the mash go bad? Can I distill it without worry of blindness? Lol Is there a max time to ferment? Thanks for your input. For your piece of mind; As always I understand that the final decision is mine alone and you are not responsible for anything I do.

Thankyou count dankula

Can you visit commercial yeast producers showing the production of bulk yeast.

IV noticed when mine is does it has a extremely sour and has a huge bite

My corn/barley mash started at 1.120 but only fermented down to 1.044 even know it fermented real hard the first four to five days. Recipe was 4 lbs of flaked maize, 2 lbs of Six Row, 12 lbs of sugar, and traditional 7 1/8 oz corn sugar to get the initial OG at 1.120. I still rain it and it came out great, but what did I do wrong ? Too much sugar, wrong temps ? I used 48 hr Turbo yeast. Any thoughts for next time, would be much appreciated ! Thanks !! Batch size was 5 gallons

Hint, the blue ring is supposed to help in keeping you from breaking the top if it tips over. 😁

love you.... you just got a little kick back from me

What shirt is that? :) Love the design.

I use both a SG meter and a refractometer and compare the two and normally both read the same start to finish

I have a wash that started at 1.130 and is now at 1.000, but still bubbling, all be it slowly. I tasted the wash and it's not sweet now, but it's also not sour. Should I leave it for another week or run it?

And it is a "Chase"! THANK YOU! As a Journeyman(Mister) craftsman in Multiple Crafts, one Must learn to use the tools of any trade Well! I will Learn more! to become a Whiskey Mister?

I forgot to check my starting gravity , does that matter ?

We all want to know where you got that shirt!!!

A short hot fermentation seems to be optimal for whiskey though, slowly torturing your yeast to death for a week or two is probably not the way to go for a clean spirit. But hey, try both see what happens?

Till its done 🤣 I break plastic tubes as well i finally went to the white plastic ones you can't see threw but they don't break. I usually do a grain on fermintation when its all cleared and no bubbles. There is also taste there should be no sweet left Thanks for the great tips 👍 One little tip I can share is the paper scale in gje hydrometer can move around maybe some don't get glued in to place right 🤷‍♀️ so take a caliper and measure from the tip of the tube to 0 wright that measurement down some place safe i do it on the conversion chart i keep in the hydrometer case. Then if it looks off you can know for sure.

It takes a Human to teach us how to make a good brew, thanks...

mine's stop the second day after i change pot i add some yeast nothing i heat it up again nothing and last shot i add two spoons of sugar(syrop)and with baby stop mf fer restarted!!I dont know if this is right or wring way but it workrd for me..

What if while making my mash someone had opened my mash container for about 15 mins .. Is my mashed ruined ?

I have a red wine that I started last Oct. that is still fermenting now. Gravity slowed way down once it hit 1.000. I thought it was done at 0.998 back in Dec., but it still continues to off gas. Go figure! lol

The better question is will my mash spoil if I leave it for 2-3 weeks while I’m dragging freight across the country? As always thanks for the good info!

The slower the ferment the cleaner the outcome. Fast, warm ferments = lots of off flavors. Loved how you explained that excess sugar washes = high osmotic pressure on yeasts in your last video. More people need to understand this. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/j.2050-0416.2003.tb00162.x You complained about how slow your last mash fermented and how inefficient the distillation was, but also stated it was the best tasting neutral you ever produced. Part of that was the still, but also the mash and fermentaiton. EC1118 may be a slow yeast, but it ferments very cleanly and has a high alcohol tolerance. People should be taught to sugar feed their fermentations for higher alcohol and cleaner fermentations. Distill on !

Make a video about aging in the dark, sun, and what abv get some other flavors. And what happends when you let your alcohol open in the air for a few hours.

I live in the Aussie bush, we ave quite hard bore water and yeast loves it, now and then I try get fancy and use rain water ( Zero ec ) but even with yeast nutrient it stalls. Gonna stop trying to get fancy, any minerals from the water don't distill anyway.

Jesse, You don't need ONE hydrometer... You need TWO! Always have a backup. Shit happens. I need to order another backup. Cheers!

literally what i was dealing with yesterday :D tried using bakers yeast for the first time with sugar and.... i killed it XD

I thought that was a mushroom in a bottle till i put my glasses on, then i could see it proper....Magic....

So I have a question... I understand WHEN it's done fermenting... but how long can that fermentation last? Let's say it finishes but I cant distill for 2 weeks...will it sour? How long do I have until it goes bad??

love your show/ video/ Looks like you tied your commentary loosely Lips should match mouth. Keep up the good work. In the craft also.

Put a small ball of copper or stainless steel mesh in the botton of your test flask and you won't break your hydrometer by dropping it in to hard just a million other ways

@1:18 Fook I wanna run it tomorrow night but I think I over dosed the sugar haha

Hi gessi

Hi brewers! I am in desperate need of help from you experts! I am experiencing a frustrating stall in the fermentation of 2 of the 3 batches I started a month ago. I will go with the full story and a summary in the end for the lazy helpers! So.. I am on a quest to find my perfect recipe, I obviously got into frenzy and gave birth to 7 one gallon batches (yes, I know) but with all the advice I got online the only batches I really have hope for are the last 3, the ones I made with all the required equipement, ingredients and attention to the details. For those 3 batches I wanted to have similar recipes, with some small and pondered differences so that I can start to make experience on what I like and what not. That said, let’s go straight to the point: I have these 2 batches started one month ago at 22 BRIX, with a yeast called “grand zin” that claims an ABV of 19%, a temperature range from 15 to 35 C, and stuffs like that, so in theory it should ferment everything (our expected abv is 12ish). I added 3,5g of tartaric acid, The correctly activated yeast, and Nutristart (similar to fermaid K, so DAP and shells) following TOSNA: 0,6g after 24,48,72h and a week (total 2,4g). I left it in my house in the corridor, temperature of around 28C (I m in Sardinia, Italy), it s not completely dark but no direct sunlight. The fermentation started vigorously, and in ten days the BRIXs dropped to 12, then it slowed down a bit (it should be normal) but then after 20 days I noticed it stopped at 8.1 and 8.8 in the two batches respectively. I waited one week and with my despair the refractometer standed still. We are in range of temperature and under the ABV (should be around 8 at the moment). After some time I needed to try something because this thing was driving me mad, so I tested the pH with some paper strips (pHmeter on its way via amazon) and it seemed a bit acidic. I added 3g of bicarbonate to a gallon batch (I still find so hard to use imperial system argg) and surprisingly it bubbled a lot and seemed to help but three days later BRIX are still the same. I was desperate, I saw some activity with yeast and not much precipitate so I thought the yeast was still alive, I added in one batch 0,6g of Nutristart (I know it s not recommended but I need to try everything) but nothing. SUMMARY: Temperature: 26-28 C Starting Brix: 22 BRIX after 5 days: 15 BRIX after 20 days: 8 Then stuck at 8. Yeast “Grand Zin” La food (abv:19%, Temp range 15-35 Celsius) 3,5g tartaric acid at day one 2,4g Nutristart (staggered addition) Antistuck countermeasures: -adding bicarbonate: bubbling at the start but no influences on fermentation -lowering temperature: (to 18C, only tried with one batch) nothing, the yeast precipitated -adding nutrients: nothing changed What should I do? Pitching more started yeast? Changing Yeast? Help!

Good video, but wish you had gone into some of the reasons why a ferment might stall and ways to mitigate those things. BTW - you still scare the crap out of me with all the arm waving. Especially when an expensive hydometer is involved.

after 3 days of stormy fermentation, my wine stopped and stuck, I added sugar(so together 8.5 kg) and 10g yeast to 25l wine, still did not work, what to do?

Have a wash going for 26 days so far. Still going. Lol

Sir can we kill wild yeast. And stop yeast fermentation. With any chemical.

So I should probably get a hydrometer

Check the SG... when the mash / wash gets to 1.000 it’s done and shouldn’t taste sweet at all .