Mostly O-rings

Today's post is mostly about o-rings. Not the most exciting topic, but o-rings are pretty vital to homebrewers especially once you get into things like kegging, a pump, or decide to throw together a weldless kettle fitting. Not to sound like a grumpy old man, but I swear you used to be able to buy all sorts of o-rings at local hardware stores for super reasonable prices; I'm talking less than 10 cents each. Now you go somewhere like Lowe's, Home Depot, or even Ace Hardware and you'll be lucky to find the size you need and/or it only comes in an assortment pack that costs $10-$20. Or say in the case specialty brewing equipment like homebrew pumps, you order from the manufacturer and you pay $5+ for a single o-ring plus $7 to ship it. I believe in supporting the homebrewing industry, but I have a hard time paying inflated prices for something that likely costs a couple cents to manufacture. 

If you're looking for a good supplier of o-rings and similar gaskets, I highly recommend O-rings and More. They have a huge selection plus reasonable prices and very affordable shipping. They do often have minimums (e.g. 5, 10, 50 pieces) but with their pricing, you're still coming out way ahead.   

Side note, I always use silicone lubricant (AKA Keg Lube) on my o-rings. It doesn't take much, but it helps to ensure they seat correctly when assembling equipment and prevents issues with binding and deforming. Material-wise, I tend to use either Silicone or Buna Nitrile rings, and both tend to be 70 durometer hardness. Basically, the higher the hardness, the firmer the material, the lower the softer the material. It's also a good idea to make sure the materials are food safe, but I haven't ever seen any that aren't. Also, Buna-N tends to be less permeable to O2, so I usually use it for keg lids rather than Silicone. 

I'll update this post as I come across additional o-ring needs, but here are the common ones I've encountered so far.

 

Keg and Draft O-rings
Description	Size	Comments
Dip Tubes	-109	The o-rings that slide onto dip tubes (gas and liquid) and seal them against the threaded male posts on the kegs. Use a quad or x-ring style as this will provide much better sealing than a standard round cross section o-ring. This is especially true if you run any high pressure kegs (e.g. nitro beers). I believe I've only ever used Buna-N for these.
Internal Ball-lock	-013	The o-rings that are internal on standard ball-lock disconnects (grey gas, black liquid). I believe it's the same size on standard pin-lock kegs as well. These are easily lost during cleaning. If missing, your disconnect will leak. Quad or x-ring styles seal better.
Keg Lids	-417	The large o-ring that seals between the lid and keg body. Both Buna and Silicone work well, though Buna-N is more common.
Posts	-111	These slide onto the posts and prevent leaks between posts and quick disconnects. Silicone tends to last longer than Buna-N. I often use natural red, but recently switched to green ones from Value Brew to quickly identify gas posts. This is especially handy for connections on Kegmenter fermenters where gas vs. liquid isn't as obvious.

Blichmann Equipment O-rings
Description	Size	Comments
Brewometer	-111	Brewometer seal
Dip Tube Seal	-112	This is the seal inside the nut that the dip tube assembly slips into.
False Bottom Washer	See comment	Not an o-ring, but a washer that slides over the kettle pickup tube and prevents grain from getting through the gap and under the false bottom. A standard 1/2" × 1 1/2" stainless fender washer will do the trick here.
G2 Linear Valves	-112 and -110	The G2 linear valve has two sizes of o-rings. -112 is the larger and prevents liquid from leaking out the valve body. -110 is the smaller one that seals the cone-shaped stopper that is used to control the rate of flow. By the way, I love these valves as they are super easy to clean and make fine adjustments to flow rate.
Riptide Pump	-143	This is the large o-ring that provides the seal between the pump head and the motor.
Riptide Pump Thrust Washer	See comment	Not an o-ring, but a part that's easy to lose is the thrust washer on a Riptide pump head. I found that a standard Hillman 6mm stainless steel washer worked perfectly. As long as the finish looks nice and smooth, any 6mm stainless washer should work.
Sight Glass Cleanout	-012	This is the seal for the top and bottom sight glass cleanouts on the Boilermaker kettles.
Sight Glass Seal Small	-111	Furthest from sight glass, top and bottom.
Sight Glass Seal Large	-113	Closest to sight glass, top and bottom.
Sight Glass-Kettle Seal	-112	This is the seal that goes between the sight glass blocks and the kettle, top and bottom.

Spike Equipment O-rings
Description	Size	Comments
Flo Pump ARV	-012	The o-ring for the Air Release Valve. I haven't confirmed the size on this part, but I saw it referenced online so I've included it here.
Flo Pump Head	66418MMS	This is the large o-ring that provides the seal between the pump head and the motor. It's a metric o-ring measuring 66.4mm ID × 70mm OD × 1.8mm C/S. The size referenced here is O-rings and More's SKU.

SS Brewtech Equipment O-rings
Description	Size	Comments
Bucket valve	16220MMB70	The o-ring that fits between the valve and the body of the SS Brew Bucket. I always use silicone lube on these and be sure not to overtighten them. You want them finger tight, but not so tight that they're deforming or tearing. The size on my buckets are 16mm ID. The C/S on mine vary between 2.2 and 2.3 mm. On SS Brewtech's site, they indicate the C/S is 1.8mm, so this may be an updated size compared to what came with mine. I haven't ordered any yet, but I'd likely go with 16mm ID × 20.4mm OD × 2.2mm C/S, which would be SKU 16220MMB70 on O-rings and More.
Bucket racking arm	851MMB70	These are the two small o-rings that slide over the racking arm and allow the racking arm to push-fit into the valve body. The buckets came with two of these on the racking arm, but they work fine with one. Be sure to use silicone grease on them as they tend to bind and/or deform when used without lube. If lost or damaged, you'll lose siphon and leave beer behind in your fermenter. I've tried both Buna-N (OEM from SS Brewtech) and Silicone, and the Buna-N ones seem to be more durable. These o-rings measure 8.5mm ID × 10.5mm OD × 1mm C/S, and the size listed here is the SKU on O-rings and More's site.

Misc O-rings
Description	Size	Comments
Heating Element	-217	This was used primarily for heating elements on The Electric Brewery style assemblies. These aren't too common anymore with people buying off-the-shelf All-in-One systems. Also, those building their own systems are typically using Tri-Clamp style elements rather than threaded elements.
Old School Weldless	-211	These were often used on old school 1/2" weldless bulkhead fittings, aka The Electric Brewery style fittings. Typically these would be used with a thin washer. The thin washer's ID was slightly larger than the o-ring's OD, and served to keep the o-ring from squeezing out while the fitting was tightened. The washer became less important as locknuts with grooves became more common. Regardless, this o-ring is used primarily in 1/2" bulkheads. I've used these in equipment I've repurposed for brewing so that I could have leak-free bulkheads.
Temp Probe	-009	This o-ring is used in a compression type fitting in conjunction with a 1/4" diameter temp probe like those used with the BCS-460 controller. These will also work as the outer o-ring on Blichmann Brew Commander temp probe fittings. They create a tight leak-free fitting that can also be easily disassembled.

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Becoming a BJCP Judge

I took the BJCP Tasting Exam at the end of 2019, just a couple months before COVID shut down everything including homebrew competitions. I've been judging comps since 2013 and homebrewing since 2000 (or thereabouts...I always forget exactly when). My homebrew club is pretty competition-focused and within the club we have numerous BJCP judges. For anyone that sticks with the hobby there tends to be a natural progression towards becoming a certified judge. I kept planning on taking the exam but other things would always come up.  In the Fall of 2019, I finally decided I'd put it off long enough. I’m hoping this post might help motivate those that have been sitting on the fence about getting certified.

First off, if you're not familiar with the BJCP, it's the Beer Judge Certification Program. The purpose of the BJCP is:

Encourage knowledge, understanding, and appreciation of the world's diverse beer, mead, and cider styles;

Promote, recognize, and advance beer, mead, and cider tasting, evaluation, and communication skills; and

Develop standardized tools, methods, and processes for the structured evaluation, ranking and feedback of beer, mead, and cider.

Style guidelines are one of the important contributions of the BJCP from a competition perspective because they serve to define characteristics for recognized beer styles. The BJCP also focuses on developing a common beer vocabulary which is important for being able to describe virtually everything about a particular beer, including its appearance, aroma, flavor, and mouthfeel. This is important because it doesn’t matter how great your palate is if you can’t describe what you’re tasting.

So, let’s say you’re to the point that you’re hooked on the hobby and you want to dive a little deeper and learn about the various beer styles around the world. Or let’s say you’re a seasoned homebrewer that’s stewarded or even judged in a competition and wants to dive deeper into the brewing hobby. If either of these statements describe you, then you’re probably a good candidate for taking the exam. 

Step 1 - Entrance Exam

The overall process for becoming a certified judge starts with the entrance exam which is a timed online exam. The BJCP’s site has plenty of details about the exam, so I won’t get too detailed here. The only thing I’ll say is it’s open book, but I wouldn’t recommend taking it without studying. It consists of 180 questions in 60 minutes. That’s 20 seconds per question. There are some questions that everyone gets, then other questions that are pulled from a pool of available questions. Long story short, you won’t get the same test as your buddy. Some people I know have passed without studying, but for the majority of us it would be a waste of money to take the exam without prepping. 

Numerous questions will focus on style comparisons and typically involve popular/common classic styles. One funny note, I had multiple questions re 19B California Common (Steam Beer) and 10A Weissbier, two styles I rarely drink because they just aren’t favorites of mine. I'd spent a lot of time studying American Pale Ale, Porters, and Stouts...but definitely not California Common or Weissbier. One nice thing, you immediately find out at the end of the hour whether you passed.

Step 2 - Tasting Exam

After passing the entrance exam, the next step is to take the Tasting Exam. Although this may seem intimidating, it's really not too bad, especially if you’ve judged in a competition before. Personally, I was much more nervous about the Entrance Exam due to the time limitation than the Tasting Exam. Although the Tasting Exam also has a time component. The Tasting Exam is similar to judging a competition, so if you've done that before, you should be familiar with the process. A few tips:

• Make sure you’re familiar with the BJCP scoresheets.
• Practice judging at home with various styles and time yourself. You’re shooting for a 100% completed scoresheet in no more than 15 minutes. That seems like a lot of time but it goes by quick.
• If you can pair with an experienced judge for some practice sessions, do it. They’ll help you validate and describe what your tasting.
• Re the scoresheets, focus on completeness. Whitespace is bad. Use all available lines for each section.
• Get familiar with common terminology/vocabulary to describe malt, hops, and yeast-derived characters. For example, bready, floral, fruity, phenolic, estery, etc.
• Use quantifying descriptions with your malt, hop, and yeast descriptors. For example, low fruity hop aroma.
• If you get hung up on something, skip it and come back to it after a minute or two.
• Practice writing legibly. My penmanship used to be incredible. Years of working on computers and tablets have definitely had a negative impact. Write clearly so the exam graders can easily read your comments.

The Tasting Exam is not open book, in fact no phones or reference materials of any kind are allowed. It’s just you, your pencil, and the beers you’re judging. You’re not allowed to discuss the beers with anyone until after the exam concludes. For the Tasting Exam itself, you’ll be judging side by side with about a dozen other examinees. There will also be a couple proctor judges as well, but they won’t be seated with the examinees. You get 15 minutes per beer, 6 beers overall, so a total of 90 minutes. 15 minutes flies by, so make sure you’re timing yourself during your practice judging sessions. At the end of the exam after everyone’s scoresheets had been collected by the administrator, we talked about each beer with the proctors. This will give you an idea of how well you did by how close your scores and comments matched up with the proctors.

Post-exam

Ok, so now you’ve made it through the Entrance Exam and the Tasting Exam. Here’s the hardest part…waiting for your exam results. The tasting exams are individually graded by volunteers, experienced judges who are also graders that will evaluate your feedback compared to the proctor judges. Timelines vary a little, but I wouldn’t expect to get your results any sooner than 3 months from the exam date. That seems like a long time but try to remember it’s a volunteer organization and the graders are literally reading through all comments from all examinees. Mine ended up taking about five months if I remember correctly but that seems to be longer than most.

That’s about it. If you don’t score well the first time, try not to beat yourself up over it. I mean, it’s just beer after all. You can always retake the exam, plus you do earn points for judging which will help you advance if you struggled with the exam. Cheers and happy brewing and judging.

Resources - Below are some resources I found helpful in studying for both the Online Entrance Exam and the Tasting Exam:

• Barleypopmaker's free BJCP prep course videos. I found these videos very helpful. They give you a great overview of the process and help you focus on key points. Take notes, especially for things he tells you will be on the test. Edit: This website seems to no longer be available, but the videos are still on YouTube.
• Beer Style Compare-O-Matic from beersyndicate.com - I didn't see this one until after I'd already passed the Entrance Exam, but it would have been very helpful during the open book exam. This tool really makes it easy to compare styles on the fly. You will be comparing styles during the test...the only question is which styles will you be comparing? 
• BJCP.org - The BJCP has published numerous materials that will help you pass both the Entrance and Tasting exams.

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Malting Corn

Last year I brewed my interpretation of a Wari Chicha, incorporating home malted purple corn. I've been tossing some ideas around in my head in regards to using the corn malt in another beer, so I figured I'd document my process. Here it is:

1. Step 1, acquire some purple corn for malting. Really, any corn should work as long as it's not too old or been treated in some way to keep it from germinating. Here's the brand I bought at my local international market.

   

   Inca's Food, Maid Morado

2. If your corn came on the cob like mine did, the next step is to remove the kernels from the cob. 
3. Next, transfer your kernels to a colander and wash the corn with cool tap water. My pre-soaking weight of my dried corn was 966g.
4. Transfer the kernels to a suitable container, such as a bucket. Top off with cool tap water, about 1" over the kernels. Soak for about five hours.
5. Transfer corn to colander to drain. Leave it in the colander for about two hours.

   

   Kernels are more translucent after a soak

6. Transfer back to a suitable container and top up with fresh water. Leave to soak overnight.
7. Transfer back to colander and rinse well with cool tap water.  Transfer back to suitable container and top up with fresh water.
8. 24-28 hours after starting first soak, transfer corn to your colander and rinse well. At this point, the soaked kernels weighed in at 1154g, so an increase of 188g.

   

   Looks like purple pomegranate

9. Line a large shallow dish/pan with damp paper towels or dampened dish towel. Transfer corn to the dish and spread it out into a thin layer. Cover with another dampened towel and set it in a warm place.
10. Check your corn at least a couple times per day. Both times I've done this, they've grown extremely fast. Once the shoots are about 2x the length of the kernel, it's time to dry them.

    

    Sprouted corn

11. I use a food dehydrator to dry the malted corn and stop the germination process. Set food dehydrator to between 100 and 125F. Once the kernels have lost 14.2g per .45kg, it's time to increase the temps. In my case, this meant when the weight was down from 1154g to ~1118g.
12. Increase food dehydrator temp to between 140 and 160F. It's done when the kernels have lost 85g per .45kg of its original weight. In my case, this meant down from 1154 to ~936g.
13. Next, preheat oven to 176F. 
14. Kiln corn malt for about four hours at 176F.
15. Lastly, transfer corn malt to a pillow case and put it in the clothes tumble dryer for about 10 minutes to knock the shoots off.

At this point, the malt is ready to use. I store it same as I would any other grain. When it's time to mill, it seems to mill more easily if you partially crack/crush the grain first. That's about all there is to it. Cheers!

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Home Malting Corn

Malting Maiz Morado

I mentioned a while back in my post about my grain tumbler that I was toying with doing some home malting. I've always wanted to try brewing a beer inspired by fermented corn beverages that are native to the Americas, like Chicha and Tiswin. I haven't settled on a final recipe yet, but I'm happy to say I seem to have successfully malted some Peruvian purple corn.

To be honest, I was kind of shocked this worked on the first attempt. I went to a local market after spotting maiz morado on their website. The corn comes in a gallon-ish-sized bag, dried, and still on the cob. My initial concern was maybe it was somehow treated/kilned so that it was sterile and wouldn't germinate. The second concern is I've never tried malting anything, so I figured there was as good or better of a chance of me ending up with a soggy mess of moldy rotting corn, as there was of being successful at actually germinating the corn.

I started out by removing the kernels from the cobs. I then sifted the corn over a desk fan in a stainless colander. The purpose here was to remove as much debris as possible, hopefully reducing chances of mold. Next, I transferred it to my stainless bucket and filled it with tap water until it was about an inch above the kernels. I let this sit for about 5 hours, then transferred them to a colander for a couple hours. Then they went back in the bucket with fresh water for an overnight soak.  The next morning I changed the water again and left it to soak for a grand total of about 24-28 hours. Then I drained them in a colander and transferred them to a large stainless chafing pan. I placed moist paper towels in the bottom of the pan before adding the corn and covered them with most paper towels as well. Then I stuck it in my warm garage (just in case it started smelling like hot garbage) and headed off to work. I checked it when I got home from filling Chardonnay barrels with sour beer at SaltFire Brewing (shameless plug, I'm running the sour beer program) and was super happy to see that the corn was germinating. Most resources indicate it can take up to 5 days to germinate, but in my case, it was closer to 16 hours.

Once the shoots were about 2x the length of the kernel, I transferred the corn malt to my food dehydrator to halt the germination process. Spreading the grain out on a towel, or in the sun to dry should work too, but I have access to a good dehydrator so that's what I used.

Next, I lightly kilned the corn malt in our oven at 176F for about four hours. The last step was to transfer the corn malt to a pillow case and put it in the clothes dryer (no heat) for about 10 minutes. This knocks off the shoots; they're bitter, and you don't want them in your beer.

That's about it as far as the process goes. You'll notice i didn't use my malt tumbler this time. The main reason was I wasn't sure this was even going to work, and I didn't have time to pick up a bucket to be dedicated for malting. I'll probably give it a try on the next batch now uhh far I have a little more confidence that the process works. Stay tuned for an experimental beer.

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