I have been struggling to stabilise things in my last few brewing attempts. I had been using a combination stabiliser (sorbate and sulfite) from the department store Boyes. It doesn’t seem to work.
I know have sorbate powder and I already had campden tablets. I am wondering how you dose them correctly. From what I understand it’s dependant on the ABV and the pH. Is there an easy way to calculate this? I take it there is no easy and cheap way to do a free SO2 test.
I am begging to think buying a sous vide and doing pasteurization is easier and more reliable at this point.
Donjuanme@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Pasteurization is a pretty cheap way to go about it, what quantities are you working with, pony keg? There are some new wine detectors that claim to measure free sulfurs in barrel during aging. But they’re pretty expensive. For the price of the glassware to run free sulfur you can buy 3-4 really good sous vide devices.
There are tables that show safe levels of fso2 with %alcohol and ph on x and y axis. Should be easy to Google.
Do you have a digital pH meter? You could theoretically do free sulfur by watching the rate of pH change during… I forget the chemical it’s been a number of years since I did the wet chemistry, sodium hydroxide I believe… addition, once the pH spikes, it’s how my old lab currently does it.
If you don’t have the equipment and aren’t doing large quantities, it’s not worth the investment, pasteurization is very easy to control, I’m not sure how it changes the profile (I’m a chemist not a taster/maker) that’s the easy route, might not be the best taste, but it sounds like you’re a home brewer, longer lasting is a fair trade for a little bit of flavor, and you won’t find any skunks months later.