best learning gadgets for kids
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JaeMoney
I want to build something like a rocket powered skateboard or a flying glider like on spiderman 3. I'm not some young kid who's fantasizing I just want to build things and sell them I want that to be my occupation
Answer
+1 Mechanical Engineering, you'll learn a little about everything.
How difficult is it to brew your own beer?
Mike S
I've heard of individuals learning how to brew some tasty beer and I was wondering about some of the secrets.
Answer
The basic homebrewing equipment is not all that expensive – you can probably get everything you need to start for $100 - $150 – and we'll be glad to direct you to it online in our related products section. Of course, you could also choose to ruin our fun and buy it from some local brewing supplies store. In order to start brewing, you will need the following items:
Brewpot
Primary fermenter
Airlock and stopper
Plastic hose
Bottling bucket
Bottles
Bottle brush
Bottle capper (if glass bottles are used)
Stick-on thermometer
Household items
Now we will explain what these items are and give you a basic idea of what you do with them, although the more detailed brewing instructions come in steps 2, 3, and 4.
Brewpot
A brewpot is a huge pot made of stainless steel or enamel-coated metal which is of at least 16-quart capacity. You might have a huge pot at home already, but it's no good if it's made of aluminum or if it's a chipped enamelized pot. These will make the beer taste funny. You use the brewpot to boil up the beer ingredients or "wort," as described in 3. Cook up some beer).
Primary fermenter
The primary fermenter is where the wort goes after you've boiled it, and it's where the beer begins to ferment and become that fabulous stuff that makes you so funny and charming. The primary fermenter must have a minimum capacity of 7 gallons, and a lid which seals airtight and accommodates the airlock and rubber stopper. There's no faking these puppies – you've got to buy one that's made for the purpose. Make sure the one you buy is made of food-grade plastic, as this kind of plastic doesn't allow the bad stuff in or let the good stuff out.
Airlock and stopper
The airlock is a handy gadget which allows carbon dioxide to escape from your primary fermenter during fermentation, thus keeping it from exploding, but doesn't allow any of the bad air from outside to enter your beer's hygienic little world. It fits into a rubber stopper which has a hole drilled into it, and the stopper goes in the top of your primary fermenter. The stoppers are sized by number, so make sure you figure out what size of hole you have and what kind of stopper fits it.
Plastic hose
This small, wind-powered burrowing machine is . . . no, just kidding, we're talking about an ordinary five-foot length of food-grade plastic hose. You need it to transfer beer from place to place, and you need to keep it clean and free of kinks or leaks.
Bottling bucket
This is a large, food-grade plastic bucket with a spigot at the bottom. It must be at least as big as your primary fermenter, because you need to pour all the liquid from your primary fermenter into your bottling bucket prior to bottling your beer.
Bottles
After primary fermentation, you place the beer in bottles for secondary fermentation and storage. You need enough bottles to hold all the beer you're going to make (a 5-gallon batch of beer is about 640 ounces, so if you're using 16-ounce bottles you'll need 40). The best kind of bottles are solid glass ones with smooth tops (not the twist-off kind) that will accept a cap from a bottle capper. You can use plastic ones with screw-on lids, but they look crappy and they're not as good for fermentation. It's your call, but we recommend you go with the glass ones.
Whether you use glass or plastic bottles, make sure they are dark-colored. Light damages beer, so you want your bottles to be as dark as possible.
Bottle brush
This is a thin, curvy brush which you can insert into a bottle in order to clean it out really well. We haven't even gotten into how clean everything has to be, but we will, and the bottle brush is a specialized bit of cleaning gear you will need.
Bottle capper
If you take our advice and buy glass bottles, you will need some sort of bottle capper to secure the caps on them. You'll also need caps, of course, and you can buy them from any brewing supplies store. The best sort of bottle capper is one which can be affixed to a surface and worked with one hand while you hold the bottle with the other. There are also cheaper ones which require two hands on the capper, but these can be a pain. Go where your budget guides you.
Stick-on thermometer
This is a thermometer which you can apply to the side of your primary fermenter. They look like thin strips of plastic and they are backed with an adhesive. You can purchase them online, from a brewing supplies store, or from a pet store or aquarium store (they are also used for aquaria).
Household items
In addition to the above specialized equipment, you will need the following household items:
Small bowl
Saucepan
Rubber spatula
Oven mitts/pot handlers
Big mixing spoon (stainless steel or plastic)
Once you've got all these things, you're properly armed.
For you, the beginning brewer, this step is accomplished all at once, because you are simply going to buy a "beer kit" which tells you what kind of beer it will make and includes all the necessary ingredients. (More experienced brewers find a recipe they like and purchase the ingredients separately. Not you, novice.) A beer kit consists of a big can of hopped malt concentrate and a packet of yeast. You will also need to purchase additional "fermentables" (this is the stuff that makes alcohol. All together now - "More fermentables means more alcohol"). Common additional fermentables are include brewers sugar, dry malt extract, liquid malt extract, rice syrup, demerera sugar, Belgian candi sugar or any combination of the above. You will need at least two pounds, and not more than three on your first go-round (you want to get just drunk enough to be charming, remember).
Beer kits eliminate a lot of your capacity for error and let you get used to the procedure before you start messing around with loose ingredients. These beer kits are available online or at brewing supplies stores and most people in the world brew with beer kits. Some brewers like the convenience and certainty of them so much that they continue to use them throughout their homebrewing careers.
There are, however, many variations on the brewing theme. We don't provide you with any recipes in this article because it is aimed at the beginning brewer. If and when you wish to move beyond beer kits, we recommend that you purchase a book about homebrewing which contains a good recipe section, subscribe to a brewing magazine which will provide you with new recipes each month, or look on the Internet yourself for online recipes. (We took the liberty of including some links to homebrewing books with this SYW.) Once you've selected a recipe, you can then purchase the required ingredients and proceed.
Clean and sanitize your equipment
Cleanliness is incredibly important. You must clean and sanitize all of your equipment right before you start brewing, and keep everything clean throughout the process. Bacteria and fungi are everywhere and if enough of them get into your beer they will completely ruin it. The good part is that if you do clean everything you will make an excellent first batch of beer. At the first stage of brewing, you will need to clean and sanitize the following items:
At the first stage of brewing, you will need to clean and sanitize the following items:
Brewpot
Primary fermenter
Brew spoon
Airlock and stopper
Saucepan
Small bowl
Rubber spatula
Big mixing spoon
Later stages will also require you to clean and sanitize other items, and when we say that you should refer to the following cleaning and sanitizing instructions.
Cleaning refers to the removal of any visible crud, sediment, film, dust, etc. from all of your equipment. This can be accomplished with dish soap and a cloth or brush. Or if you're lucky enough to have one, you can just use a dishwasher.
Sanitizing is a separate procedure from cleaning, and it requires the use of heat, chlorine or iodine mixed with water to kill off any remaining bacteria. If your dishwasher has a "heat dry" cycle, you're in luck. Turn it on and let the steam in the dry cycle do the work for you.
If you are not blessed with a dishwasher (no doubt, one of man's greatest inventions) you will need to sanitize the old fashion way.
First, you need to mix up some sanitizing solution, using either unscented chlorine bleach (2 ounces per 5 gallons of water) or pure iodine (not the stuff your mom put on your wounds, but stuff you have to buy at a brewing or restaurant supply store) and cold water.
Mix this up in a big basin, a sink or a bathtub, so long as whatever equipment you put it in has been thoroughly cleaned.
The primary fermenter and the bottling bucket don't need to be soaked; you can mix up sanitizing solution right in them. You can even soak your other items in these two pieces.
All small items should be completely immersed in the sanitizing solution in the sink or in one of the large pieces of equipment. Once everything is full of or immersed in sanitizing solution, you can kick back and wait (30 minutes if you are using bleach, 5 minutes with the iodine solution) while the solution does its work. If you are using bleach you need to rinse everything thoroughly after it is sanitized. Set everything somewhere clean and let it dry. Don't allow small children, pets or gypsies to rummage through the equipment, don't sneeze on it. We want everything to be nice and clean for the brewing. OK. Let's make some liquid nirvana!
Instructions for making great beer from a beer kit
Bring 2 quarts of water to 160-180°F, basically steaming but not boiling. Then remove from heat.
Add your beer kit and additional fermentables according to the directions. Suggested fermentables, as we mentioned before, include brewers sugar, dry malt extract, liquid malt extract, rice syrup, demerera sugar, Belgian candi sugar or any combination of the above. Each will impart its own unique flavor profile. Ask your local shop owner for advice on how to get what you want.
Stir aggressively to ensure that everything gets dissolved. Put a lid on the pot and let it sit for 10-15 minutes on the lowest heat setting. This will ensure that you achieve sanitation.
Add the contents of your pot to 4 gallons of cold water already in your primary fermenter. Mix well, at least a minute or two. This helps add oxygen to your wort prior to adding your yeast. Trust us, your yeast will thank you for it later (if you know what we mean). When the side of your fermenter feels cool to the touch, it is safe to add your yeast. Some kits recommend re-hydrating your yeast in water first. This is not really neccessary.
Ferment as close to recommended temperature range as possible
Primary fermentation
You have now made wort (it's not exactly beer yet). Your wort will begin to ferment within the first day, and it will continue to do so for 3 to 5 days. You can tell that your wort is fermenting when you see little air bubbles rising up through the water in the airlock. This is basically just the gas produced during the fermentation process being forced out of the fermenter. After five days, you should begin to check on your beer every day, to see if it is still fermenting. If the water in the airlock is still bubbling, the beer is still fermenting and you must leave it alone. You can ruin your beer and cause your bottles to explode if you bottle your beer before primary fermentation has finished. When the bubbling stops or slows until there is a pause of two minutes between bubbles, primary fermentation is completed and your beer is ready to be bottled.
Bottling and Secondary Fermentation
Secondary fermentation takes place in the bottles, so you don't get to drink your beer just yet. You can go ahead and try some, but it won't be carbonated so you might not like it very much.
First, of course, you must clean (be sure to use your bottling brush and get all the crud out of your bottles) and sanitize (see section 3) the following items: Bottling bucket, Bottles, Bottle caps, Plastic hose, Saucepan, and Mixing spoon.
Make sure you have enough bottles to contain your new brew. Five gallons of beer is equivalent to approximately 640 ounces, so you need to plan accordingly, e.g., if you have 16-ounce bottles you'll need about 40. You should also make sure you have more than enough caps, in case you screw up and have to re-cap some of the bottles.
You will also need to have some pure dextrose on hand, to make a priming solution. This is what allows the remaining yeast in your beer to carbonate the beer. Take the saucepan and put two or three cups of water in it, and dissolve 3/4 cup of dextrose in the water. Bring the solution to a boil over medium heat, then cover it and set it aside to cool for 15 to 20 minutes.
After the priming solution has cooled, place your cleaned and sanitized bottling bucket on the floor. Place the primary fermenter on a chair, table or counter directly above the bottling bucket. Try not to shake up the beer inside the fermenter too much when you move it, because you want all the sediment to stay on the bottom. Attach the plastic hose to the spigot on the primary fermenter and put the other end of the hose in the bottom of the bottling bucket. Pour the priming solution into the bottling bucket, and then open the spigot on the fermenter, allowing the beer to flow into the bucket and mix with the solution. Don't try to get the last of the beer out of the fermenter, because it contains sediment you don't want.
Close the spigot on the fermenter, take off the hose, and clean it well. Then get the fermenter out of the way and put the bottling bucket up where it was and hook up the hose to its spigot. Line up all your bottles on the floor underneath it and stick the hose into one of the bottles. Then you're ready to open up the spigot on the bottling bucket and let the beer fly. Stick the hose in all the way to the bottom, and when the beer gets really near the top, yank the hose out and stick it in the next bottle. The level in the bottle drops when you take the tube out, and you want to leave about one inch of airspace at the top of the bottle (as close to one inch as possible; much more or less than that is not good). Therefore, you should be yanking the hose out when the beer is more or less right at the top of the bottle. If you have any financial aid money left over from last semester, invest in a bottle filler. It will make bottling less messy and be the best $2.99 you ever spent.
Once all the beer has drained out of the bucket, get ready to put the caps on your bottles. You need to do this right away, because every second that your beer remains exposed to the elements is a bad second. We've warned you about the bacteria and fungi. If you are using plastic bottles with screw tops, you can just sit down on the floor with your beer and twist them on. If you're using glass bottles with metal caps, you're going to need to use a bottle capper, and it will be way easier if you move them to a table or wherever you're going to sit and work. Follow the directions of the capper you've purchased, and take your time. If you suspect that one of the caps didn't go on correctly, rip the cap off and put on a new one. Check all your bottles for leakage and re-cap any that leak.
Once you've got all your bottles capped, you need to find a cool, dark place to put them while secondary fermentation takes place. They should not go in your fridge. Refrigerators are too cold for the yeast to do its work. You might as well put your beer wherever it was you put your fermenter, like in a closet, in the basement, in the attic or wherever, so long as the location is at a steady temperature of around 60 - 70 degrees. Now comes the really hard part. You have to leave your beer there for a minimum of two weeks before you can drink any of it. We know you've already waited for like, a whole week or maybe more, but you must be patient.
You must also continue to be clean. We know you're tuckered out from all that bottling, but you have to clean out all of your equipment before you shove it into the closet. You'll be doing yourself a huge favor, as the equipment will be much easier to clean and sanitize next time you want to make beer, and, therefore, it will be easier to make your next batch
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