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  • recipe formulation software

    I hope this is the right forum for my question, anyways the company that I work for is going to be opening a brewery and I happened to be the guy with the most knowledge about beer that they had working for them (all homebrewing). We've also hired an outside consultant to help me get familiarized with the equipment and help with the challanges brewing on a larger scale will present. I know I'm rambling but I just wanted to give a bit of background.
    My question has to do with recipe software. As a homebrewer I use Promash and have been happy with it, but it seems to work completely opposite of how I formulate recipes. I usually start with a desired target gravity and then figure the percent of each malt I want to use in my grain bill. whereas with promash you enter how much of each grain you are planning to use and it tells you the gravity based on your efficiency and what percent of the total malt bill it will be. Is there any software out there that you can enter your batch size, target gravity, system efficiency, and the percent of each malt you want for your recipe and it will tell you how many lbs of each grain you need .
    Thanks in advance for any help given.
    billk

  • #2
    Software

    I dont know of any software that does what your looking for, but the way I do it is with an Excel spreadsheet. It is set up exactly like what you want. I can punch in gravity, batch size and my percentages and it will give me the pounds of grain I need. It is an invaluable tool for recipe formulation. Luckily for me the brewer before me created it and I didn't have to enter all the formulas. If you are going through the trouble of opening a brewery however, i think it would be worth a few hours to create your own customized program. Excell makes it pretty easy and you can add whatever calculations you want. Every program has its limits, so it is nice to do it yourself and be able to change things as you use it. Hope this helps.
    Big Willey
    Big Willey
    "You are what you is." FZ

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    • #3
      Some time in the past, I made up a simple Lotus 123 or Excel spreadsheet to do that, but I am not sure that I still have it now. I based it on exactly the way you are describing, with the additional data for calculating colour added by the malt (and adjuncts if any). I based it on litre degrees / kilo of malt etc, not pounds, each type being editable. For colour addition it is not strictly correct in the original calculation because of course this will vary according to wort runoff and boiling conditions, but it was useful to be able to adjust coloured malt additions to trime to desired spec.

      It was not as sophisticated as calculating salts or hop additions etc, though of course you could then run your grist weights through the Promash software afterwards to do this.
      dick

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      • #4
        Sorry, No software. I still use pencil, paper and caculator,
        but the formula I use is fairly simple and would be easy to put into a spreadsheet.
        First we start a new recipe by desired alcohol %(abv). One reason for this is the Tax Man, more alcohol, more tax.(most of Europe anyways)
        Extract is stated in Litre degree/kilo, Volume is litres, weights are Kilograms, gravity is specific gravity. Alcohol conversion factor varies(Higher Original Gravity, lower conversion), but generally around .129

        Formula;

        Desired abv / alcohol conversion factor + Terminal Gravity(ending gravity) = Original gravity(target gravity)

        Oringinal gravity X brew size(Litres) / Brewhouse efficency(%) = total extract needed.

        Total extract needed / malt extract(litre degrees) X percent of of total grist(%)= Kilogram malt.

        Run this calculation for each malt used and presto, there is your
        grist recipe.
        Your malt supplier should be able to provide extract in Litre degrees, if not convert %extract by multipling by 386.(not exact) It is better if you have the maltster exact figure though.
        Hope this helps.

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