It has been a while since I have published UberFridge and this update is long overdue. Now I’d like to finally share the first results with you and you can download my paper on UberFridge for a more scientific and condensed write-up of this project. I have brewed two beers so far:
Hoppy Hefe:
- 3kg Wheat Dry Extract (8,0 EBC)
- 30,00 gm Hallertauer Perle [6,90%] (30 min) Hops 14,2 IBU
- 30,00 gm Hallertauer Perle [6,90%] (15 min) Hops 9,2 IBU
- 120,00 gm Hallertauer Hersbrucker [2,90%] (Dry Hop 5 days)
- 1 Pkgs Weihenstephan Weizen (Wyeast Labs #3068) [Starter 1500 ml]
Hoppy Hefe fermented around 15 degrees. When fermentation started to slow down, I slowly raised the temperature to keep it going. The OG was 1.064 and the SG 1.014, which makes 6.5% ABV.
Hoppy Hefe was a bit of an experiment: a hefe with lots of hops. It tasted quite good, but the typical hefe flavors (banana, clove) didn’t mix well with the bitterness and freshness of the hops. The flavors blended better after 4 weeks bottle conditioning, which is quite long for a hefe.
Here are some pictures:
A healthy layer of krausen 
Dry hopping with two 60g hop bags
Hopping Bock
- 1.8kg Wheat Dry Extract (8,0 EBC)
- 1.2kg Amber Dry Extract (18 EBC)
- 60,00 gm Hallertauer Perle [6,90%] (15 min) Hops 20,8 IBU
- 30,00 gm Hallertauer Perle [6,90%] (30 min) Hops 16,1 IBU
- 1 teaspoon of Irish Moss
- 1500 ml stir plate starter, from scooped off krausen from Hoppy Hefe
- 1 Hoppy Hefe yeast cake
This weizenbock was delicious. It started at 1.090, dropped to 1044 in 2 days and finished at 1.023. The ABV was 8.9%. I fermented this beer at 17 degrees, and increased the temperature at the end to boost fermentation. Here is a graph of the temperature during fermentation:
Temperature profile for Hopping Bock
I don’t have a wort cooler yet, so I throw some sanitized 1.5L soda bottles filled with water in the freezer the day before I brew. When I have to cool the wort, I cut them open and drop the 1.5L ice cubes in the wort. The wort temperature was still a bit higher than I wanted, but UberFridge brought the temperature down quickly to 17 degrees.
When fermentation had stopped, I dropped the temperature to 15 degrees to let some of the yeast suspend. Close-ups of the temperature graph can be found in my UberFridge paper.
I really like the taste of Hopping Bock: it is very malty, a bit sweet and has a bit of banana and clove. I added a lot of yeast to this beer, but it is still sweet enough.
Here are some more pictures:
Ice Bottle ready to cool my wort
Siphoning the wort from brew pot to fermentation bucket
Cheers!
Paper on UberFridge
More details on UberFridge (schematics, algorithms, results, etc.) can be found in my UberFridge Paper.
I still don’t have a name for my brewery and no inspiration either… If you have a suggestion, let me know!
Elco gefeliciteerd, you did it.
Graag zou ik willen toosten op jou met een Hopping Bock.
Helaas lukt dat vanavond niet en hou het dus bij een Bavaria.
Proost.
Tot gauw, Ima
Awesome project!!
I’ve got an arduino starter kit ordered & am going to have a play around before trying something similar.
Just out of interest, why have you gone with a temperature schedule like that? Is that to test out the uberfridge, or is a there a brewing reason behind that?
I’m guessing thats something that you can program in beforehand & then the arduino automatically takes care of?
Thanks
The temperature schedule in the movie is just to test. For a real brewing schedule, check the first test results or the paper.
The schedule is maintained by the python script on the router. When the router crashes, the temperature just stays on the last value received by the Arduino.