A couple Sundays ago went to visited my dad and step Mum. They’re going to moving out of their place and are slowly cleaning out things. Was looking through some old stuff and found was some old wine making equipment.
I knew my dad had made wine in the past. I didn’t realise how much equipment he had. And until then I hadn’t joined the dots to realise that I could use this stuff for making beer. As I lifted each piece out of the cellar it dawned on me that this was going to be really helpful.
Jars of some Some really old ingredients stuff
All up the equipment totalled:
- Eight x 1 gallon (UK) glass carboy/bottles
- Four x 2 litre glass bottles
- Ten ‘Senior’ airlocks with rubber bungs
- Two spare rubber bungs
- Three different lengths and size of tubing
- Test jar/flask
- Hydrometer
- Hand Corker
- Bunch of corks
- Wine filters
- Three different sized bottle brushes
Some really old ingredients stuff, some known and some not
On top of the equipment there was some ingredients and stuff:
- Jar of nutrient salts
- Jar of sodium metabisulphite
- Jar of Pectinase (No.5)
- Jar of white stuff, no idea
- 30+ Campden tablets
- Tannic acid
- Small bag of something without a label. Looks like sand.
- Bag of more nutrient salts
- Bad of more Pectinase.
Not sure how much use I’ll get out if the ingredient stuff. The sodium metabisulphite [edit: this is a non-rinse sterilising and only part of Campden tablets]. Campden tablets are help control fermentation and a few other things. Might give it a go. The nutrient salts might be ok. Will have to test them. Pectinase is for getting more flavour and cleaning wine, unlikely that I’ll need that. Tannic acid is for clearing and flavour enhancement. Might need to try that. Rest, got no idea what they are and will probably go in the bin.
Range of print stuff, plenty of wine and brewing things
The last part of the stash is a whole bunch of print. Some of it is home brewing catalogs. Some of it is single sheets of instructions on something about brewing. Some of it is recipes for home brew wine. And the one big piece is a book on home brewing wine, photocopied and bound.
What will come of all this? Firstly a whole lot of cleaning! The carboys and bottles have a whole bunch of caked on dirt. The tubes have stuff through them. The airlocks have sediment and dust. Plenty to clean.
Once all cleaned I’ll give an update.
If you’ve got any advice on this stuff it would be great if you want to comment below.
-Mikey
We make home brew 