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Option to add hops by desired IBU not weight

BrewDad

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First off, I absolutely love version 2 after having been a longtime holdout with version 1.  However, having gotten back into the swing of new recipe formulation I decided to upgrade to version 2 and while playing with the new features I thought of one that I know I'd use: the ability to add hops to a recipe using nothing but the desired IBU charge for that hop.

Currently hops are measured in the reverse. We say how much we want to add and the software/formula tells us how many ibu's are added. Well, given that I know how many ibu's I want that's not terribly helpful and I actually had to reverse Tinseth's formula to be more useful, to tell me how much I need to add without trial and error.  It would be great to see this feature added in as an option in a later edition of the program, because I'm sure I'm not the only one who would find it useful.
 
I think this would be a great feature. I've found a couple recipes that list hops in IBUs.
 
That would be neat.  Hops, though, do not have inherent IBUs.  IBUs result from the hops AA%, boil length, and wort gravity. 

I suppose the AA% is fixed to your inventory, and the boil time could default to 60 for this bittering addition math.  BSmith guesstimates wort gravity.

Perhaps a check box on the Ingredient where we choose and enter either the weight (oz) or the IBUs, and the other figure calculated, given the AA% and the 60 minutes?
 
MaltLicker said:
That would be neat.  Hops, though, do not have inherent IBUs.  IBUs result from the hops AA%, boil length, and wort gravity. 

I suppose the AA% is fixed to your inventory, and the boil time could default to 60 for this bittering addition math.  BSmith guesstimates wort gravity.

Perhaps a check box on the Ingredient where we choose and enter either the weight (oz) or the IBUs, and the other figure calculated, given the AA% and the 60 minutes?

True, but the hop bitterness tool takes into account the gravity of the wort and length of boil.  The hop age tool allows prediction of the aged AA%.  Combining these tools into a hop substitution tool would be extremely useful.  I'm pretty sure that Beersmith already takes into account the wort gravity at the time of the hop addition when calculating final IBU.  I thought it also took into account the AA% of the wort (since that has an impact too).

I went through this, just today.  I buy my hops from freshops.com in bulk at the start of the year.  I'm making a porter today, and I'm out of fuggles.  However, I have plenty of willamette, Hallertauer, and Nugget. 

My recipe calls for 32 IBU of fuggles (4.5 %AA), 2.4 oz, boiled for 60 minutes.  My Willamette (my chosen substitute) started at 5.1 %AA, 12 months ago.  So, I used the hop age tool to find out that its down to 4.46 AA%.  So, as it turns out I can direct substitute my aged Willamette for fresh fuggles. 

Or, I could use some of my nugget.  Using the two tools, I find that 0.75 oz of my aged nugget (started at 14.6, now at 13.6) would do the same job. 

But, I have to do this in two steps: 1.  calculate the aged AA%, 2. calculate the ounces needed for the desired IBU.  Further, step two is iterative: I have to enter Oz of hops until I get the IBU that I'm aiming at.  Takes a couple of tries to get the number close enough.

There are other times where I'm looking to experiment with hop additions at different times.  Two years ago, I was experimenting with IPA.  I tried all kinds of different hop timings.  I wanted to keep the same finished IBU, and just adjust the boil time. 

Finally, if I were using the inventory system...it would be interesting if the recipe could offer to adjust the hop amounts based on the age of the hops drawn from my inventory (eg, I opt to substitute Willamette that was added to my inventory 12 months ago). 
 
+1 from me, even though I know this is a three year old thread.

I'm using the latest version and, for me at least, this feature is still lacking. It would be most useful when substituting hops - to calculate how much of the new hop I need to achieve the same IBU. At the moment I manually calculate but it wouldn't be difficult to automate it given that the AA and boil time are already there.
 
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