Has anybody done a scoby project similar to The Thought Emporium

[Kabing]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds8ZFzOwGeI

So far I am doing my own batch and I just started the growth process. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRhf-CS2594

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urlhjSdNLy8

Heres my Project so far though. This Scoby Project was for Benicia Makerspace. 

[xuwen wenxu]

Ive tried drying some SCOBY i got from SG Hackspace using an Old Iron as i was quite impatient, the end materia turned out to be quite interesting I swear its the perfect material for a Wallet, Its texture is quite rubbery tho and it gives off this musky smell.

Right now iam growing some SCOBY but have had problems with keeping ants out.

Here are some pics
 

[Michael Hogan]

If your goal is to grow bacterial cellulose, then you want a flat, shallow container .. the cellulose production is basically driven by the available carbon substrate (sugar) and the amount of available oxygen. A flat tray maximizes oxygen availability, so the cellulose forms rapidly.

Temperature rule of thumb "if it's comfortable for you, then it's comfortable for the culture"

The culture should not be exposed to strong sunlight. However, ambient, indoor light or outdoor shade seems to be fine. The biggest culture I ver did was done in a kiddie pool that was housed in a tent.

Commercial iced tea (pre-mixed or powdered drink mix) works well as a culture medium. However, the powdered stuff often has dye that will give the cellulose some pretty "interesting" (gross) colors.

If you are using sucrose as the sugar, then the ideal seems to be about 1 cup per gallon of water.

When you harvest, you can kill the funky smell by soaking the sheet in a solution of baking soda. If you want to bleach it, you can boil it in a weak solution of sodium carbonate (washing soda).

If you want it to stay pliable forever, you can use cyclopentasiloxane or dimethicone (these are silicone oils that can be found in hair care stuff that makes hair soft and shiny)

[Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck]

Greetings to all,
with Food Hacking Base (fhb) we'll be brewing kombucha and growing therefore also SCOBY for SHA2017 hacker camp (4-8/8/2017). If someone would be interested in participating in the project just get in touch. I'll be documenting the project and promoting it at fermentation evening and Open Fermentation Days

https://foodhackingbase.org/wiki/Open_fermentation_day

Hack 42 and Lurwah were making some big SCOBY'ies during 2013 and 2014 I believe.

I'm thinking about doing something smaller first like aquarium size and after that maybe something like the small swimming pool action as Michael's describes he was involved in before. Do you have a fermentation diary somewhere Michael? I would be interested in more info on the subject. Thanks!

Sincerely,

Frantisek 

[Michael Hogan]

Here is a write-up of the kiddie pool sized sheets (using tea and sugar): https://www.hive76.org/2013/07/09/drexel-design-futures-bacterial-cellulose-and-a-world-record-maybe/

And a write-up of a "tealess" recipe that can be used to make pale cellulose:
https://www.hive76.org/2011/11/24/microbial-cellulose-2-a2-sheets-worth/

And a write-up of my first effort:
https://www.hive76.org/2011/06/21/cellulose-some-and-you-win-some/

Honestly, it's hard to fail .. the Acetobacer Xylinum grow vigorously at "room temp" if given enough oxygen (flat try takes care of that), and they drive the culture to such a low pH that they kill almost all potential competitors.

If you read up on Coco Nata, there are some descriptions of how they use weak sodium carbonate to clarify the cellulose.

The 1 cup per gallon rule for batch processing came from a science project my son did in high school. Anything much over that tends to leave a lot of unreacted sucrose in the medium. Much below that, and you deplete the sucrose (and limit growth) before reaching full thickness.

Fed batch or continuous batch would be really interesting, but I have yet to try either.

Also, some strains are more productive than others. If someone manages to isolate a super-cellulose strain, I would be interested.

[ukitel]

Bumping the thread

Does anyone have a good resource for the whole process and especially on how to process the cellulose sheet in an analogous way to tanning leather?

[Kabing]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tG3bWsWBBDE

New Video out mixing yeast and Cyanobacteria is mentioned to make better ethanol. 

[Kabing]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tG3bWsWBBDE

New video is out between yeast and cyano bacteria

On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 7:55:23 PM UTC-7, Kabing wrote:

[Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck]

Hi Michael,
thanks for the info. My passion is fermentation of foods and beverages, I've been using kombucha on regular bases since 2010 to make drinks.

One thing which I'm wondering about and I would like to find an answer to is how much the cellulose can be used by the microbes living in the "SCOBY" later on to break it down to get energy when it is needed. I've seen some "forgotten SCOBY's" in the fridges for two years or so and basically all sugar/liquid was converted in the cellulose. It is both protecting the microbes but you can also see that when growing the SCOBY batch after the batch the older layers are falling apart and I bet it is rather due to the batteries of enzymes used by some of the microbes rather than pH.

Anyway this would be something what I would like to do some experiment in the future to find out what is going on in more detail.

I'll share the info on the project which we will make at La Cherche, Cherbourgh, Normandie.

Sincerely,

Frantisek

[Ryan Vitug-Gavieres]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds8ZFzOwGeI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsvbUNTcUoo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9W98zgMsrE

Here is an update

On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 7:55:23 PM UTC-7, Kabing wrote:

[Michael Hogan]

Nice work!

I think that the growth rates you quoted are a little on the low side, but great job showing how simple the process really is.

For keeping the scoby supple .. have you tried silicone oils? Hair polish is usually cyclopentasiloxane and dimethicone. They seem to penetrate the material well, and seem to last a long time without any noticeable drying.

[A. Ekergård]

Den söndag 20 januari 2019 kl. 10:29:17 UTC+1 skrev A. Ekergård:

I have tried it, by myself in my kitchen. Six batches with 4 l sweet tea. I have notes in my lab-book to prove it (se video). But in my experience growing it yourself in the kitchen is not the way to do it. Every time I tried it, it predictable started to mold (se video).
 Sure I have tried to clean everything in my kitchen first with soap then with bleach. But let’s say every m³ of air in my kitchen has X mold spores. As you know,  X is an astronomically large number that even if cleaning with bleach is so effective it reduce the number of spores to 0.1X / m³, there will be tons of mold spores contaminating the batch. In the other hand, it is not like everyone brewing kombucha has access to a lab with HEPA filters and UV-light and stuffs. I think it should be possible to make att home.

[Nathan McCorkle]

On Sun, Jan 20, 2019, 1:29 AM A. Ekergård <oakf...@gmail.com wrote:

I have tried it, by myself in my kitchen. Six batches with 4 l sweet tea. I have notes in my lab-book to prove it (video 1). But in my experience growing it yourself in the kitchen is not the way to do it. Every time I tried it, it predictable started to mold (video 2).

I did it in my kitchen for several batches, the key mainly just seemed to be subculturing the scoby quickly and attempting not to mix the fluid too much as you do it, and peeling off the top most-contaminated layer. A few generations after the scoby was shipped to me it seemed to recover it's vigor and was doing fine. You could also add a bit of vinegar in the beginning to attempt to discourage contaminant growth as the scoby ramps up its own production. Also use glassware, because plastic is notorious for scratches being able to harbor contamination which can escape chemical sterilization. (Or use new plastic and ensure any cleaning steps are done with a cloth that ensures you won't scratch the surface).

[Nathan McCorkle]

On Sun, Jan 20, 2019, 1:29 AM A. Ekergård <oakf...@gmail.com wrote:

I have tried it, by myself in my kitchen. Six batches with 4 l sweet tea.

I would suggest starting with a single batch at a time, of 1-2 liters volume. Then you spend less time and reagent as you subculture to serially reduce contamination. When your culture is relatively pure, then you can ramp up production volumes.

[Patrik D'haeseleer]

Make sure to use at least 10% old starter culture. If you don't have enough starter culture, you'll need to brew a smaller batch batch to ramp up first. Using that much starter culture makes sure you get a vigorous growth right from the beginning, and the low pH should inhibit mold growth. Starting pH should be 4 or lower - get some pH strips to check. If you use enough starter culture, you should not need to add any vinegar.

You also need to be very careful to clean all containers and utensils. And use a freshly laundered dish towel or a paper towel to cover the mouth of the jar, so the culture can get plenty of air, but no mold spores can get in. I usually use a roll of paper towel, discard the outer layer of paper, and cover the mouth of the jar with at least 2 layers of paper. I don't recommend using cheesecloth - the pores are far too large, and you'd have to fold over the cloth multiple times to even keep our fruit flies, let along mold spores.

To grow a large sheet in a large plastic tub, some people seem to trust the gap between the tub and the lid to provide oxygen while keeping out mold and flies. I wouldn't - if the lid closes tightly enough to keep out a tenacious fruit fly, it likely doesn't provide as much air as the culture would prefer. Last time, I simply put 2-3 layers of paper towel on the rim, and pushed the lid down on that, both enlarging and filtering the air gap. Next time, I'm considering just cutting some big holes in the lid, and covering them with a cloth filter. 

Most importantly- don't leave the tea or brewing kombucha open to the air for any longer than absolutely necessary. I would put the sugar, teabags and boiling water in the container you'll brew the kombucha in, and let the tea cool down in there. That way, you disinfect the container one more time with the boiling water, and you avoid having to pour a lot of sweet tea which seems like a great occasion to suck in some contaminants. Use a container made out of glass or transparent plastic, so you won't need to open the lid during fermentation to check for progress and any signs of contamination. I wouldn't recommend using a ceramic crock pot to brew kombucha, because you wind up having to risk introducing contamination just to check for contamination! 

Patrik

[A. Ekergård]

So smaller batch with more culture in it. Test pH. Be as clean as possible. I am going to try the tip with paper towels on the jarl. Now I have something to work with again.

Thank you all!

Btw for you how thinks about trying this. They are not kidding when they write to use tea bags. One mistake I did was using loose tea at first. So I know about the problem of small pieces of tea blade getting in the batch.