Dry Ice To Prevent Oxidization During Racking

Anyone else doing this?
I searched HBT through Google and all the results were about using dry ice to carbonate or to keep a cooler cold, to cold crash or to store hops.

The General Technique I am referring to is placing a pound or so of dry ice in the bottom of your bottling bucket or secondary and letting it sublimate prior to racking. The CO2, being heavier than air, displaces the air in the bucket and pools at the bottom. So long as you keep the exposed end of the siphon tube below the visible cloud of gas the outflow of beer is protected from oxidation. You also get the most awesome effect of the CO2 cloud rising and pouring off the top as the liquid level rises.

Dry ice is cheap in my area if you must buy it and free if you don't. It is commonly thrown away at food distribution docks (hint). Storing it is somewhat of a problem so you do have to obtain it relatively soon prior to bottling. I don't always use it thanks to this but I do when I can. I can't say I've found a difference in my beer but I can say the peace of mind during transfers is worth it.

I would expect dry ice to be unsanitary so I do douse it in Star San which only helps it to sublimate that much faster.

No offense, but it sounds like a lot of wasted time. I've never had an oxidized beer other than ones that weren't capped properly. Its a good idea, just not worth the extra time in my opinion.

No offense taken. I was wondering if this was an extraneous step that needed to be removed or if the sheer genius of it would blister the minds of HBT. Sounds like the former. There seems to be a great deal of consternation over oxidization during transfers. The dry ice is free for me and a brewing friend who works a food dock and lives close to me brings it home all the time so the only time I lose is the 5 minutes sublimation during which I am busy sanitizing and readying for transfer.

I think I might omit this step but I am waiting for a blistered mind or two before I completely let go of the idea.

TheSeether said:

No offense taken. I was wondering if this was an extraneous step that needed to be removed or if the sheer genius of it would blister the minds of HBT. Sounds like the former. There seems to be a great deal of consternation over oxidization during transfers. The dry ice is free for me and a brewing friend who works a food dock and lives close to me brings it home all the time so the only time I lose is the 5 minutes sublimation during which I am busy sanitizing and readying for transfer.

I think I might omit this step but I am waiting for a blistered mind or two before I completely let go of the idea.

Click to expand...

If it's free for you, then do it. I've seen a lot of people on here mention purging the secondary or keg with CO2 gas prior to transferring. Basically, you are doing the same but it's free and little to no effort for you.

Try this first (even more fun if you have kids), take a chunk of dry ice and put it in clean water in a clean bucket and play with the fog created. After the ice and fog have dissipated look at the tremendous amount of dirt/crud/sand/rust/etc. in the formerly clean bucket.

IFF you have a inexpensive source of medically clean dry ice go for it. If you are picking up dry ice from the local supermarket/ice company it is almost certainly filthy since it is not expected you will remove it from the protective packaging and place it in direct contact with food. In my experience it is not made in a way that is clean.

The above poster has a good point. If you aren't sure of the cleanliness, be wary of putting it in your beer.

You don't want to oxidize the beer by splashing it, but if you're just gentle it won't be an issue.
Your idea is perfectly sound, just overkill.

Now, if you could rig it into a keg lid somehow so it would purge the headspace after kegging, that'd save some CO2 from the cylinder and be a nice passive way to purge the air out.

Idea sounds fine, but I would be concerned about getting dirt in my beer based on what camiller said.

The dry ice my friend brings home is "food grade" in the sense that it comes in direct contact with food. I have used it many times for Halloween and other such fun and have never noticed any traces or deposits left behind.

It would certainly be a sound idea to test your source first.

Try it. I haven't done it yet but I can do O2 free transfers between better bottles using CO2 and a couple hoses when using two better bottles. It's a sweet setup. If it makes you feel better and you can tell a difference I can't see why to not do it. Other thing to consider is that you don't need to use a large piece of dry ice. So if there is dirt in it and you just rack on top of the ice before it fully sublimates you should have very minimal residue if any. After a quick lookup 1g of Dry Ice will occupy about .5L of space. So to occupy a 5 gal carboy you'd need only about 40g or 1.5oz. So if you throw 2oz in you'll do what you want.

I recently saw a spray can of CO2 at a grocery store. It was labeled "Wine Saver" or something like that. Spraying a bit of CO2 over the top would seem to be a good thing.

camiller said:

Try this first (even more fun if you have kids), take a chunk of dry ice and put it in clean water in a clean bucket and play with the fog created. After the ice and fog have dissipated look at the tremendous amount of dirt/crud/sand/rust/etc. in the formerly clean bucket.

IFF you have a inexpensive source of medically clean dry ice go for it. If you are picking up dry ice from the local supermarket/ice company it is almost certainly filthy since it is not expected you will remove it from the protective packaging and place it in direct contact with food. In my experience it is not made in a way that is clean.

Click to expand...

you could put some water in a bucket and add some dry ice. You can actually pour the co2 gas from a Pale or bottle without pouring the liquid. There are several videos on youtube showing this. It might work for your situation without putting it directly into the beer

I dunno, seems like a solution in search of a problem to me. I guess if you had dry ice kicking around the house and you used it to create a blanket of CO2 to prevent oxidation post-racking (which doesn't happen really in the first place), but if you have to actively go and procure some, that really puts it out of the realm of being even remotely practical (even for home brewers).

RukusDM said:

I recently saw a spray can of CO2 at a grocery store. It was labeled "Wine Saver" or something like that. Spraying a bit of CO2 over the top would seem to be a good thing.

Click to expand...

Now THAT sounds awesome. I always want to clear the head space in my secondary after racking, esp if the beer has zero air-lock activity and can't push the air out on it's own.

At the grocery store, eh? I hope they've got 'em around here.. thanks!

MarzBock said:

Now THAT sounds awesome. I always want to clear the head space in my secondary after racking, esp if the beer has zero air-lock activity and can't push the air out on it's own.

At the grocery store, eh? I hope they've got 'em around here.. thanks!

Click to expand...

+1.. But at what cost $.. Would like to see up against just a regular tank of CO2 that cost me 2nd hand 40 bucks and 13 more to fill and last forever with just a squirt in my secondary or my wine-mead-cider bottles.. Good idea for the average consumer, lots of bank for the manufacturer!

edmanster said:

+1.. But at what cost $.. Would like to see up against just a regular tank of CO2 that cost me 2nd hand 40 bucks and 13 more to fill and last forever with just a squirt in my secondary or my wine-mead-cider bottles.. Good idea for the average consumer, lots of bank for the manufacturer!

Click to expand...

Even as cheap as this method is, its still a waste of money (albeit a minuscule one)....because there isn't a problem with oxidation in the first place.

MarzBock said:

Now THAT sounds awesome. I always want to clear the head space in my secondary after racking, esp if the beer has zero air-lock activity and can't push the air out on it's own.

At the grocery store, eh? I hope they've got 'em around here.. thanks!

Click to expand...

Yep, it was at a Wegmans in Webster. I think they have Wegmans in PA as well?

Edit: Perhaps at a wine shop as well?

I think this is a good idea. Dry ice is pretty simple. If you're using buckets you could place the dry ice in a tupperware containter to keep any sediment out of the bottom. Then a quick spray with star san before you rack and you're ready to go. Pouring the CO2 would be pretty neat too but it might be tricky to pour it into a carboy. I would guess a funnel would help but I think most would spill out. Can you imagine the mess you'd have to clean up if you spilled all of that CO2?!

you could put some water in a bucket and add some dry ice. You can actually pour the co2 gas from a Pale or bottle without pouring the liquid. There are several videos on youtube showing this. It might work for your situation without putting it directly into the beer

Click to expand...

Now there's the idea, and safest way to reuse dry ice. If the dry ice is free, it is a good step for good measure. But, if you are getting heaps of it like you say you can....you can try some pretty cool stuff with it. I used some in a cooler one time with some fruits in it, and everything became carbonated. It was awesome to bite into an apple that effervesced on your tongue, the same for grapes. Try it out sometime.

I would DEFINITELY experiment with hop infusions and hop flavors with your access to dry ice. Maybe sublimate some with hops and see what happens. why not, right? I know that Lagunitas has a masterful way of accessing hop flavors and potent aromas through their super-critical-CO2 hop extraction.

But, this is done under pressurized liquid CO2 which is probably pretty risky to try on a homemade rig....but they are making virtual hop-hash....something that the really big, industrial breweries use all day, and some scientific hippies to make a potent product from the "other" plant :cross:

I just thought I would resurrect this thread from the dead to see if anyone has tried this ?

Here is what I need to do.
I have a large quantity of Orange Blossom Mead, and a large quantity of Cider.
Both have already been bottled to their final container.
The problem is that I do not like the taste of either in their final form.

So I am going to blend them into a Cyser.
So I have to uncork about 34 bottles of mead & cider and “pour” them back together to blend them.
I obviously do not want to “Pour” them into an container to blend the Mead & Cider.
SO I was going to get myself a bucket, add a pound of Dry Ice to fill the bucket, thinking that racking each bottle into the bucket will help reduce oxidation.

Un corking 34 bottles is going to take me some time, and racking each one into a bottling bucket is increasing the odds of oxidation.

Aside from the Dry Ice having ‘dirt’ in it, does anyone see a reason my plan will not work ?

Or know of a better way to rack from 34 - 375ml bottles ? without a lot of oxidation ?

Thanks
Steve

steveoatley said:

I just thought I would resurrect this thread from the dead to see if anyone has tried this ?

Here is what I need to do.
I have a large quantity of Orange Blossom Mead, and a large quantity of Cider.
Both have already been bottled to their final container.
The problem is that I do not like the taste of either in their final form.

So I am going to blend them into a Cyser.
So I have to uncork about 34 bottles of mead & cider and “pour” them back together to blend them.
I obviously do not want to “Pour” them into an container to blend the Mead & Cider.
SO I was going to get myself a bucket, add a pound of Dry Ice to fill the bucket, thinking that racking each bottle into the bucket will help reduce oxidation.

Un corking 34 bottles is going to take me some time, and racking each one into a bottling bucket is increasing the odds of oxidation.

Aside from the Dry Ice having ‘dirt’ in it, does anyone see a reason my plan will not work ?

Or know of a better way to rack from 34 - 375ml bottles ? without a lot of oxidation ?

Thanks
Steve

Click to expand...

I have racked a lot of wine without too much worry of oxidation. Just be gentle and I think you could pour without any problem. The dry ice is still a good idea for your receiving vessel. You could also hit it with some K-meta before you re-bottle the blend.

helibrewer

thanks for the info, i will give it a try

what if you put the dry ice into a container with a hose leading to the secondary. The co2 vapour fills the container, (2L bottle) through the hose that is at the bottom of your carboy. The co2 displaces the o2 and boom clean co2 gas blanket in your carboy!

I had good luck this method.

I had over 30 bottles of Cider & Mead to uncork, and pour into a 6 gal Carboy
To re- mix into a Cyser, and add some additional flavors.

I bought a 5 lb block of CO2 at the local grocery store = $5.oo
( that was the smallest amount they would sell )

What I did was, break up the CO2 into small chuncks, and just drop them in to the Carboy ( wear gloves ! you will get frost burns )
I probably got 1/2 a pound of chuncks in the Carboy.

( they gave it too me in a paper bag, get a meat tenderizer and pound the cr@p out of it, in that bag - CO2 does not cut with a knife ! )

I had a funnel & hose, snaked down into the carboy.
I opened each bottle and poured gently into the funnel

When the Mead/Cider hit the chuncks of CO2 it started to gas up
Filled the Carboy right up to the neck - ghostly gas looking !

I figured that since the carboy was now filled with CO2, I just contiuned to gently pour the mead & cider into the funnel.

I was told that all this CO2 was "food" grade - packing for food - so that it was "Clean" of any other contaiminates.

Just in case I dropped in some Potasium Meta Bisulfate to kill any yeast that might have survived. Put an air lock on the carboy. No activity on the air lock
I am going to dose the Cyser with Super Klear this weekend to clear out the dead yeast.

Sorry no pictures, I had my 6 year old son helping me with a "science" experiement
and did not have time to snap a shoot of the Carboy filled with fog.

I remember something from high school chemistry about dry ice changing the ph (lowering?) of water during sublimation. Not sure if its enough to effect anything, but something to think about.