Question about clarity, filter it?

I don't trust myself transfering into the secondary fermentor on my first batch. Its been in the primary for two weeks now

I went to take a gravity ready from the spigot, and there are lots of small particles floating around in the beer, I really really do not want this stuff in my bottles, how can I get rid of these.

Two weeks of not being moved and they have not settled on the bottom.

What can I do?

You might be getting some bits from the bottom of the fermenter that will clear after a little bit comes out. It is easy to rack the beer to secondary. I would recommend doing that. Then if you get some chunks into the secondary, they will fall out. You will then rack clear beer into your bottling bucket.

After a week in secondary, the beer will be much clearer.

Rich, you're one away from 5,000

Anyone mention cold crashing it? Just like placing bottles in the fridge, it will get much clearer, much faster.

If you don't trust yourself getting it into secondary, how can you trust yourself to rack it to the bottling bucket?

racking is an important part of brewing, so you may as well start becoming a pro at it sooner rather than later.

I'd be more worried about encountering issues with sanitation by filtering it than by racking it. Just be sure to thoroughly star-san everything. I've never had any problems with it.

The purpose of racking is to remove the fermented and partially cleared beer from the trub, making it easier to finish clearing. If it is not clear enough after racking and settling for two more weeks, you can use finings to finish it.

how will these chunks dissapear from simply moving it to the secondary? I mean they will just get tranfered into the second batch and then to the bottle.

They aren't just going to dissapear, its like pulp in OJ....not quite that thick, but you get the idea

I think I might just cut the bottom off of a 2 litre bottle and put a couple woman's stocking in it and run the beer through that, maybe i did something wrong when I was boiling the wort, but there are a lot of chunks in there, I really don't see how a secondary fermenter will get rid of them.

Bryan,

Please trust the huge amount of collective experience advising you to rack the beer to secondary or at least NOT filter it.

You drew off a sample from the spigot and I think the chunks you got were things that settled to the bottom. Some of it just got inside the horizontal tube of the spigot. This test sample is not at all indicative of the clarity of the beer in the whole bucket. Go ahead and draw another small sample and let it sit overnight. I guarentee the beer will be clearer and the "chunks" will be sitting on the bottom (unless the beer is still fermenting).

When you rack either to secondary or the bottling bucket, you siphon from an area above all this sediment.

Running this beer through any kind of filter is just bad news. You're going to oxidize the hell out of it.

My advice, if you haven't already done anything, is to either wait another week and go to the bottling bucket from there or rack to a secondary vessel for 2 weeks then to the bottling bucket.

If they are hops particles, you can filter it relatively safely by securing a hop bag or pantyhose (I guess) to the end of your hose.

Don't be afraid of your beer. You are the BREWER!!!!

I would also advise not using the spigot to transfer from the primary fermenter if you have a lot of particles at the bottom that you are worried about. You can use a siphon to pull all of the cleared beer out of the bucket and leave the chunks behind on the bottom.

edit: I see Bobby_M already suggested the siphon. I really need to read all the details in peoples posts before I comment. It's Monday morning.... need more coffee.

I believe that it's been beaten to death, but I'll throw in as well - rack to secondary. Good ol' gravity will clear it right up in a week or so. Since you are a new-ish brewer, you probably don't have a keezer or such set up for cold crashing, but you can just stick the secondary carboy out in the garage, or other cooler spot around the house to help the process.

If you plan on sticking around this forum, do yourself a favor and listen to the guys with a bunch of posts, or 'moderator' next to their names. They generally know what they are talking about.

If you are using an autosiphon (and if you are you shouldn't be afraid of racking...it's dead easy-especially if you practice with water) the holes in the bottom of the autosiphon sits above the trub, and the holes tend to keep most of the big chunks out....If you really feel that that is not enough you can use a piece of hopsack or other netting and 2 rubber bands and wrap it around the bottom of the autosiphon...just be sure to sanitize the netting and the rubberbands first...

But honestly, I'm sure your beers are no more "chunkier" than ours and most of the time just racking from primary to secondary, and secondary to bottling bucket is enough for us....

+1 to everything Bobby_M said. Rack to secondary. It'll really help.

BTW, do you have an autosiphon? I cannot recommend them highly enough - they make siphoning incredibly easy and painless, and they're pretty cheap (about $12 over here). Having tried one, I'd never ever ever go back.

[EDIT: Ah! I see Revvy got there first...]

I have a racking cane

ok maybe this is what I don't understand

if the chunks are sitting at the bottom of the primary, when I siphon it to the secondary won't the chunks just come with it? I mean am I supposed to slowly move the cane down until it reaches the "chunk" zone and then stop?

My spigot sits about 2" above the bottom, and there are a lot of chunks

2" in a five gallon bucket is a lot of beer to waste

I have 3 or 4 good friends that can't wait to try it, and all of them told me before I started brewing

friends: "I've had a homebrew before, it was good but they had all these chunks in it"

me: "there will be no chunks in my beer!"

I've done a lot of reading, I know how to siphon, but how exactly do you siphon the good beer and not the sediment?

Yes, careful racking leaves most sediment behind. It's why it's done at all. The racking cane probably came with a little diverter cap that slips on to the bottom to keeping the majority of trub from getting into the cane.

Comments about sediment in homebrew are typical. Bottle carbing leaves a small sediment layer in the bottle which is why you have to decant into a glass. Another reason why kegging rules.

BryanZ said:

I have a racking cane

ok maybe this is what I don't understand

if the chunks are sitting at the bottom of the primary, when I siphon it to the secondary won't the chunks just come with it? I mean am I supposed to slowly move the cane down until it reaches the "chunk" zone and then stop?

My spigot sits about 2" above the bottom, and there are a lot of chunks

2" in a five gallon bucket is a lot of beer to waste
...

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There should be a plastic cap for the racking cane that will make sure you don't filter up the trub from the primary to the secondary. If you don't have one already - get an auto siphon, it makes the whole thing 100 times easier. So once you move the beer to secondary, there's less junk in there, there's no fermentation going on - so it's really still in there and the beer will clear nicely.

The spigot might be 2" above the bottom of the bucket, but it's not acrually 2" of beer - the base is thick, there is an air gap below the bucket, so you won't be wasting as much beer as you think.

Your homebrew may not, in any case, turn out totally clear, but it shouldn't have "lumps" in it - unless these guys are pouring the whole bottle out. You need to leave the last 1/4" or so in the bottle because it contains the yeast that provided the carbonation. Unless you're drinking Hefeweizen - in which case - yeast em up.

Send in a picture! I am sure you are trying to describe the yeast cake sediment, but if you can post a picture, perhaps someone can tell you what you are seeing, and calm the anxiety. Alot of good folks here who want you to relax, and have . . .

I have never seen chunky homebrew

Newfermenter1 said:

Send in a picture! I am sure you are trying to describe the yeast cake sediment, but if you can post a picture, perhaps someone can tell you what you are seeing, and calm the anxiety. Alot of good folks here who want you to relax, and have . . .

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lol, when I said I wouldn't have chunks in my beer, i didn't just say it, I stated it like I would die before I let anything other then liquid and gas in my bottle.

I really really don't like failing, even if it is my first batch....sorry for the stress, I've never met a homebrewer that wasn't laid back.

cd2448 said:

There should be a plastic cap for the racking cane that will make sure you don't filter up the trub from the primary to the secondary. If you don't have one already - get an auto siphon, it makes the whole thing 100 times easier. So once you move the beer to secondary, there's less junk in there, there's no fermentation going on - so it's really still in there and the beer will clear nicely.

The spigot might be 2" above the bottom of the bucket, but it's not acrually 2" of beer - the base is thick, there is an air gap below the bucket, so you won't be wasting as much beer as you think.

Your homebrew may not, in any case, turn out totally clear, but it shouldn't have "lumps" in it - unless these guys are pouring the whole bottle out. You need to leave the last 1/4" or so in the bottle because it contains the yeast that provided the carbonation. Unless you're drinking Hefeweizen - in which case - yeast em up.

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ah, this just pretty much solved my entire problem...

all I kept reading was in various threads was, "just transfer it to the secondary" while I'm sratching my head thinking "how in the hell is just moving the liquid from one container to another going to get rid of any sediment"

thanks

Bobby_M said:

Yes, careful racking leaves most sediment behind. It's why it's done at all. The racking cane probably came with a little diverter cap that slips on to the bottom to keeping the majority of trub from getting into the cane.

Comments about sediment in homebrew are typical. Bottle carbing leaves a small sediment layer in the bottle which is why you have to decant into a glass. Another reason why kegging rules.

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thanks man, I never knew about the diverter cap, ill have to look in my kit again

see you and cd2448 on sunday

Here...do this...

Paint strainer from Lowe's...$1.00. Use a zip tie to fasten.

malkore said:

racking is an important part of brewing, so you may as well start becoming a pro at it sooner rather than later.

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Not neccessarily. You could always just add some priming sugar and cap the carbuoy. You have to be a little more careful decanting into your glass, but it beats sanitizing all those bottles... :cross:

To the OP: Racking primary to secondary leaves behind most of the trub. Your racking cane (autosiphon {+1} or not) should have a black tip that raises it about 1/2" off the bottom. The trub that siphons will settle in secondary. Then, Racking secondary to bottling bucket leaves behind the rest of the trub/yeast.

"Chunky" bits are either on the bottom (trub) or floating on top. They are not usually floating in between. As long as you have your cane tip above the trub and then stop transferring before the floaty bits get to the tip you will solve most of that issue.

Anything in the clearing vessel will most likely drop out eventually. If not then do the same thing as above.

Oh and filtering does NOT oxidize beer. Yeesh. You'd have to be an idiot to oxidise beer with a filter. I leave in the primary for x amount of weeks then filter though a s 2.5 micron absolute filter and a .3 micron abs. filter.

If by filter you meant dumping the beer through a mesh bag into a bucket, then you of course were right Bobby_M.

My racking cane doesn't have something that keeps trub from coming in. I just sanitize my hand and hold it carefully halfway down. As the beer level lowers, I move the cane down. When I move it down and it picks up a little trub, I know I'm done. I'd rather have 48 bottles of really tasty clear beer than 60 bottles of cloudy (if it's not supposed to be) beer with off flavors.

Laurel said:

My racking cane doesn't have something that keeps trub from coming in. I just sanitize my hand and hold it carefully halfway down. As the beer level lowers, I move the cane down. When I move it down and it picks up a little trub, I know I'm done. I'd rather have 48 bottles of really tasty clear beer than 60 bottles of cloudy (if it's not supposed to be) beer with off flavors.

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You can buy the pastic tip for 50 cents at a HBS.

Denny's Evil Concoctions said:

You can buy the pastic tip for 50 cents at a HBS.

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I'll investigate when I go pick up yeast. My racking cane has a little tip, but it's just black plastic with a small diameter pointy bit on the end that lets beer it.

Yep, that's it.

Denny's Evil Concoctions said:

Yep, that's it.

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Oh, well it sucks up loads of trub.

I have been using a sheet or two of sanitized paper towles, and wedging it between the cane and the rim of the bottle. It holds the cane just above the Trub. So far so good!

If you use the force the trub will stay in the primary (mostly).

Other wise. Jam your racking can through the bung till it's the right depth and place the bung on the carboy so that it is askeeeeeew (sorry had a Lewis balck flash back, and , by the by, He's one of the greatest comics ever).

Uh and if me spelling looks terrible and I start talking like adrunk Irshmen, it's only becasue I'm tasting me recently kegged (carbed but still needs some aging time) Borwn Porter that came out at 8.5% cause me efficincy was around 90% and I me recipe was set for 75%. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!! Burp

(No not drunk, just buzzed and I swear this one imperial pint is making me high)

It doesn't get much easier than this:

Clothes line clip.

Don't remember where I got it, but I have a plastic cone with a slot for the cane. It goes around the cane, and into the carbuoy like a 6" long stopper. Anyway, it holds it still and maintains the height.

Of course, now that I use an auto-siphon it's useless....

If you have a SWMBO, ask for one of those foam wedges that they use to apply makeup. that's how I keep my autosiphon from sliding down.

BierMuncher said:

It doesn't get much easier than this:

Clothes line clip.

View attachment 4996

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The primary tube on my autosyphon is way to thick for that. :-/

well, despite what I thought you guys were correct

I decided to just leave it in the primary for 2 weeks and 5 days, I don't have a lot of free time so I did it a couple days shy of the standard 3 weeks

I siphoned everything into another 5 gallon container and mixed the priming sugar in....

I did use a paint filter though (I sanitized it) and it picked up quite a bit of stuff. My bottles are now in the dishwasher waiting to be filled

I made the mistake of smelling the primary right after I took the lid off lol.

The beer gives off an extremely potent alcohol smell. Almost like there is too much alcohol lol. Anyway it looks and smells just like beer....

This is going to be a painful 3 weeks that the beer is just sitting in the bottle staring at me, I can't wait.

BryanZ said:

...I made the mistake of smelling the primary right after I took the lid off lol.

The beer gives off an extremely potent alcohol smell. Almost like there is too much alcohol lol. Anyway it looks and smells just like beer....
...

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That thar is the smell of good ole fashioned carbon dioxide.

Should have choked you up a bit.

I get all choked up when I rack to the bottling bucket. But mostly because I'm so proud of my beer.

Anyway it looks and smells just like beer....


Another success!! Okay, what beer is up next?

BierMuncher said:

That thar is the smell of good ole fashioned carbon dioxide.

Should have choked you up a bit.

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Ha Ha! I know that smell/cough... Just the other day I opened a tapped keg and took a sniff w/o thinking.