anyone use a "bazooka screen" in your brew kettle?

I have a birthday coming up and my swmbo would like to get me something for my brewing hobby that might improve the clarity of my beer. I like to add the hops directly to the boiling wort w/o using the small sacks/bags because I read that this can give better hop utilization during the boil. Problem I have is that even using my auto-siphon I still get plenty of hops pieces floating around in my fermentor. Thus, I wondered if using this screen along with this valve assembly might be what is needed. She enjoys my hobby by consuming much of the beer I brew but would prefer to see "less stuff" floating in it.

Does anyone know how well these things work and if there is a big difference between brass and stainless steel for the valve assembly. This is definitely newbie territory for me.

Thanks...

http://www.midwestsupplies.com/kewler-kitz-deluxe-conversion-stainless-steel-with-1-2-barb.html

http://www.midwestsupplies.com/the-bazooka-screen.html

Found some reviews at the NB site that says this does not work well with pellot hops which is what I use most of the time. Shoould have done a more thorough search prior to posting this question.

Yeah, it can be a pain with pellet hops, but all you have to do is scrap the hops off with a long spoon while draining. I've used a bazooka almost since day one and the clogging is annoying, but not enough to cause me to change to something else.

I have on order a SS dip tube for my kettle that will pick up most all of the wort and leave the trub behind via whirlpool method. Check out Bargain fittings or brewershardware for there diptubes.

Absent a filter screen for the BK, I siphon at the top of the whirlpool, through the CFC, and into a kitchen strainer, which drains into another fine mesh screen and into the fermenter.

The kitchen strainer is the kind that forms a funnel shape, and the fine screen is an El Cheapo from Walmart that came in a pack of 2-3 of different sizes. When the first strainer starts to get clogged, I just dump it into a waiting bucket and let the fine mesh take over for a second or two. I usually get hardly anything until the BK starts to get low, then I'm still not too bad as long as I keep it to the outside.

I've got a large piece of SS mesh from the scrapyard and am looking to make a basket for the BK to eliminate this work.

I use something similar to a bazooka screen in my keggle (see http://www.midwestsupplies.com/bazooka-t.html). I have never had any problems with it. I drain through a spigot, to my counterflow chiller, through a kitchen strainer and colander, and into my fermentation bucket.


The setup


The screen


The outlet

The trouble with a screen in the boil kettle comes when you use an immersion chiller and have all the cold and hot break clog it up.

I use the Bazooka "T" screen in my Keggle and it does work fairly well but +1 on it sucking with pellet hops. I have to use a hop bag if I want consistent drainage of the keggle when using them.

Joelsyales said:

I use the Bazooka "T" screen in my Keggle and it does work fairly well but +1 on it sucking with pellet hops. I have to use a hop bag if I want consistent drainage of the keggle when using them.

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I've never had a problem with pellet hops and the bazooka-t. I even brewed a Pliny clone with almost 9 oz. of pellet hops in the boil. I now use a 5 gal. paint strainer bag which drastically reduces the hop sludge (maybe by 85-90%), but that was mainly to help keep it out of my fermenter, not to deal with drainage issues.


The hop strainer bag

david_42 said:

Yeah, it can be a pain with pellet hops, but all you have to do is scrap the hops off with a long spoon while draining. I've used a bazooka almost since day one and the clogging is annoying, but not enough to cause me to change to something else.

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I completely agree with all of this. +1

jgourd said:

I've never had a problem with pellet hops and the bazooka-t. I even brewed a Pliny clone with almost 9 oz. of pellet hops in the boil. I now use a 5 gal. paint strainer bag which drastically reduces the hop sludge (maybe by 85-90%), but that was mainly to help keep it out of my fermenter, not to deal with drainage issues.

The hop strainer bag

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Do you mind telling me the diameter size of the PVC piece you have there to attach the large strain bag? I might try something like this.

There's a lot of things you can do to improve the clarity of your beer, most happen after the kettle. The hops will settle to the bottom, so a bit of particles or even a bunch won't matter in the end.

In the kettle/Mash Tun:
1. Vorlauf well, and as you drain to the kettle, place the hose in a hop bag. You will catch a lot of husk.
2. Use a diptube that is at the wall, not the center of the kettle.
3. Use whirlfloc.
4. Whirlpool no matter what kind of chiller you have.

After the kettle:

1. Use a sieve or hop bag on the way to the fermenter.
2. COLD CRASH!

msa8967 said:

Do you mind telling me the diameter size of the PVC piece you have there to attach the large strain bag? I might try something like this.

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It's 4" diameter. I cho0se this coupler because it had protrusions on half of the outside so that my hose clamp could easily rest against it and not slip off. I drilled two holes on each side for a wooden dowel that rests on top of my keggle (in the handles, actually). I adjust the 5 gal paint strainer bag so that it doesn't touch the bottom. The only hop sludge that gets through is during the first addition. After that hardly anything gets through. My bazooka-t does still get hop sludge on it, but nowhere near as much as without the strainer.

The hanging hop bag makes life simple. I don't think it will make your beer much clearer, though. But it sure helps a lot if you want to use a plate chiller!

Crash cooling the beer down to 33 for a few days, and using gelatin, will do far more.

I use a bazooka screen and it's nice. Don't think it's going to make your beer a lot clearer though. Biggest thing to improve that is cold crashing in a fermentation chamber.

I use mainly leaf hops but if you're using pellet hops you can just scrape on the screen with a sanitized spoon while draining to keep the flow going strong.

BTW, I use a bazooka screen in my mash tun and it is perfect in there!

passedpawn said:

BTW, I use a bazooka screen in my mash tun and it is perfect in there!

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Good to know...I have a spare one and am thinking about using it in a mashtun.

This is what i've recently been doing: throw the hops into the boil. When it is time to dump everything in the fermenter, i take a 5g nylon paint strainer (like used in the picture above) in the bucket with the elastic end around the rim of the bucket. Then just pour the wort in. You have to jostle the strainer around a bit to get all the wort to filter through, but it leaves most of the particles out. Works pretty well and still allows me to get full utilization of the hops by just tossing them in the boil.

passedpawn said:

BTW, I use a bazooka screen in my mash tun and it is perfect in there!

Click to expand...

same here. Works like a charm

Try using gelatin. I hear that clears the beers..

Cleaning hop bags was a real drag for me so I got a bazooka boil screen like the Midwest one and I use only leaf hops now. It works like a charm but I never tried it with pellets. I get much clearer wort into my fermenter now but the clarity of the finished beer is still the same. I buy my leaf hops from online grower/dealers.

I have my Bazooka screen along the side of my boil kettle. I whirlpool and let the trub settle for at least 15 minutes, then drain from the side. Works like a charm.

Here is what I use. I have one in my Mash Tun and my Boiler. The SS braid is stuffed inside the copper tubing.

Gritsak said:

This is what i've recently been doing: throw the hops into the boil. When it is time to dump everything in the fermenter, i take a 5g nylon paint strainer (like used in the picture above) in the bucket with the elastic end around the rim of the bucket. Then just pour the wort in. You have to jostle the strainer around a bit to get all the wort to filter through, but it leaves most of the particles out. Works pretty well and still allows me to get full utilization of the hops by just tossing them in the boil.

Click to expand...

I tried using the bazooka screen that came with my kettle last night for the first time; it clogged up immediately with cold break and hops. I ended up dipping the wort out until enough was out of the kettle where I could pick it up and pour the rest without spilling.

I decided the 5 gallon bucket I poured into wasn't big enough, so I put a paint strainer bag on a 6.5 gallon bucket and poured from the 5 into the 6.5, then pulled the strainer bag out and drained it. That worked great; removed a whole bunch of crap that I won't have to let settle out now. (I've used a hop spider a few times and it seems to reduce my hop utilization too much, so I threw the hops into the kettle w/o the spider)

Next time I will drain the from the kettle directly into the 6.5 with a strainer bag, and no bazooka screen.

I came here mainly to ask what the bazooka is really good for, because it's obviously no good for straining out hops pellet matter. Maybe it's supposed to just be for lautering rather than in the boil kettle?

I think using the strainer bag to remove most of the hops and some of the break is gonna be my new secret weapon.