hardcore fining (?)

I want my beers to look reasonably professional, so I've been adding steps to my process to clarify the finished product. I've had good success with adding Irish moss to the boil and just being generally careful when siphoning and bottling (e.g., putting a filter over my autosiphon). My latest batch is presenting a new challenge.

Once my beer went into primary, the Irish moss began doing its job almost immediately; all the clumps fell to the bottom and I had a pretty clear beer by the end of day one. Then I decided to do a late brown sugar addition. I stirred in the sugar and my beer promptly went ape****. The krausen was pumping like a heartbeat and blowing off, and all the sediment kicked back up and was swirling around the carboy like the gulf stream. The beer bubbled loudly next to my bed and I had nightmares about exploding carboys.

Things are settling down, but now I have a pretty cloudy beer. I plan to move to secondary and siphon carefully, but I have a feeling that this batch will need some other type of hardcore fining. Is there anything else I can do? Can I add another fining agent at this stage? Some people have mentioned cold crashing, but I'm not exactly sure how to do that.

Cold Crashing just involve putting the whole fermenter into the fridge and quickly dropping the temp down to mid 30's. You could also use gelatin, one packet of flavor free gelatin in 2 cups of warm water. Let it sit for a few mins then just dump into the fermenter. Leave if for a few days and you'll see that all the crap just drops to the bottom.

I've had best results using this method and no longer use irish moss in the boil.

At this stage you could add some isinglass, which works as a fining after primary fermentation has occurred.

Brewers Supply Group :: Knowledge Center

Everything you ever wanted to know about the use of finings, except Gelatin. I suspect the articles will offer some insight into the proper use of IM, dosage for desired results, and how it actually works.

There is also much technical info on Isinglass.

1. Transfer your beer off to a secondary, leaving the trub behind.
2. Put your secondary in your fridge/freezer and drop it down to 34 degrees to allow chill haze to form.
3. Allow to sit for a week.
4. Slowly stir in Super Kleer KC Finings. This is better than isinglass as it attracts both negatively charged particles and positively charged particles.
5. Wait another couple of days and very gently rack into a keg/bottling bucket.

In reality - cold crashing and waiting several weeks will work almost as good as the steps above.

JVD_X said:

1. Transfer your beer off to a secondary, leaving the trub behind.
2. Put your secondary in your fridge/freezer and drop it down to 34 degrees to allow chill haze to form.
3. Allow to sit for a week.
4. Slowly stir in Super Kleer KC Finings. This is better than isinglass as it attracts both negatively charged particles and positively charged particles.
5. Wait another couple of days and very gently rack into a keg/bottling bucket.

In reality - cold crashing and waiting several weeks will work almost as good as the steps above.

Click to expand...

Where do you get Super Kleer KC Finings?

Never mind, I found this new thing called the internet.

This is great info, thanks. At least I have options.

I got the impression that some people use a cold crash before bottling. Is this done in pretty much the same fashion? I am a little concerned that it might bias the distribution of the priming sugar.

Thanks again for the feedback guys. I am interested in trying out some of the other additives mentioned here, but this time I just went with gelatin and some time in the fridge. I got great results, much better than expected. You can see pictures at the link below.

All my beers are super clear (Wheat excepting) without fining agents, but then I tend to leave them in secondary 3 weeks or more in the cellar 38F to 48F.