To filter or not?

I made another Centennial Blonde. A few things changed for this batch. First, I now have a keggle to brew in. I can't see how much of a difference this could make, but I mention it in case I am retarded and can't see the obvious.

Also I may have forgotten the Irish Moss. I brewed 2 batches that dya and I am unsure if it was the Blonde or the Stout that got the irish moss. At any rate, I have forgotten it more than once before and not had a problem.

I purchased Golden Promise malt to try it out. I thought a Blonde would be a good beer to try because I have brewed a few times before and would have a good idea of what the difference would be.

Ferm temps were very good for this batch.

Sanitation was normal.

It just doesn't seem to want to settle out in the keg! I primaried for 3 weeks, as normal, and then transferred to keg and placed in kegerator. I would normally crash cool before kegging bottling, but I figured what's the point? If it's in the keg it will settle quick and I can pour the yeast out in the first few pints, right?

So it's still cloudy and although I don't mind the flavor, I would prefer it to look a lot clearer. And I think I can taste the yeast hanging around in there. I surely don't want to serve this to other people.

Should I invest in the filter system, just in case this happens again??

Homer, I'm being even more obtuse then normal today, sorry. Are you asking whether you should buy a filter system or let the beer clear and the yeast settle out in the keg when you chill it?

how about a little gelatin in the keg to help it clear up

IMO, filtering is not needed. Letting the beer sit in the primary for a minimum of 3 weeks, up to 6, careful racking, and Irish Moss/gelatin is all you need.
Even with a beer with lots of protein, like a wheat beer, I have produced crystal clear beers using those simple steps.

Pappers said:

Homer, I'm being even more obtuse then normal today, sorry. Are you asking whether you should buy a filter system or let the beer clear and the yeast settle out in the keg when you chill it?

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Sorry, the question is whether or not to buy a filter for just this kind of event.

Starderup said:

IMO, filtering is not needed. Letting the beer sit in the primary for a minimum of 3 weeks, up to 6, careful racking, and Irish Moss/gelatin is all you need.
Even with a beer with lots of protein, like a wheat beer, I have produced crystal clear beers using those simple steps.

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Normally I'd agree, but I may have only forgotten the Irish Moss, and in my experience, it can help, but I have still produced pretty clear beers when I have forgotten it. Usually cold crashing helps a ton. It's not even a wheat beer!

I have thought about using gelatin, but have not tried it yet. I poured another glass last night and even my wife thought it looked gross. Very muddy. I'm not talking about a little chill haze here!

Gelatin works wonders. My pumpkin ale had 4lbs of pumpkin in the mash, I didn't even use a secondary and it's crystal clear. It sat 3 weeks in the primary, then cold crashed it for 4 days, then added 1 tablespoon of gelatin that was proofed in 170* water. Two days later I bottled it, and you could read a magazine through it.

Cold crash it, and add gelatin, if that still doesn't get you clear beer, maybe then think about a filter.

Filter setups are inexpensive (< $50) and do wonders for reducing the wait time from kegged-to-drinkable.

1 x 10" filter housing with 1/4" NPT ports
2 x 1/4" 45 degree flare fitting
1 x 1 micron (absolute) reusable filter
1 x 5 micron (nominal) reusable filter

Filters are reusable 10+ times. Just back-flush, soak in PBW for 24hrs, and rinse. I always dunk the clean filters in 160F water for 5 minutes and sanitize (Starsan) prior to use.

Works great every time.



You can upgrade to SS flare fittings, but the short contact time will not attack the brass fittings.

I have thought about gelatin, but how does it work for carb and kegged beer? Any foaming issues?

I'd hate to spend the $$ on a filter setup considering I am looking to get a ferm chamber fridge and some RIMS parts, but mostly because it's rare for my beer to not clear up with proper brewing process. The 2 times it's happened I just can't say why it ended up as cloudy as it has. The filter would be only for those times.

I've read that they filter elements are only usable one time, but I had wondered about reusing after sterilizing like you mentioned. That might make it worth the cost to get into it. A filter or two would last me years.

Well, I'm thinking about trying it. I might swing by Lowes or Menards and see what they have. Seems to me they had a few different systems there before.

What's the word on filtering carbonated beer? Any concern, or does it work the same as flat?

Dude try the gelatin. It's super cheap and easy and works like a charm. Add it to your keg, wait five days, and then transfer to another keg. Your beer will be clear. I started using gelatin a few months ago and use it in every batch. I even turned a hefe into a crystal weisse with it as an experiment. it works great!

I'm not opposed to gelatin, but it takes longer than filtering, and I don't have it either. Plus I'd miss out on the fun factor of building a new piece of equipment. I

I do plan on adding it to my next order when I get to the LHBS or get around to shopping online (Got a $25 Gift Card for Morebeer.com)

Also, I heard you shouldn't use gelatin on carbed beer? I heard it could cause an eruption or something. That's why I asked about filtering carbed beer. I'd rather not have to degass it first.

I don't know much about fluid dynamics.....BUT my limited brain function says filtering carbed beer probably isn't a great idea either. From the pic it looks like the water filters hd and lowes sells...that is basically a cotton type thread wound up on itself that the water/liquid goes through and it catches the microscopic junk....now how will that also not massively disturb the co2 that is also in solution? Would you not end up with a super foamy beer anyways and risk it actually causing just as much time to degassing and recarb?

Gelatin works overnight and you don't need to order it it's available at ANY grocery store that sells jello it's called Knox gelatin and costs like 2 bucks for a couple packets. You could have this beer clear sooner than if you build a filter between going to the hardware store and all those other places for fittings....

Yeah, I hadn't thought of using canning gelatin. I think I actually may have some from a while back when I was going to make some jelly. If it hasn't been thrown out by now.

I don't know about disturbing the beer and foaming. That is why I asked.

Along with most other members, I would suggest you use gelatin first. Buy some Knox unflavored at the supermarket. Use 1/2 tsp or less. Add it to one cup of boiled H20 allowed to cool to under 170F. Let it sit for 10 min or so. Relieve the pressure on your keg and slowly pour it in.

A water filter can be used to filter carbonated beer, but it does take practice. You should use a 5 micron carbon filter that has had a fair amount of water run through it. The first 10 gallons or so will have a "filter" taste to it. The keg you transfer to will have to have the same CO2 pressure as the keg the beer comes out of. You will need to have an adjustable valve added to the gas out on the final keg. To start the filter you will need to SLOWLY release the pressure on the empty keg. The pressure differential will allow the beer to flow through the filter. Again, you need to do this SLOWLY to avoid foaming. You will need to keep CO2 hooked up to the supply keg.

This will take a fair amount of gas to get done. It would be best if the final keg was pre-chilled to minimize foaming.

The filter will remove most of the haze, but it does take effort, time and a fair amount of extra gear. Adding gelatin is inexpensive and easy. It does take an extra day or two.

Homercidal said:

Also, I heard you shouldn't use gelatin on carbed beer? I heard it could cause an eruption or something.

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Adding any sort of nucleation agent (gelatin, maltodextrin, salt, etc) to a carbonated beverage will cause an eruption.

Homercidal said:

That's why I asked about filtering carbed beer. I'd rather not have to degass it first.

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Filtering cold (< 40F) beer will not cause foaming. Numerous homebrewers and 99% of all commercial brewers filter their beer.

kunstler said:

my limited brain function says filtering carbed beer probably isn't a great idea either

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Thanks for your informed opinion.

kunstler said:

how will that [filtering] also not massively disturb the co2 that is also in solution?

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It's not a fluid dynamics problem - it's strictly gas pressure. Foaming is primarily caused by the sudden escape of CO2 from solution.

How do you avoid foam then? Two ways:

1. Chill the liquid to prevent rapid CO2 escape.
2. Maintain a small positive pressure (~2psi) on the destination vessel/keg.

Wayne1 said:

A water filter can be used to filter carbonated beer, but it does take practice. You should use a 5 micron carbon filter that has had a fair amount of water run through it. The first 10 gallons or so will have a "filter" taste to it.

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That's the craziest advice I've heard all week. Carbon filter your beer? Seriously?

I'll probably get both. I couldn't stand to not build another piece of equipment. And the gelatin sounds like a winner too. Hopefully I won't have too much cause to use either in the future, but good to try them both out at some point.

And yeah, I'm not going to use a carbon filter. I know there are plenty of sediment filters that won't absorb flavors. I'll try filtering under pressure. Nucleation points AND lower pressure are both required to release CO2 from solution. No doubt there will be some foaming at the start, but I think it should be manageable if the temp is equal and I have a way of controlling the pressure in the receiving keg.

Nothing like a fun experiment! Need to find a time to play with all of this though.

Cold Crash + Gelatin = Crystal Clear Beer

So, after I add the gelatin, I put the keg back in the fridge and after a day or so I can pour a couple pints of sludge?

Homercidal said:

I have thought about gelatin, but how does it work for carb and kegged beer? Any foaming issues?

I'd hate to spend the $$ on a filter setup considering I am looking to get a ferm chamber fridge and some RIMS parts, but mostly because it's rare for my beer to not clear up with proper brewing process. The 2 times it's happened I just can't say why it ended up as cloudy as it has. The filter would be only for those times.

I've read that they filter elements are only usable one time, but I had wondered about reusing after sterilizing like you mentioned. That might make it worth the cost to get into it. A filter or two would last me years.

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Needing to filter your beer? Who would want to persuade you otherwise? Hmmmm. Oh, yeah! Those that don't have filters or the knowledge or ability to use them. Commercial and micros filter their beer as a matter of routine. The elements are autoclavable and reusable. They come in all sizes. A prefilter would be a good bet for occasional use, and they are cheaper.... Check here

I've been meaning to try gelatin so I finally did today. All of the things that are far enough along to bother with were already in a keg, cold, and carbonated. I got some boiling water, measured out a cup with a pyrex, dumped it into a coffee mug and it had already dropped to 175. A bit of stirring and it was down to 170 so I put half a packet of knox in. I stirred it on and off for around 5 minutes, got impatient and dumped it in one of my carbonated kegs. It may have foamed up a tiny bit when I poured it in but no beery eruption. I put the lid on quick just in case but it wasn't building any of its own pressure as revealed by pulling on the airlock pressure relief. I'll let it go a few days and see what pours out.

I basically did the same thing. I put the gelatin in on Friday evening, and Sunday went and poured 2 full pints of cloudy beer. The third glass I poured a bit and drank. I could see no difference at all. It's been in the fridge the whole weekend.

Ok you dumped into a keg, the yeast and chill haze crap settles to the bottom- and the keg draws from the bottom. Try racking into another keg I always secondary when I use gelatin (I put in a keg and just purge co2 but then rack to another keg after a couple days....

You might just be pulling up the stuff that settled out....other than that it's odd it would still be cloudy after a weekend....

Still cloudy last night. Lowes and Menards' filter kits were not desirable. I'll try that shop online and see about ordering one from there.

Next time I try the gelatin I'll make sure to use it in the secondary.

The trick I found with gelatin is have your beer cold ( and preferably uncarbonated)
Warm the water just enough to dissolve gelatin and rack cold beer onto warm gelatin. This will create convection. I also leave it in thefridge so that it will also help fight chill haze. As the warm gelatin moves around it picks up th. Negative charges and as it picks up more charges gets heavy and then settles... And with it being kept chilled this helps shake yeast out ofsusoention as well.

You didn't follow the gelatin instructions on the packet did you?

Homercidal said:

Lowes and Menards' filter kits were not desirable. I'll try that shop online and see about ordering one from there.

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I highly doubt you'll find a suitable 1 - 5 micron filter locally. And, if you do, it will probably be made from spun poly, which isn't reusable.

Pleated filter is the word...Have you heard about the bird?

sudbuster said:

Needing to filter your beer? Who would want to persuade you otherwise? Hmmmm. Oh, yeah! Those that don't have filters or the knowledge or ability to use them. Commercial and micros filter their beer as a matter of routine. The elements are autoclavable and reusable. They come in all sizes. A prefilter would be a good bet for occasional use, and they are cheaper.... Check here

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You must be joking, ha ha.

There are plenty of home brewers who realize that an extra week or so of cold conditioning gets them a clear and great tasting beer without the extra expense or effort of filters.

Why insult everyone else because you are so damn smart. Many micros and some of the larger operations don't filter.

samc said:

Many micros and some of the larger operations don't filter.

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Got a list?

I'm betting less than 2% of all microbreweries do not filter any of their beers. The only well known brewery (I'm aware of) that doesn't filter *most* of their beers is Rogue. They still filter their brighter beers.

Of course, you could always skew the numbers and say "Sierra Nevada doesn't filter, look at Kellerweis!".

On a side note, I wish more brewpubs filtered their beer. I've had numerous excellent tasting beers that look like Louisiana swamp water. If you close your eyes, it's heaven! Open them, well....

lamarguy said:

I highly doubt you'll find a suitable 1 - 5 micron filter locally. And, if you do, it will probably be made from spun poly, which isn't reusable.

Pleated filter is the word...Have you heard about the bird?

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Yeah, I liked the one linked to earlier. I got a 5 micron and a 1 micron. I'm not really interested in going any cleaner than that. I just hate looking at this keg of sludge. It looks like unfiltered apple cider that's been shaken up.

I've been told that 1 um filtering is "the competitor's edge" with brews that I am going to put into contests. My brews are clear enough coming out of the keg, but my friends are telling me that I will go up against polished brews in comp, and that the ever-so-slight chill haze will look profoundly cloudy next to them.

Normally, I don't bother with gelatin, but did put some into a California Common last night, using a method I found on the NB web site.

* In a Sanicleaned Mason jar, I added 12 oz. of tap cool water...around 70-odd degrees.

* Put in 3 teaspoons of gelatin in the jar and let it sit for 20 minutes. Swirled it up a few times during the 20 minute wait to dissolve the gelatin. After a few minutes some would precipitate out, but always went into solution when swirled.

* After 20 minutes, I put it into the microwave for 75 seconds. The glass was warm but not hot to the touch. This made the solution clear with no precipitation.

* Covered and cooled and then dropped into the fermenter which was around 50 dF. I will keg after 48 hours of crash cooling.

We'll see how that goes, but next up are two Kolsch brews (one using Munich, the other Vienna) and both need to be crystal clear. Hopefully the gelatin will do the trick.

Thanks LamarGuy for posting the reusable filters... I've been using cheap ($1.50) disposable poly-spun filters, and my problem with them isn't the cost but it is that they seem to clog up easily. It looks to me like the pleated ones should be far less prone to clogging. I filter with a 5 micron right out of the primary fermentation keg after dumping as much yeast as I can using a picnic tap. I do another pass with a 1 micron for a Helles or other light beer. In addition to being ready quicker, I don't have to worry about stirring up sediment if I decide to grab the keg and take it to a party.

Yep, I'm even thinking about filtering now. I just run through beer so fast and have no time for gravity to work its magic. I know my beer is done with the yeast cleaning things up, now I can just clean the yeast up for a professional looking product. I was referenced to another filter site by sudbuster here. So there are plenty to look at, and even 100% autoclave-able ones.

Why is filtering so controversial? I've filtered a few beers for "shine" over the years, and thanks to figuring out some "tummy trouble", will be filtering most of my beer going forward.

People say it "strips flavor", but I have not ever experienced such a thing.

Besides, wouldn't it be nice to hand someone your brew and not worry about them getting "yeast farts"? There's nothing wrong with filtering. There's nothing wrong with letting it sit for an extra week or two either. Whatever works for you.

I do use gelatin before filtering, just to keep it as clear as possible before it hits the filter.

/drunkenramble

EDIT: It would be interesting to test some filtered and some unfiltered beer over a period of time to see how it affects aging...

Yeah, I definitely agree with the GI upset symptoms of homebrew....I think it's the unusually high yeast count. In fact, half of my bad hangovers from homebrew are because my guts are uneasy for the whole next day

I've used gelatin, and it worked fine....but I gotta admit I've been reluctant to filter because of the PITA factor and cleanup. That being said, it may still be worth avoiding the "tummy trouble"...

ScubaSteve said:

I've used gelatin, and it worked fine....but I gotta admit I've been reluctant to filter because of the PITA factor and cleanup. That being said, it may still be worth avoiding the "tummy trouble"...

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This was my first motivator for trying it, and I liked the results so much I now filter pretty much everything except pale ales (somehow Sierra Nevada got it right, an APA just seems to taste better to me unfiltered).