How to filter beer

I use hop and grain bags to try and keep the beer from having bits floating around it.
It works quite well, but there are always some small particles floating around the beer, which, as you can imagine to someone tasting it, is quite off putting.

So I suppose the best thing to do, would be to filter it in some way, to get the grains of particles out, while still preserving the integrity of the beer.

My problem is, I don't know what stage, and how to do this. After cooling would seem like a logical time to do it. How do you guy generally go about it? Would a coffee filter work, or would that add off flavours to my beer?

In all the batches I've ever bottled, I've NEVER filtered it, and I've NEVER had bits floating around it the bottles....

I use moss most of the time in the boil, if I'm going to a bucket I use a paint strainer bag sometimes to catch hops (but sometimes I don't bother), use a long primary (up to a month), rack carefully, and leave my beers a minimum of 3 weeks to bottle condition.

I don't have the ability to cold crash but many people do that as well.

And even when I forget the moss, or just dump everything in the fermentor, I still don't have issues with floaties or anything....

You'll find very few brewers who bottle who filter. Even very few keggers that I do know of as well...

If you are letting sediment compact in your primary, or even secondary then you shouldn't have issues.

My simple advice would be to stop trying to drink young beer. Leave it in primary longer. After bottling and verifying carbonation has taken place, leave the bottles in the fridge for at least a week to settle out chill haze and compact the sediment layer.

The ONLY filter I have ever applied to my beers is my liver. Time and patience has taken care of everything else.

"Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears." - Barbara Johnson

Yup, with patience and good racking technique you can get very clear beer. No need to filter, IMO.

Give us some more info on where you are getting floaties. If you see stuff floating around in the fermenter, thats normal. If you leave it in the primary for the correct amount of time, all of the trub (hot break, hop particles) will settle out. I will sometimes pour my cooled wort through a sanitized paint strainer to collect the hot break and hop particles. This eliminates trub inthe fermenter. I really have no idea if this really helps the clarity. I just do this when I know I'm going to leave the beer in a primary for more than 3 weeks.

The yeast will also mostly settle out leaving you with a relatively clear beer. Crash cooling before bottling will also help compact the yeast cake and force other particles to the bottom.

If you are getting floaties in the beer you are drinking, you are either pouring it wrong, or drinking it too early. Fermentation has to re-occur in the bottle for it to carbonate. Its a small fermentation that happens quickly. You need to give the yeast time to settle out. Also, when you pour, leave the last bit of beer in the bottle so you dont pour the yeast into your cup (unless its a wheat).

Revvy said:

In all the batches I've ever bottled, I've NEVER filtered it, and I've NEVER had bits floating around it the bottles....

I use moss most of the time in the boil, if I'm going to a bucket I use a paint strainer bag sometimes to catch hops (but sometimes I don't bother), use a long primary (up to a month), rack carefully, and leave my beers a minimum of 3 weeks to bottle condition.

I don't have the ability to cold crash but many people do that as well.

And even when I forget the moss, or just dump everything in the fermentor, I still don't have issues with floaties or anything....

You'll find very few brewers who bottle who filter. Even very few keggers that I do know of as well...

If you are letting sediment compact in your primary, or even secondary then you shouldn't have issues.

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I was given ( I know, lucky!) a fridge that my carboy fits in. When would you recommend putting it in the fridge for a cold crash?

The floaties are usually small bits of hop. Typically one or two a bottle. Not really a big deal, but people get pretty turned off by things floating around their beer.

I do leave it to ferment and settle for a few weeks. I don't know why it's like this.

Edcculus said:

Also, when you pour, leave the last bit of beer in the bottle so you dont pour the yeast into your cup (unless its a wheat).

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I know wheats are meant to be cloudy, but I still have always avoided the bottom 1/8 to 1/4 inch of brew... are you telling me that I've wasted all that good stuff all these years?

blisterman said:

The floaties are usually small bits of hop. Typically one or two a bottle. Not really a big deal, but people get pretty turned off by things floating around their beer.

I do leave it to ferment and settle for a few weeks. I don't know why it's like this.

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Hmmm. That's very strange. I never have floaties, and I make a lot of IPAs with tons of hops.

One thing you can try is to use a mesh paint straining bag and sanitize it and put it over the end of the racking can or autosiphon so when you rack from secondary to the bottling bucket, you don't transfer those floaties to your bottling bucket.

I get specks of pellet hops in my beer after dry hopping even though I'm using a nylon bag to contain the hops and another nylon bag over my autosiphon when siphoning. Some of that dry hopping debris is really tiny. Even so, it annoys me to see it floating in my beer.

I'm considering making a filter that can accommodate beer or wine. I'll probably base it on a 10 inch cylindrical water filter and use a vacuum to pull or a pump or CO2 to push liquid through it. I'm not looking for sterile beer or wine, just polish and removal of hop debris from dry hopping.