Cold Break Removal Idea: Low tech, works great

[choosybeggar]

First off, a confession; I am troubled by trub.

Been brewing all grain for about 2 years and my experience has taught me that when lots of trub (cold break) carries over into the fermentation, it negatively impacts flavor. The flavor attribute I assign to it is is harshness (taste the trub sometime-it tastes harsh) So I avoid it. And from what I read, it is near impossible to completely remove the cold break, so despite my efforts, I've never seen a fermentation go awry from lack of nutrients/fatty acids or whatever the cold break contributes to the fermentation.

I have a low tech setup: picnic cooler mash tun, no recirculating pump. So to remove trub I allow the cooled wort to settle in a 6 gallon carboy for an hour, then rack the clarified wort into a second carboy and start the fermentation. This works great but, to my dismay, I lose 1-1.5 gallons of hard-earned, beautiful wort because that is all the settling I get. Letting settling go longer in the carboy helps a little but not much.

Here's my new wrinkle: after settling and racking from the carboy, I pour the remaining trub-besmirched wort into a sanitized 4 liter graduated cylinder. I cover the cylinder and let it sit beside the fermentation carboy (the proximity helps the wort in the cylinder aspire to be fermented ). The photo shows the result after about 16 hours of settling in the cylinder. Pouring the clarified wort off the trub into the fermentation carboy is a piece of cake; almost no mixing occurs due to the geometry of the cylinder.

Voila, 2 liters additional clarified wort

 

[duboman]

Pretty nifty but seems like a lot of work and in all honesty after 100s of gallons of AG I've never experienced the harshness you speak of.

Curious though, have you given any thought to filtering your wort into the primary first and using hop bags? A lot of people including myself do this and it takes out almost 95% of the break material if not more and I leave less than .25 gallon in my kettle and I use a CFC to chill.

Seems like your process requires a lot of unnecessary time and opens up a lot of wort sitting around inviting problems

 

[choosybeggar]

Not much work at all. The settling happens all by itself. The racking from the settling carboy is accomplished with one of these gizmos powered by a CO2 tank. I'm on the third batch with the graduated cylinder and so far no trouble with contamination.

What are you using to filter? What's CFC (counter flow?).

 

[duboman]

Not much work at all. The settling happens all by itself. The racking from the settling carboy is accomplished with one of these gizmos powered by a CO2 tank. I'm on the third batch with the graduated cylinder and so far no trouble with contamination.

What are you using to filter? What's CFC (counter flow?).

I use paint strainer bags for my hop additions to keep all the hop debris out. I have a bazooka screen in my kettle to trap hot break and as the kettle drains through my counter flow chiller it goes through a large strainer I place over my primary to catch any further debris that may come through.

This process allows me a nice clean wort and leaves less than .25g in the kettle as a loss. If you are doing all grain it helps also to vorleuf until you get nice clear runnings before draining and again sparging the tun as well.

 

[TimT]

I do something similar to this, I just put the last 4L of wort into a jug and into the fridge. I then pour the top half it into the main beer the next day. I do it more so to have cleaner yeast to reuse. I have never done a side by side of clear and not as far as taste though.
The idea that the change in the isoelectric point due to the PH drop during fermentation causing some proteins to be brought back into solution does seem like a logical reason to remove trub. I wish there was a hard study on it.

 

[choosybeggar]

The idea that the change in the isoelectric point due to the PH drop during fermentation causing some proteins to be brought back into solution does seem like a logical reason to remove trub. I wish there was a hard study on it.

Interesting. I hadn't considered a pH effect. I figured the ethanol might play a role in altered solubility.

 

[choosybeggar]

I use paint strainer bags for my hop additions to keep all the hop debris out. I have a bazooka screen in my kettle to trap hot break and as the kettle drains through my counter flow chiller it goes through a large strainer I place over my primary to catch any further debris that may come through.

This process allows me a nice clean wort and leaves less than .25g in the kettle as a loss. If you are doing all grain it helps also to vorleuf until you get nice clear runnings before draining and again sparging the tun as well.

Seems like a fine strategy. To get there I'd have to buy more gear, though. Hmmmmm.

For now, I'm sticking with the current approach.

 

[acidrain]

I would never have thought of this method. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Rev2010]

Huh... I just put this between my fermenter and the hose I am draining through from my brew kettle:

If it gets clogged up I stop the flow and dump the gunk into a garbage bag thus clearing the strainer and I resume. No problems whatsoever with this method. I don't have any odd tastes in my beers, not a ton of loss to trub in the fermenter, or anything of that sort.


Rev.

 

[BetterSense]

I stopped worrying about cold break after I brewed some batches with large amounts of cold break and they came out fine. Now I just dump the whole boil kettle into the fermenter and don't worry about it. As you have shown, it settles out. I prefer to just let it settle out in the fermenter...

 

[planenut]

I know you say no problems so far but I would lose sleep worrying about contamination from the 16 hour settle.. too much time for bugs to start growing.

Just saying, I worry..

 

[zacster]

I used the settling method, but without the additional cylinder. I have a 6.5 gallon and 5 gallon carboy and the 5 gallon was overfilled as it was and the krausen came up through the airlock. That in itself didn't cause any problems. What surprised me is how much more settled out when the wort looked so clear. I also had used Whirlfloc in it and that makes it settle pretty fast.

 

[dzlater]

Might be easier to just increase your batch size by 2 liters to make up for the lost volume ?

 

[Xpertskir]

I use a strainer but only because I don't want to waste fermenter space with trub, I'd rather it be filled with wort. If you are getting off flavors this is probably not the source. What was it that made you come to the conclusion that it was?

 

[zacster]

Here's what mine looked like.

 

[choosybeggar]

Might be easier to just increase your batch size by 2 liters to make up for the lost volume ?

Sure but that fails to provide the thrill of actually increasing efficiency (getting something for nothing if it all works out)

 

[choosybeggar]

I use a strainer but only because I don't want to waste fermenter space with trub, I'd rather it be filled with wort. If you are getting off flavors this is probably not the source. What was it that made you come to the conclusion that it was?

Twas oh so many batches ago that my EtOH-addled brain cannot recall. The flavor was harsh and astringent (I thought of tannins). I recognized the same flavor when I taste sampled the trub. Admittedly, that's far from a iron clad indictment. But as a fringe benefit, this approach makes racking from the primary a cake walk.

Next time I make something super trubby (IPA, perhaps) I'll split the batch.

 

[choosybeggar]

Here's what mine looked like.

So I do the same but wanted to see how much more clarified wort could be had from the settling carboy. In the process, I learned at least half was salvageable in most cases.

BTW Zacster, the fermentation carboy looks a little full. How did things go?

 

[Ed4]

Take the two liters of separated wort and freeze it. Then use it in a starter.

Thaw it, boil it for 15 minutes, cool it and pitch your yeast. Add water in the boil to get the gravity where you want it.

Think of all the money you can save on DME.

Personally, I just dump everything into the fermenter though.

 

[HBCBrewmaster]

I have 2 suggestions. first, if doing a 5 gallon batch it is easy to tilt the pot after flame out. tilt it so that the output nozzle/valve is about 2-3 inches higher than the back side of the pot. commence chilling. as the cold break forms it will settle out and coagulate at the back of the pot and away from the out put valve. then, when you transfer the chilled beer to the fermenter gently , very gently level the pot. most of the trube and hops will stay piled up on the opposite side from the valve.

my second recommendation is to get the blichman hop blocker, a plate chiller and a pump. this works great with larger batches. I do 20 gallons. as you circulate the wort through the chiller and back into the pot, the trube will tend to coagulate in the middle of the pot. Circulate the wort till the POT temperature is down to chill temp as opposed to when the temperature of the wort exiting the chillplate is is down to fermentation temp. This is because it will take longer to get the pot temp down. As cold wort enters the warm wort, the break is redisolved back into the warm wort. where as when the pot temp is cold the trube just falls out. using this method I get almost zero trube/hops etc. Then harvesting the yeast from the bucket is also a snap. since there is no trube to worry about, I just swiril vigorously (not shake) the rermaining beer that I cant siphon out, (keep the lid on it and dont breath on it). thei I sanitize a masonjar and lid and funnel. then I pour the yeast slurry into the jar through the funnel and put the lid on tight. Into the fridge and its ready to go for my next batch.

 

[zacster]

So I do the same but wanted to see how much more clarified wort could be had from the settling carboy. In the process, I learned at least half was salvageable in most cases.

BTW Zacster, the fermentation carboy looks a little full. How did things go?

The krausen went into the airlock and then out the top.

 

[choosybeggar]

The krausen went into the airlock and then out the top.

Had a funny feeling that that would happen. Happily, you beer is probably unharmed. Brew on!

 

[leaf]

Did you end up using that reclaimed wort for a starter or for bottling? A couple times before I've reclaimed some wort from the hop/cold break material left in the kettle, although I haven't taken it far enough to siphon clear wort out of a carboy. I think I ended up using this wort for yeast cultures.

 

[choosybeggar]

Did you end up using that reclaimed wort for a starter or for bottling? A couple times before I've reclaimed some wort from the hop/cold break material left in the kettle, although I haven't taken it far enough to siphon clear wort out of a carboy. I think I ended up using this wort for yeast cultures.

That could work although I'm more a kegger than bottler. Since I handle the reclaimed wort in a sanitary fashion, I poured it into the already rocking and rolling fermenter.