marcb
Well-Known Member
spiffy78 said:
I would go 2" longer to be safe. So 6"x16". Do you use a false bottom too? I presume you are direct fired and not electric or have anything else in the kettle.....
New way to control Pellet Hop gunk!
- Thread starter marcb
- Start date
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
I would go 2" longer to be safe. So 6"x16". Do you use a false bottom too? I presume you are direct fired and not electric or have anything else in the kettle.....
marcb
Well-Known Member
marcb said:
Here's my clearance with the false bottom with my 6"x14" filter in the b3 26g kettle.
I will reply tonight when I get home on the specifics as I can't get to the email account from here. I will also post a picture. I had Chad build one that drops down an inch or so into the kettle.
There was movement in the spider, but I would not say it was as rapid as the rolling boil I have in the open kettle. I added both pellet (Magnum for bittering) and flower (Saaz) to the spider, though I ended up with a lot of flower in the kettle (not really worried about flowers clogging). I do use a bazooka screen and a screen on my funnels to catch the hot break. There was not much hot break at all that made it to my funnel screen...maybe covering <10% of the screen. With pellet hops and no spider, that screen would clog 5 or more times during the carboy fill, requiring me to stop, wash, sanitize, and repeat. It is important to note that I recirculate with my plate chiller, and I put the hose into the spider which may have caught the majority of the hot break during recirculation as a bonus...
Saturday I filled two 6.5 gallon carboys without any interruption in process. Like a dream come true! Not to mention prior to completely clogging, this slowed down the drain process. Not so this time, which subtracted another couple of minutes off the process.
a boil isn't needed inside the basket. the alpha acids quickly enter the solution (wort) and are transported out of the basket. the AAs are not being transformed directly in/on the hop material.
Awesome! Thanks man.
Yep, direct fired with a false bottom.
Just trying to get the size right so I can use the same tool for whatever size batch I feel like making. You think 6x16 would work? Any possible downsides to going with the larger size in your estimation?
Sweeeeeet!:rockin:
marcb
Well-Known Member
I think 6x16 would be great. No downside at all, it will also give you a little extra capacity for hoppier beers
marcb
Well-Known Member
br1dge said:
Depends on the batch size.... I've done mega super hoppy IPA's in mine and it is fine as long as you stir.
marcb
Well-Known Member
stonebrewer said:
Hey Stonebrewer,
I realized that I never posted a follow up pic of my 'water wand'. Really simple for hanging over the edge of a kettle for filling and cleaning from my tankless water heater. If you added a nipple on the inside drop and another elbow with a barb you'd have your whirlpool attachment without having to poke any new holes. It helps if you have a bunch of stainless fittings kicking around the garage to keep the cost down ; )
Bluechulappa
Member
Used my plate chiller last weekend for the first time. Didn't know I needed a filter. Long story short my plate chiller clogged half way through cooling my wort. If I get the 300micron filter do I need any other filter? I am extract brewing with pellet hops...
Brulosopher
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jun 1, 2011
- Messages
- 3,007
- Reaction score
- 447
Bluechulappa said:
No, you'll be fine.
marcb
Well-Known Member
Brulosopher said:
Second that, this is the only filter I use and I cycle through tandem plate chillers. This has not only kept my plate chiller from clogging it also shortens my cleaning cycle as there isn't any crud at all in the chillers so you only need a hot PBW and a rinse cycle to clear them completely.
Not to kick off the 300 vs 400 mesh debate again, but the plate chiller question made something rattle in my head (rocks maybe?). So I have used both and what I do with my plate chiller is recirculate the wort, as do most folks I suppose. I ran the return into the 300 mesh and, at least once, this turned out to be a bad idea as it overflowed into my pot carrying the hop gunk with it. With the 400 mesh (okay, to be honest we are talking only a single brew so far) this did not happen. Gonna have to get more time with the 400, but I think it was better for my situation. Again, different beer and smaller amount of pellet hops, so need more beers under the belt to draw a more definitive conclusion. I absolutely love the fact that I do not have to clean the filter screen on my funnel and I can just drain the kettle into the carboy without all that extra hassle and delay. No hop gunk, no hot break, nada. Worth every penny I sent to Chad, IMHO...
I have never had a clog, even with just a bazooka tube, however I can say that when I have used one of Chad's spiders that I have not had anywhere near the crap come outta my plate chiller when cleaning. I'm talking hop gunk and hot break material. I just boil up some water, flush to a bucket, then recirculate for 10 -15 minutes to have a sparkling clean chiller. I then immerse it into a bucket of StarSan and leave it full of StarSan until my next brew day.
Eternalodyssey
Well-Known Member
Just received one of these badboys the other day and I can't wait to put it to good brews!
Don't mean to hijack but in the spirit of keeping hops out of your plate chiller, where did you, marcb, and anyone else get your false bottom?
I got a simple cheap one but it keeps moving on me allowing hops under it (basically a round plate with a lot of holes in it from homebrewing.org). I want to order one of these hop filters but I need to make sure I have my final dimensions right.
marcb
Well-Known Member
BullGator said:
No worries. The false bottoms I have in my B3 kettles are the cheap, flimsy 18 gauge fermentap (Morebeer china manufacturer) but they fit well and do the trick. I just picked up a couple of 50 gallon Glacier kettles to upgrade the brewery and the false bottoms were caved in and totally ineffective! Chad is actually fabbing a bombproof one made out of thick stainless perf for me so I'll let you know how it works out. I have also had great experience with jaybird false bottoms as well from NorCal brewing.
marcb said:
I've been eyeballing this for filtering out dry hops and maybe for when i do fruit beers as well. http://www.brewershardware.com/FILTER1.html
Curious to see what you sketch up.
marcb
Well-Known Member
Jukas said:
I've got one of those in the garage... How the heck would you use that on the brewhemoth?
uberg33k
Well-Known Member
marcb
Well-Known Member
uberg33k said:
Damn, and I thought I was a stainless junkie, how much volume do you lose when transferring.... My 1/2" racking valve is definitely a choke point in the Morebeer conical.
uberg33k
Well-Known Member
It's not mine. I just saw that pic somewhere around here. Can't remember who has this setup, but I believe they were talking about pressurized fermentation in the conical. They use CO2 to push the beer out the bottom and through the filter.
marcb
Well-Known Member
uberg33k said:
Yep, I do the same but am limited to 5-7psi in the Morebeer conical and a 1/2" out valve. It got jammed on Sunday with the dry hip trub from my Pliny clone so I had to back pressure the keg to 20+ psi to clear the line. Turns into a dangerous game of what is going to pop first ; )
Bluechulappa
Member
Ordered the 4x10 filter from Chad last night! Badass seller. Shipped the item the next morning. Cannot wait to receive it. Now what to brew....
Stonebrewer, if you are recirculating from your plate chiller back into your SS hop spider, are you also catching some/all of the cold break?
-fafrd
fafrd: seems that I am. I am seeing next to nothing in my carboy screen, which is making my brew day a lot more enjoyable. I've made a lot of brewing updates over the last year and I think the hop spider is dollar for dollar one of the best investments. Went from a immersion to a plate; went from a cooler mash tun to a Stout; went from my stove to a stand. All great upgrades. The spider was inexpensive and is taking away some of the last remaing drudgery items in my brew day. Now if I could get my kettle/tun to clean themselves, I would be all set. Grin!!
fafrd: seems that I am. I am seeing next to nothing in my carboy screen, which is making my brew day a lot more enjoyable. I've made a lot of brewing updates over the last year and I think the hop spider is dollar for dollar one of the best investments. Went from a immersion to a plate; went from a cooler mash tun to a Stout; went from my stove to a stand. All great upgrades. The spider was inexpensive and is taking away some of the last remaing drudgery items in my brew day. Now if I could get my kettle/tun to clean themselves, I would be all set. Grin!!
Encouraging! Your spider is quite small (in Diameter) - what size batches are you brewing and would you see any benefit to having a spider with a larger diameter/surface area?
Are you still using another filter at carboy entrance and if so what? (and do you think it is still needed if this spider is working so well?)
-fafrd
-fafrd
StoneBrewer, did you dump the hop gunk out of the strainer before recirculating through it? Or was your flow rate good enough to not overflow the hop strainer with the gunk in place?
I considered going with the 6" diameter, but instead went with more depth. What I found with using the stock version that sweetcell let me borrow was that it was working really well, but with 7oz of hops it was pretty full and flow was not as good. Also his did not drop down into my kettle, so by end of boil I had 5-6" of the screen out of the boil. With the one I got, I start within a 1/4 inch of the wort surface and end up with only an inch or two out of the boil at the end.
I have "legacy" screens in place, bazooka at the outlet of the kettle and in the funnel before the carboy. I like the carboy screen for two reasons: it aerates the hell out of the wort going in so I get lots of O2 into solution, and it is a fail safe in case something goes wrong. The bazooka is nice for when I drop leaf hop into the kettle. I will probably leave them both in place as they are not hurting anything and in some cases help.
I brew mainly 11 gallon batches, with usually 14 or so gallons at the start of the boil.
I have "legacy" screens in place, bazooka at the outlet of the kettle and in the funnel before the carboy. I like the carboy screen for two reasons: it aerates the hell out of the wort going in so I get lots of O2 into solution, and it is a fail safe in case something goes wrong. The bazooka is nice for when I drop leaf hop into the kettle. I will probably leave them both in place as they are not hurting anything and in some cases help.
I brew mainly 11 gallon batches, with usually 14 or so gallons at the start of the boil.
This is helpful - thanks. Your pot looks like a 15 gallon Bayou Classic but I thought I would ask to be sure. Would be very helpful to know the approximate diameter and length of both the spider you have now and the stock version you tested.
And one last question - what size mesh are you using in your funnel?
-fafrd
No, I had some aroma hops in the mix so I just had the wort flow into the basket of hops, through the mix, into the kettle, to the pump, round and round again. It's a similiar concept to using a whirlpool to extract hop aroma, I believe. Worked great with the 400 mesh...not so much with the 300 mesh but I did have different hop types and amounts so not an apples to apples comparison...
The standard was I believe a 4" by 10" that belongs to sweetcell (chime in here buddy if I am wrong). Yep, it is a 15G Bayou Classic I got off Amazon. The one I have now is 4" by 14" 400mesh with a 1.5 inch drop down hook.
Funnel mesh is unknown. Here's picture of one of them ( I have two different sizes, this is the large one):
marcb
Well-Known Member
Update on carboy filter. Worked well, finally finished fermentation so let the dry hopping commence. Added a few oz of pellet hops to a hoppy Scottish ale today. Looks good!
The standard was I believe a 4" by 10" that belongs to sweetcell (chime in here buddy if I am wrong). Yep, it is a 15G Bayou Classic I got off Amazon. The one I have now is 4" by 14" 400mesh with a 1.5 inch drop down hook.
Funnel mesh is unknown. Here's picture of one of them ( I have two different sizes, this is the large one):
Thanks for the additional detail. So your BK is about 19" tall and you have a 14" spider in there - 1" or 2" off of the bottom and 7" or 8" down from the top?
Anyway, with everything others have reported regarding clogging, I'm surprised you don't need more than 4" diameter, even with the increased length. Maybe it's because you are using 400um mesh instead of 300um...
And thanks for the picture of the strainer funnel - where did you pick them up? Any idea just from eyeballing it if the mesh appears to be smaller or larger than the 400um mesh on the spider?
-fafrd
yup, you got it - 4" D x 10" H.
every homebrew supply shop should have them (i have yet to see one that doesn't), and all the online shops have them as well. pretty standard piece of equipment. i would guess that the mesh on them is a bit bigger than 400 microns.
Thanks - have not noticed funnels with built-in filter screens at my LHBS but will ask them about them next time I am there...
-fafrd
19" tall - 3" from bottom = 16" minus 14" = 2". The 2" comes from the drop down from the hanger arms. The funnel mesh seems comporable to the mesh of the spider, but I can't eyeball something that small and tell for certain. Every LHBS I have been in sells funnels with the filter. Some sell it either way so you have may have to ask someone where their filters are. At the stores I have bought them, they are usually separate but very close to the funnels (i.e. same shelf).
Thanks. Is there a reason you did not want to design your spider to rest on the kettle bottom? For the increased filter area? Because it was less expensive that way? Another reason I am missing?
-fafrd
Several reasons, scorching being the biggest one. Having the spider on the bottom probably would cause the basket to dislodge from the lip of the kettle as it would likely bounce up and down. I wasn't worried about expense as these are pretty inexpensive and going from a 14" to a 16" or 17" probably would have been less than $10 bucks. Reading on here most people don't have them on the bottom and it might be a-okay to do so, but I am pretty happy with where I am at.
Similar threads
