Cold break, auto siphon, uhh, clogged, help!

Ok, I have been having some problems recently. I use 1 tablet of wirlfloc in the last 15 minutes of the boil. I also put my immersion chiller in the last 15 minutes.

After the boil is done I hook it up to the sink and chill it out. I usually shake the immersion chiller around to stir up the water so its evenly cooling. I think I need to distort the copper coils a little bit so it spreads more evenly through the pot.. The coils are still in factory condition and maybe this is the problem, maybe not. Anyway I get a crazy "cold break" happening, I can literally watch it separate every time I move the chiller around.

Well all of this is good, but I get tons of crap stuck in my autosiphon to the point where it breaks the siphon. I literally end up with most of the crap from teh cold break (hops, protein etc..) in my fermenter.

How is everyone transfering so they dont get all this trub in their fermenters?

Not sure.

I think I get a good chunk of cold break in mine.

just pour through a disinfected metal mesh strainer...no need to siphon into primary.

orfy said:

Not sure.

I think I get a good chunk of cold break in mine.

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thats an absurd amount of deposits! HAHAH! I usually end up with around 1/2" at the bottom of a 5.5gal batch that hasnt been dry-hopped.

sirsloop said:

thats an absurd amount of deposits! HAHAH! I usually end up with around 1/2" at the bottom of a 5.5gal batch that hasnt been dry-hopped.

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That's suspended, not settled.
This is after it settles, the kruasen fallen and the yeast finished.

How is everyone transfering so they dont get all this trub in their fermenters?

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Well... I used an immersion cooler for a while too and I had the same siphon problem you speak of. Eventually I went to a larger diameter J tube and then I put a small strainer on the bottom of the J tube. But it was still troublesome, especially near the bottom of the kettle, when the trub got heavy. I was wasting a lot of wort.

Somewhere along the line I changed my setup to use a counter flow chiller. Once you get one of these all the trub does end up in the primary fermentor. Nothing you can do about it.

I have mixed feelings about that. According to Dave Miller, trub is high in fat (!) and promotes yeasties making bad things, so we should rack off as soon as the trub settles. Keep in mind that fermentation hasn't started at that point, so its another opportunity to contaminate the beer.

The thing that really bugs me is that the trub takes up space in the fermentor and once its removed you have less beer ! When will someone make a 7.5 gallon carboy for primary fermenting ??? The whole trub issue is almost enough to make me consider getting a conical fermentor !

I think I am going to go back to an immersion heater of some sort, just to separate out the trub prior to racking into the primary fermentor. My brewpot now has a side tap on it and I have a pump, so siphoning isn't an issue anymore. I'll probably put a screen on the intake of the tap though. God forbid it ever plugs because its not like you can reach into chilled, unfermenting wort and unplug it without seriously contaminating the wort !

You pose a good question. I hope other people chime in.

just pour through a disinfected metal mesh strainer...no need to siphon into primary.

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Maybe that is the best answer of all. Prior to pitching the wort needs to be aerated anyway. A large strainer probably wouldn't plug and would minimize how much wort was lost too. I'm going to run my beer through one of these after it comes out of my counter flow chiller. This is a great site. Very thought provoking.

I highly recommend a counter flow chiller over an immersion chiller, btw. Everyone asks how to sterilize it. I run very hot water through it with my pump prior to using it. Then I circulate very hot wort through it a bit before turning on the cooling water.

Mike, just get yourself a big funnel w/ strainer, and pour the cooled wort through that into your primary, rather than racking. That's what I've always done, and it works fine. Sure, it's exposed to more open air, but after 20 batches doing it this way, I've yet to contaminate a batch.

What mesh size are these strainers ? How big is the funnel and how big is the strainer ?

Thanks.

Evan! said:

Mike, just get yourself a big funnel w/ strainer, and pour the cooled wort through that into your primary, rather than racking. That's what I've always done, and it works fine. Sure, it's exposed to more open air, but after 20 batches doing it this way, I've yet to contaminate a batch.

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Evan, I have the following strainer with a funnel.... Is this what you are using?? I would think it would for sure get clogged quickly.



http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?products_id=2452

I do it through a strainer that's about 7" or 8" in diameter. Like this:


edit: I am obviously using a plastic bucket as my primary.

Mike, it's probably similar---mine doesn't have the "peace sign" through the screen, but yeah.

It does get clogged...especially if you're using hop pellets. Ugh. I had to stop using them as much as possible for this very reason.

But the remedy here is that I sit on a little bucket next to the carboy, and I'll pour the wort into the funnel till it's close to the top. Then I'll stir the liquid in the funnel with a sanitized butterknife, making sure that the blade is scraping the screen the whole time, in a circular motion. This takes longer, but it sure cuts down on the gunk in my fermenter, and makes for cleaner beers I think. I clean the screen in between pours. Like I said, it's not quite as bad if you're using whole hops. It'll also be better if your break solids have settled---this way, it's only the last couple of funnelfulls that are pains in the ass.

My trick is a combo of a stainless kitchen strainer (almost the diameter of my primary bucket), but I also line it with a sanitized grain bag. As the grain bag starts to clog, I just pull it out and finish the pour leaving the strainer to do the filtering. The trick is to pour slowly to avoid getting a lot of break material in the stream in the first place.

Count me in as another strainer user. I find that I with worts that have a higher volume of trub, I may have to empty the strainer a couple times when I am transfering to my primary but it eliminates the problem for the most part.

If you're doing full boils you might want to consider whirlpooling after your wort is cooled. You can do it while its cooling, but in my experience I have had better success doing it afterwards. You have to be patient to wait and get the nice trub cone, but then you can really keep a lot of it out of the fermenter. Here is a link to a discussion we had about it not too long ago:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=7682

I have tried a few things including whirlpooling but never had much success. Now I just siphon off the first 4 gallons above the pellets and trub and then line a 2.5 gallon plastic bucket with a paint strainer nylon bag. I pour the last remnants into the bucket and lift out the bag and everything gets filtered. I clean and sanitize everything beforehand and I am pleased with the results.

I whirlpool and then rack with the autosiphon but I take the tip off, a little break will get in but 90% stays in the kettle, it works great for me!!!

i use a paint strainer bag like blender but i put it on the outside of my immersion chiller after chilling the wort. then slowly lower it into the wort and syphon clear wort from the centre as all the break material and hops are filtered out.
the surface area of the bag is large enough to prevent clogging in most beers(not pumkin ale as i discovered)

Mike-H said:

Ok, I have been having some problems recently. I use 1 tablet of wirlfloc in the last 15 minutes of the boil. I also put my immersion chiller in the last 15 minutes.

After the boil is done I hook it up to the sink and chill it out. I usually shake the immersion chiller around to stir up the water so its evenly cooling. I think I need to distort the copper coils a little bit so it spreads more evenly through the pot.. The coils are still in factory condition and maybe this is the problem, maybe not. Anyway I get a crazy "cold break" happening, I can literally watch it separate every time I move the chiller around.

Well all of this is good, but I get tons of crap stuck in my autosiphon to the point where it breaks the siphon. I literally end up with most of the crap from teh cold break (hops, protein etc..) in my fermenter.

How is everyone transfering so they dont get all this trub in their fermenters?

Click to expand...

Mike, how big is your kettle? Instead of dealing with the autosiphon, you may want to drill the kettle and put in a spigot. On the interior side, just put in a copper or stainless pickup that's covered with a stainless screen and that will filter out "most" of the break material. I found stainless lint traps that are intended for washing machine drain hoses. It was a package of two and I put one inside the other and clamped it on to my pickup tube. Works like a champ.

How is everyone transfering so they dont get all this trub in their fermenters?[/QUOTE]

I first tried cheesecloth duct-taped to the bucket (still cant believe i EVER did that) . Then I got to thinking about contamination of the cloth. So I switched to a strainer. THEN ... I made a barley wine ... 90 minute mash, 100 minute boil and there was almost as much trub as wort. Here's what I do now:

After the boil and cool, I put a hose on the spigot of the kettle and run EVERYTHING into a 6.5 gallon carboy. I cover it with a piece of foil and sit it on the counter. I then clean up my brew mess and put everything away except a bottling bucket and siphon hoses.

After an hour, the trub has settled. I rack the beer off the trub into the bottling bucket and oxygenate the hell out of it with a stone and oxygen canister.

I discard the trub and re-clean and sanitize the carboy. I put the yeast (90% of the time I have made a starter first) into the fermenter and then let the wort free-fall into the fermenter from the bucket, agitating it like crazy. A final shake, airlock and store.

My beers are fermenting faster and tasting better too.

It takes a little longer, but its simpler. STRAINING IS STRAINING!!! to me, anyway.

My brew day might be 30 minutes longer but its worth saving the aggravation.

I pour my wort through a funnel with a strainer. It really aerates the wort and I get almost all of the hops trub out.
-Ben

I put a big grain bag in the fermentation bucket. The bag is big enough to fit over the opening of the bucket, so i just put the wort into the bucket, and pull the bag out - full of trub. Then I am ready to go. Oh yeah, sanitize the bag first.