The OFFICIAL Low Oxygen Brewing Thread, AKA lodo, lowdo, LOB

Die_Beerery · Oct 10, 2017

Since people genuinely care about this and want some data to be put out there, let use this thread as a resource for that. So want to try it, but unsure? Tried it and hated it? Tried it and loved it? Lets get together and discuss in a professional manner. With the title as it states maybe some folks can easily avoid it as well, maybe the best for both worlds!

Lets start it off with the material.

The Original "On Brewing Bavarian Helles

On Brewing Bavarian Helles V2

Methods of a Low Oxygen Brewhouse

Low Oxygen Brewing Blog

A vast page of reference material.

Lastly, the most up to date Low Oxygen Brewing overview THE STATE OF LOW OXYGEN BREWING: ON PROGRESS, UPDATES AND REVIEW

Please use these references and materials to make informed decisions about this brewing style.

MSK_Chess · Oct 10, 2017

Tried and loved it! My Mosaic American Pale Ale stayed fresh for ages. My Stout is the best Stout I have evah made and right now my Kolsch has not touched the air since I pitched the yeast nor will it until its out of the Keg and into the glass. LODO rocks!

user 125772 · Oct 10, 2017

LODO? ...I think I skipped that day of acronym class , I was out brewing beer :mug:

Seriously, I'll pop in from time to time because I'd be interested in learning if there are some practical things that could produce significant, and noticeable changes in my beers.

balrog · Oct 10, 2017

subbed, for curiosity

passedpawn · Oct 10, 2017

Please everyone, just talk civilly about LODO or move on. If you're not interested in doing it, move on without posting. Thanks!

MSK_Chess · Oct 10, 2017

Actually I did the bare minimum. Boiled the Mash and Sparge water to get DO to near zero and quickly chilled the mash to temp, treated it with a very minimal amount of SMB 0.32g to give 25ppm for mash and 0.2g to give sparge 10ppm. As I recirculate I built a little aperture so that I could recirculate under the surface, this served for sparging under the surface as well. I used LODO water for fining with Polyclar 730 plus and purged the head space with CO2 in the conical flask when rehydrating the fining. Also when I fined with gelatin I used LODO water and made sure disturbance was minimal. Now I can do completely closed transfer from carboy to Keg under a little CO2 pressure. Built two simple vessels to take care of suck back when cold crashing, its all good. What I don't have and don't know how to do is a hotbreak filter but a apart from that adjustments were minimal.

Silver_Is_Money · Oct 10, 2017

Subscribed. Looking forward to the day when my LHBS carries Brewtan B.

z-bob · Oct 10, 2017

MSK_Chess said:
Actually I did the bare minimum. Boiled the Mash and Sparge water to get DO to near zero and quickly chilled the mash to temp, treated it with a very minimal amount of SMB 0.32g to give 25ppm for mash and 0.2g to give sparge 10ppm. As I recirculate I built a little aperture so that I could recirculate under the surface, this served for sparging under the surface as well. I used LODO water for fining with Polyclar 730 plus and purged the head space with CO2 in the conical flask when rehydrating the fining. Also when I fined with gelatin I used LODO water and made sure disturbance was minimal. Now I can do completely closed transfer from carboy to Keg under a little CO2 pressure. Built two simple vessels to take care of suck back when cold crashing, its all good. What I don't have and don't know how to do is a hotbreak filter but a apart from that adjustments were minimal.

Is that really the minimum? If so I'd be wasting my time to even try, but I'm still interested in this just for the academics.

What I *can* do with my current setup is deoxygenate my mash and sparge water by boiling and by adding Campden tablets. Mash in at 120-ish degrees and acidify with Sauergut, and rest there before raising the temperature to 150 or whatever. And try not to splash too much when transferring the wort. Would that be enough to benefit at all? I do BIAB mashes, and I package my beer in bottles not kegs.

I'm brewing good beer without worrying about O2, and I have a lot of room to grow just with dialing-in my water chemistry and my fermentation temperature control. Lodo can come later, but if there's some low-hanging fruit...

(did the Festbier thread get locked again?)

MSK_Chess · Oct 11, 2017

z-bob said:
Is that really the minimum? If so I'd be wasting my time to even try, but I'm still interested in this just for the academics.

What I *can* do with my current setup is deoxygenate my mash and sparge water by boiling and by adding Campden tablets. Mash in at 120-ish degrees and acidify with Sauergut, and rest there before raising the temperature to 150 or whatever. And try not to splash too much when transferring the wort. Would that be enough to benefit at all? I do BIAB mashes, and I package my beer in bottles not kegs.

I'm brewing good beer without worrying about O2, and I have a lot of room to grow just with dialing-in my water chemistry and my fermentation temperature control. Lodo can come later, but if there's some low-hanging fruit...

(did the Festbier thread get locked again?)

Actually Z-Bob I think that you are doing exactly the same thing just using Campden tablets. I remember reading that a full volume BIAB was considered one of the best methods for controlling oxygen ingress. I never got round to making soured wort for acidification in the mash (just used acid malt) because there was some confusion in my mind because I read about kettle acidification as well and could not understand why it was necessary. I did email one of the guys about it but got no reply.

Big Monk · Oct 11, 2017

Even if people aren't interested in Low Oxygen, our brewing references page is a treasure trove in and of itself.

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

RPIScotty said:
Even if people aren't interested in Low Oxygen, our brewing references page is a treasure trove in and of itself.

Hi Scotty can you tell us how to make a hotbreak filter and if or why kettle acidification with soured wort is necessary. Would be really interested in finding out. Cheers!

Big Monk · Oct 12, 2017

MSK_Chess said:
Hi Scotty can you tell us how to make a hotbreak filter and if or why kettle acidification with soured wort is necessary. Would be really interested in finding out. Cheers!

A hot break filter? Not sure what you mean but don't overthink it: remove hot and cold break as you normally would with a nice whirlpool during and after chilling.

For Sauergut, I default to this:

http://www.lowoxygenbrewing.com/ingredients/a-sauergut-reactor/

Notice the excerpts from Kunze (the highlighted pages). Sauergut has a ton of great effects on the wort and resulting fermentation and it also scavenges oxygen (not as drastically as the chemical antioxidants but it's there nonetheless) when you dough-in low enough as to not kill the live culture.

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

RPIScotty said:
A hot break filter? Not sure what you mean but don't overthink it: remove hot and cold break as you normally would with a nice whirlpool during and after chilling.

For Sauergut, I default to this:

http://www.lowoxygenbrewing.com/ingredients/a-sauergut-reactor/

Notice the excerpts from Kunze (the highlighted pages). Sauergut has a ton of great effects on the wort and resulting fermentation and it also scavenges oxygen (not as drastically as the chemical antioxidants but it's there nonetheless) when you dough-in low enough as to not kill the live culture.

hotbreak filter

Have a look at this pic below, there are two glass apertures on both kettles. I suspect that these are a type of sight glass to view the clearing of the wort. I could be wrong though. If they are a type of site glass it begs the question how is the wort being filtered as its being boiled? If they are not sight glasses then what are they? They cannot be used for volume as they are too small and the only logical explanation left when all other possibilities have been eliminated is that they must be sight glasses to view the clarity of the wort as its hot break is filtered out. Surely?

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

As for soured wort, I am not that really interested in making a reactor. I need the only fridge I have for fermentation. I am interested in making a soured wort to acidify the mash though and possibly the kettle as well if its required. Although it would help immensely to understand why its needed in the kettle. On a rather positive not I have just tasted my LODO Kolsch and its utterly amazing. It tastes more like a lager than any of the other Kolschs I have made to date. Its very tasty.

Big Monk · Oct 12, 2017

MSK_Chess said:
hotbreak filter

Have a look at this pic below, there are two glass apertures on both kettles. I suspect that these are a type of sight glass to view the clearing of the wort. I could be wrong though. If they are a type of site glass it begs the question how is the wort being filtered as its being boiled? If they are not sight glasses then what are they? They cannot be used for volume as they are too small and the only logical explanation left when all other possibilities have been eliminated is that they must be sight glasses to view the clarity of the wort as its hot break is filtered out. Surely?

They are sight glasses. They aren't used for volume but rather for clarity. It's good to see the wort as you brew. Helps you troubleshoot on the fly if needed (bad conversion, etc.)

The MLT sight glass is used to view conversion progress and wort clarity.

The BK sight glass is used to see clarity of wort as the whirlpool is going.

Beerery can correct me if I've misinterpreted the BK sight glass but i'm pretty sure I got that right.

homoeccentricus · Oct 12, 2017

You can use acid malt instead, like I do.

h22lude · Oct 12, 2017

Subbing to this.

I did email the admins the other day and ask for a LODO sub forum. Yooper emailed me back and said she would bring it up to the other admins and try to get it implemented.

Big Monk · Oct 12, 2017

MSK_Chess said:
As for soured wort, I am not that really interested in making a reactor. I need the only fridge I have for fermentation. I am interested in making a soured wort to acidify the mash though and possibly the kettle as well if its required. Although it would help immensely to understand why its needed in the kettle. On a rather positive not I have just tasted my LODO Kolsch and its utterly amazing. It tastes more like a lager than any of the other Kolschs I have made to date. Its very tasty.

No need to make a reactor. That's a convenience thing if you brew as often as Beerery does.

You would use it in the kettle to drop the wort pH going into the fermenter, just like you would using any other variety of acid.

Big Monk · Oct 12, 2017

homoeccentricus said:
You can use acid malt instead, like I do.

Right. Sauermalz is the next best thing compared to Sauergut and we have been working on implementing revised calculations for it to make its use more reliable.

The only thing you don't get with Sauermalz is the oxidation reduction potential.

Big Monk · Oct 12, 2017

h22lude said:
Subbing to this.

I did email the admins the other day and ask for a LODO sub forum. Yooper emailed me back and said she would bring it up to the other admins and try to get it implemented.

We have a forum at lowoxygenbrewing.com.

I'm not sure how I feel about having subforums on other sites. Doesn't seem all that fair since we have our own forums at our own site. Let popular demand/admin preference drive that I guess.

h22lude · Oct 12, 2017

RPIScotty said:
We have a forum at lowoxygenbrewing.com.

I'm not sure how I feel about having subforums on other sites. Doesn't seem all that fair since we have our own forums at our own site. Let popular demand/admin preference drive that I guess.

Isn't it just like having homebrewtalk, aha, reddit, beeradvocate? They are all home brewing forums. I'd think having LODO brewing on different forums would get more people to try it and more information available. Plus having a sub forum isn't much different than having a thread about it. A sub forum would keep it more organized than people asking different questions in the same thread.

I guess if people don't want a sub forum here, let the admins know so they don't add it. Or start a poll and see how many people would like or not like a LODO sub forum.

z-bob · Oct 12, 2017

I just read that pdf on Bavarian Helles, and if 1 ppm dissolved oxygen is the upper limit, and no copper is allowed anywhere on the hot side, it's a waste of time for me to even try.

I still like the idea of using Sauergut to acidify the mash, and having my own reactor to make it. The water here is quite alkaline, and my beers got a lot better when I started using acid malt.

Big Monk · Oct 12, 2017

z-bob said:
I just read that pdf on Bavarian Helles, and if 1 ppm dissolved oxygen is the upper limit, and no copper is allowed anywhere on the hot side, it's a waste of time for me to even try.

I still like the idea of using Sauergut to acidify the mash, and having my own reactor to make it. The water here is quite alkaline, and my beers got a lot better when I started using acid malt.

You'd be surprised what a few changes in process and metabisulfite will do. You can certainly stay well below 1 ppm on the hot side. Easily. The cold side processes may take some trial and error for you but when you dial that in then there is no reason you can't stay below 0.15 ppm on the cold side.

Just like anything it will take some practice and some change. You can certainly get there though.

As far as copper is concerned, use Brewtan B/gallotannins as recommended in the mash and boil.

Try reading this:

http://www.lowoxygenbrewing.com/low-oxygen-methods/

and this:

http://www.lowoxygenbrewing.com/brewing-methods/low-oxygen-review/

Hanglow · Oct 12, 2017

I tried this for the last porter I made, using the trifecta of SMB/AA/Brewtan B (as I have copper in my copper

) I did notice greatly reduced aroma coming from the mash. If anyone in the UK wants Brewtan B then the malt miller sells it for a very reasonable price.

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

RPIScotty said:
They are sight glasses. They aren't used for volume but rather for clarity. It's good to see the wort as you brew. Helps you troubleshoot on the fly if needed (bad conversion, etc.)

The MLT sight glass is used to view conversion progress and wort clarity.

The BK sight glass is used to see clarity of wort as the whirlpool is going.

Beerery can correct me if I've misinterpreted the BK sight glass but i'm pretty sure I got that right.

ok now i understand! Yes it makes sense. I thought that perhaps the wort was somehow circulated and filtered as it boiled, clearly that's not the case and a conventional whirlpool is used.

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

homoeccentricus said:
You can use acid malt instead, like I do.

I do use acid malt just like you although i doubt its quite the same as using soured wort.

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

z-bob said:
I just read that pdf on Bavarian Helles, and if 1 ppm dissolved oxygen is the upper limit, and no copper is allowed anywhere on the hot side, it's a waste of time for me to even try.

I still like the idea of using Sauergut to acidify the mash, and having my own reactor to make it. The water here is quite alkaline, and my beers got a lot better when I started using acid malt.

I have copper too and still have good results attempting LODO. I don't use Brewtan B in the mash though but i do use SMB in the mash and sparge and Polyclar 730 plus after fermentation and as far as i can tell it too is an anti-oxidant.

MSK_Chess · Oct 12, 2017

I must say gentlemen that I do find the proclivity for using German words not a little pretentious. What's wrong with acid malt and soured wort? Nah just messin wid yah!

schematix · Oct 12, 2017

whovous · Oct 12, 2017

The OFFICIAL Low Oxygen Brewing Thread, AKA lodo, lowdo, LOB

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