Campden Tablets - Potassium Metabisulfite useage.

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kartracer2

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I have been using campden tabs to treat my water for chlorine and I extract brew. I split 1 tab and it goes into the boil pot before I steep grains ( when used). After steeping the grain I'll add some extract and water to start a 3 gal. boil. I put remainder 1/2 tab in a jug, (1/2 gal +/-) of water to dissolve it. After cooling the brew pot to close to what ever pitching temp is and I put the wort into the fermenter. Then I will split the jug with the dissolved campden into 3 gal. jugs and fill them to as close to pitching temp as I can for top-off water.
So my question is this; Is the campden still effective when splitting and diluting as I described above? I assume it is but it's just a (silly?) question that popped into my head today.
Thanks and cheers, :mug:
Joel B.
 
One Campden tablet is sufficient to treat 20 gallons of water. It doesn't matter if you split it and divide it, you are using way too much.
 
Added in the fermenter I think it will hinder yeast growth, not sure if natively toxic to the yeast but it does absorb oxygen which is important to early yeast growth and so that might be suppressed. Based on the dosing above use 1/4 tablet for 5 gallons, take out water into separate container for your top off to leave the volume you are mixing with your extract. So 4 brews from one campden tablet.
 
I would say you are getting your money's worth out of it. From my understanding of it a campden tablet will drive off chlorine and kill any noxious bugs in your water (that's the primary reason wine makers use it as I understand.)
 
So how do I treat my water and yet keep it out of the fermenter?
If you put a quarter of a Campden tablet in 5 or 6 gallons water pre brew. Then draw off water until you have your dissolving / boiling quantity then use that. The drawn off water keep it for topping up the fermenter. Because it's at the correct dose it will neutralise the chlorine and there won't be much left to cause hinder your yeast.
Currently you are putting 1/2 tablet in boil and excess will boil off so no worries but the other half in 3 gallons would be 3 and a 1/3 times too much and no boil off.
 
The unreacted Campden tablet will boil off and many other volatiles that are in the extract water mix.
You could make a stiffer dose and dilute it, I don't mind if that's easier for you, as long as you get the proportions right.
 
@DuncB Thanks for your info. I will probably lessen my dosing of campden in future but I have not noticed any longer lag time or any other fermenting issues after I started using them at my current rate. I can't say for sure it's even having any effect on the flavor of my beer. I have read it slows down fermenting in wine but they are dosing a 1 tab per gallon.
Cheers, :mug:
Joel B.
 
I use about 0.5 g of sodium metabisulphate for 25 litres , the wine I make the kit says to use 1.5g at the packaging stage if it's being kept for more than 3 months. So that's in 23 litres of wine. I can't notice it. Some people are using it in their kegs as an antioxidant at packaging for the same reason, to reduce oxidation of hoppy beers. Some are sensitive to the bisulphates looks like neither of us are.
 
If you have tabs, crush them into a powder and measure the usage in grams. My understanding is that you need .035g/gal, so that's the calculation I use. Much easier then breaking up a tab into quarters or whatever. Also, this is for treating water for chlorine/chloramines for beer; k-meta has other usage levels depending on the type of beverage and usage.
 
If you have tabs, crush them into a powder and measure the usage in grams. My understanding is that you need .035g/gal, so that's the calculation I use. Much easier then breaking up a tab into quarters or whatever. Also, this is for treating water for chlorine/chloramines for beer; k-meta has other usage levels depending on the type of beverage and usage.

How did you come up with the weight to use? Is it the weight of a tablet divided by 20?
 
Sort of. Early in the thread it was mentioned that 1 tab can treat 20 gal of water. A tab contains 0.44g of k-meta. 0.44/20 = .022g/gal. I increased that by a smidge to be safe. But as I'm typing this, I realize that I wasn't accounting for the filler in the tabs, but calculating for pure k-meta....if you want to come up with an equivalent (including the filler), then yeah, I would take the weight of a tab, divide it by 4, then divide that by 20.
 
I split my tablet in half, crush half and add it to my heated strike water before I add any other water treatment. In the five minutes or so it takes me to measure out my gypsum, calcium chloride, etc. it's done its job and my mash water has been de-chlorinated. (De-chrloraminated? LOL...)

Is it technically too much? A bit, yes. Will that cause any issues whatsoever? Nope, not at all.

PS. My process is no-sparge, so I don't have to treat any more water during the brewday. The second half of the tablet gets stored in the splitter / crusher for the next brewday.
 
In this thread Campden Tablets (Sulfites) and Brewing Water, AJ DeLang wrote: "What's the first thing you notice when you play with Campden tablets? Your answer should be "I smell sulfur dioxide." Metabisulfite is often referred to as 'solid SO2' and it is indeed SO2 which destroys chloramine. The fact that you can smell the sulfur dioxide says that at least some of it is leaving the solution. Wait long enough and presumably enough of the SO2 will have escaped to render the solution less effective than when fresh. That said, it doesn't take much to do the job so that even if you let it stand overnight there may be enough SO2 left. Remember the simple test in the Sticky. If you can't smell chlorine then you have added enough SO2. It probably would be sensible to store unused solution in a tightly capped small jar. That will reduce the amount of SO2 which can get away." (Post #13)

So I try to get rid of the chlorine/chloramine right away rather than let the campden treated water sit out and add more water later. To solve this problem, I mix up a crushed campden tablet in 4 cups of water, then quickly add about 3/4 cup to 3 gallons of what will be my top-off water, and another 3/4 cup to the roughly 2.5 gallons in the boil kettle. The chlorine is removed before the dissolved campden can dissipate.
 
@ncbrewer Thanks for your info and the thread link. If anybody uses campden tabs they should read it. I found the answers I was looking for and then some. The links in the thread are not working for me but they probably have more info than my old & feeble brain could comprehend any way. (LOL).
Thanks again and Cheers, :mug:
Joel B.
 
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