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cider pasteurization - new idea

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aschmidy

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So, i have searched the internet high and low to find a good way to back sweeten and pasteurize ciders ( bottle fermented) and have only found the old way.... (heat up a pot and dunk them in 190 degree water).. NO WAY .. I have a new idea.. if you look at the way tunnel pasteurizers work, it has to do with slow heat up and cool down with time and temp in the center 2 zones being the critical factors. So why not use this in home brewing? It's simple really. So i use my kettle as the hot water supply, and pump water from the kettle into a cooler with a false bottom inside, and return that water back to the kettle using gravity. If I slowly heat the water and use a series of spray pipes like a retort or autoclave, why would I not achieve the same results? The only issue is the temp over how much time ...
So i mount a copper pipe with a bunch of tiny holes in a cooler large enough to hold 48 bottles of beer. ( simple enough... right?) and then control my temp and time by the flame on the kettle and how long it stays above 60C in the cooler ( 15 min ish) and then slowly cut the flame to slow the "cooling" as the pump recirculates... emulating the slow rise and decline that tunnel pasteurizers use on a commercial basis .

I hope this helps a lot of cider brewers like myself out there... cheap and easy..
 
This seems needlessly complicated, but I think there is an element that can be added to improve current stove-top pasteurization.

The point of a tunnel pasteurizer is that many bottles can pass through the unit and be pasteurized without stopping the conveyor belt. The spray nozzles permit the bottles to be heated as they pass through without requiring full immersion in a heating bath. This is not applicable to homebrew-type, small-batch pasteurization.

It seems as though spray nozzles inside a cooler are unnecessary if you can simply introduce hot water into the cooler from your boil kettle, then pump through cooled water when the sterilization cycle is complete. It is more efficient to heat or cool bottles by immersing them in a temperature-cooled liquid than by spraying the bottles with the liquid..

Perhaps after your idea is parsed down to the simplest components, we can take away the idea of using a cooling coil to chill the bottles more rapidly following pasteurization in a kettle, cooler, or mash tun- whatever works best with existing brewing equipment on hand.
 
It is not complicated at all, you cut the flame on the kettle after the (60C ) temp is achieved for the time needed and let it cool to ambient. But yes the addition of wort chiller would accelerate the cooling temp from the pasteurization. BUT, the key to tunnel pasteurization is slow heat and cool in the interest of keeping the bottles intact after pressurization. This is the simplest and lowest cost method that I have found.
 
The simplest and lowest cost method is to put them in a water bath, like canning. The concern is that the pressure is greater than the bottles will stand, and they'll explode. But remember that you're not boiling the water (or the cider), just heating to pasteurization temp.

In the spray system, you'll lose heat as it sprays out in the cooler, so it seems like it would be harder to control in the kettle - would take a lot of monitoring.
 
You're basically pumping hot water into the cooler until you hit 60C, then wait the right amount of time, then let it cool down?

Put your bottles in your kettle, with one bottle uncapped (filled with water) and stick a thermometer in it. Turn the heat on and heat until the thermometer reads 60C for the required time. Kill the heat and let cool. Use a remote thermometer with a wire so that you can put the lid on and stay back.
 
I guess the other point of this is so that I can do all 48 bottles from a 5 gallon batch at the same time whereas I cannot fit them all in my kettle. Both methods are very much alike, I'll agree with that. It just seems more safe to be able to close the lid on my cooler with all of the bottles in it at once instead of having to transfer many bottles in and out of a water bath.
I'll be making this contraption soon so I wanted to throw it out there and see what kind of response I would get from other cider brewers. I appreciate all of your input.
 
I guess the other point of this is so that I can do all 48 bottles from a 5 gallon batch at the same time whereas I cannot fit them all in my kettle. Both methods are very much alike, I'll agree with that. It just seems more safe to be able to close the lid on my cooler with all of the bottles in it at once instead of having to transfer many bottles in and out of a water bath.
I'll be making this contraption soon so I wanted to throw it out there and see what kind of response I would get from other cider brewers. I appreciate all of your input.

I really like the thought of being able to pasteurize 48 bottles in one session, instead of around 6 sessions , would save some serious time, But I've seen some pretty bad pics in here of bottle explosions! hate to think how many bottles you would loose if you had one weak bottle go off with 48 in the same bath!
 
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