Closed Transfer questions

[daphatgrant]

Question are in red if you want to skip the backstory.

Hey HBT, I just did my first closed transfer, all in all it seemed to go pretty smoothly but I am left with a few questions. I'll mention that I'm using the SSBrewtech Brewbucket with the little racking arm.

In the past with the fermenter I've removed the lid and curved dome piece from the 3piece bubbler and put some aluminum foil over the opening that I sprayed with starsan. I'd leave the lid on the keg slightly ajar so I could look in and check on how the filling was going. As the level of the keg got to 3/4 or so I'd crack the lid on the fermenter and see what the yeast cake/trub level looked like. I never had trouble with this method but I figured why not try and improve my process by doing a closed transfer.

Today's process of doing a closed transfer was a little convoluted as I'm using a blowoff tube that goes into Jaybirds CO2 harvester setup. What I ended up doing was attaching a hose from the regulator and pushing it through the airlock grommet on the CO2 harvester so I was forcing CO2 through starsan and then into the fermenter. I then forced a 5/16ID hose over the brewbucket ball valve barb that went to the out on my keg. I then weighed the keg with the hose attached to get a final weight which was 50lbs, I did peek to see how full the keg was when I hit 48lbs.

My questions are;

1a. If I get a rather large yeast cake or a lot of trub or both in the bottom of my fermenter and the little racking arm picks them up I guess I am going to be pushing them into the keg? (one disadvantage of non transparent fermenters)

1b. Should I put the racking arm at the 4 or 8 o'clock positon and leave it there?

2. Next time should I be able to set up the transfer equipment and just transfer until I get my weight (50lbs)?

Thanks HBT!

 

[Smellyglove]

If you want to most of your wort set the racking arm to a position you know you'll be getting some trub, point the hose or whatever down the drain and rotate your arm until you see clear beer. I guess you know what to do after you see clear beer

Don't go full bore as that can disturb and suck up some trub.

 

[stickyfinger]

Question are in red if you want to skip the backstory.

Hey HBT, I just did my first closed transfer, all in all it seemed to go pretty smoothly but I am left with a few questions. I'll mention that I'm using the SSBrewtech Brewbucket with the little racking arm.

In the past with the fermenter I've removed the lid and curved dome piece from the 3piece bubbler and put some aluminum foil over the opening that I sprayed with starsan. I'd leave the lid on the keg slightly ajar so I could look in and check on how the filling was going. As the level of the keg got to 3/4 or so I'd crack the lid on the fermenter and see what the yeast cake/trub level looked like. I never had trouble with this method but I figured why not try and improve my process by doing a closed transfer.

Today's process of doing a closed transfer was a little convoluted as I'm using a blowoff tube that goes into Jaybirds CO2 harvester setup. What I ended up doing was attaching a hose from the regulator and pushing it through the airlock grommet on the CO2 harvester so I was forcing CO2 through starsan and then into the fermenter. I then forced a 5/16ID hose over the brewbucket ball valve barb that went to the out on my keg. I then weighed the keg with the hose attached to get a final weight which was 50lbs, I did peek to see how full the keg was when I hit 48lbs.

My questions are;

1a. If I get a rather large yeast cake or a lot of trub or both in the bottom of my fermenter and the little racking arm picks them up I guess I am going to be pushing them into the keg? (one disadvantage of non transparent fermenters)

1b. Should I put the racking arm at the 4 or 8 o'clock positon and leave it there?

2. Next time should I be able to set up the transfer equipment and just transfer until I get my weight (50lbs)?

Thanks HBT!

Since you are using a Brewbucket, I assume money is not a limitation, lol! Seriously, I would recommend trying a Clear Beer Draught "system" with filter (if you can get it to fit on the outlet of your brewbucket). I recently bought one to use for fermenting in my keg for IPAs. I am draining off beautiful samples of beer every few days to check gravity and there are 8 oz of dry hops loosely floating in there.

http://www.clearbeerdraughtsystem.com/

 

[tri_clamp_ninja]

Get a sight glass, run it inline, dump beer until your wort is clear then run into your keg. You may end up with a slightly short keg... this will just show you how much you were picking up before. You also could get really fancy like we do on the commercial side and run a T off your racking arm with 2 valves. Bleed off one side until its clear then run through the other side to your keg.

 

[muledogus]

Since you are using a Brewbucket, I assume money is not a limitation, lol! Seriously, I would recommend trying a Clear Beer Draught "system" with filter (if you can get it to fit on the outlet of your brewbucket). I recently bought one to use for fermenting in my keg for IPAs. I am draining off beautiful samples of beer every few days to check gravity and there are 8 oz of dry hops loosely floating in there.

http://www.clearbeerdraughtsystem.com/

This is a great idea. I just clogged my anvil fermenter trying to take a sample for a gravity reading. I'll blow that out with a little co2 but definitely going to go this route for future batches.

 

[tri_clamp_ninja]

Also, check out Brewer's Clarex (or the diluted homebrew version "Clarity Ferm").

We do not filter our beer in our brewery but we do use S04 english ale yeast so if kegs sit a few weeks they collect sediment at the bottom. We did not want to implement filtration due to the bready profile of S04 being part of our beer's flavor profile and filtering has removed this too much but we still wanted to improve the clarity.

I will not use gelatin or isinglass in my beer nor will I use silicone based finings because I legally would have to filter it anyway (FDA reg). Biofine clear requires a very slow and steady inline dosing method as well as tank mixing, we don't have time for that.

My newly hired assistant suggested the clarex (clarity ferm) because he used it at a prior brewery he worked at and I have to say I am very impressed.

It works off an enzymatic reaction so you simply dose it into your cooled wort into your fv prior to pitching yeast and the enzymes do the rest. It doesn't make your beer "lager clear" but it greatly helps with precipitating solids and haze causing proteins while still leaving full ester profiles and even enough suspended yeast cells to bottle condition (should you intend too). We immediately noticed more efficient yeast dumps out of our conicals, clearer beer in the glass, and no more complaints about "sludge" at the bottom of our kegs.

It has 2 levels of dosing: a lower dosing helps with clarification and a higher dosing reduces gluten, we use the lowest possible dose to great success.

The diluted Clarity Ferm comes in small vials intended for 5-6 gal home brew batches. The commercial grade "Brewer's Clarex" is so insanely concentrated that I only have to use 1.2 mL per 31 gal (per 1 bbl) for haze reduction/clarity improvement and around 2.2 mL per 31 gal (per 1 bbl) for Gluten Reduction.

Even if you are not trying to make a gluten reduced beer you can dose on the low end. You still may decide to filter for additional clarity but using the clarity ferm is a great start and will make a filtration session significantly less frustrating, should you decided to filter anyway.

For real, try the clarity ferm. It's available at most LHBS, is affordable, and if you decide you don't like it for any reason your batch will still be fine and you just simply don't use it again.

 

[ryanj]

This is a great idea. I just clogged my anvil fermenter trying to take a sample for a gravity reading. I'll blow that out with a little co2 but definitely going to go this route for future batches.

Ditto. I clogged my racking arm on the first batch I put in it.

Only dry hopped 2oz and left the arm at 3 o’clock.