Cold Break Questions

[srl135]

I am looking to brew my second batch of beer this weekend and hopefully will improve on the cold break. This time i was thinking i would cool the wort down as much as i could in 10 minutes (ice bath in sink) and then pour into the primary bucket and add cooled water to establish a true cold break. I doubt i can bring more than 3 gallons to a boil on my stove so i would need to add more. I will probably boil a max of 3 gallons of wort and later add 2 gallons of water.

1. Will this method work? Any problems with establishing a cold break in this fashion?

2. How cold is too cold for yeast? Assuming the fridge will cool to ~40*F and i will still have relatively warm wort i doubt i could get much below 70*F....

3. Does my cooled (adder) water need to be boiled before i cool it/add it? I am buying bottled purified water..

4. If this method is all wrong, do you suppose i ruined my first batch? I boiled 2.5 gallons of wort, cooled for 40 minutes, combined with room temperature (~72F) bottled water to total 5 gallons in primary. Resulting temp was about 77F when i pitched the yeast. Just wondering..

Thanks for the advice!

 

[rjwhite41]

Have you tried to boil 5 gallons on your stove? I went and helped a friend brew his first batch last weekend and we got 6 gallons going on a standard electric stove. Wort chiller is the best way to establish a cold break by the way.

 

[Captain Damage]

The way I do it is when I start my (2-1/2 gallon) boil I put a gallon of water in the freezer. When the boil is finished, I put my thermometer probe in the kettle, I put the kettle in the sink, fill the sink with ice (15lb bag from the supermarket), sprinkle salt generously on the ice, pour the gallon of water from the freezer into the wort and fill the sink with cold tap water. I spin the kettle for a minute or so at a time a few times until I read 75F which usually takes about 12 minutes.

Wort goes in the fermenter, I top up to 5-1/2 gallons with filtered tap water, which further reduces the temperature to about 66F-68F. Shake to aerate and mix thoroughly. Draw off a sample for my OG reading and pitch my yeast.

Super fast cooling gives me nice clear beer!

 

[RM-MN]

Ice bath in the sink will chill the wort fairly quickly but a bigger container will be faster. Get yourself a big plastic tub so you have room enough to move the kettle around. Fill it to the point that when the kettle is set in it, the water plus the ice you will dump in on the outside of the kettle will be at or below the level of the wort so your kettle doesn't float. Dump in ice to cool that water, lots of ice if you can but still keep the water level from floating the kettle. Move the kettle around as it cools so there is always cold water against the warm kettle. I can cool 3 gallons of wort in 15 to 20 minutes this way.

Yeast will survive a wide range of temperatures but it prefers to work within a much smaller range, mostly between 60 and 70 for ale yeast. As the temperature goes up, the speed of ferment does too which causes the temperature to go up some more. If it gets too high, the beer will have off flavors and/or fusel alcohols. Try to keep it from getting to warm, again using cool water in that plastic container with ice added if necesseary.

 

[rpappi]

i have always been told not to use purified water.

i think spring water was good but not purified.

 

[IffyG]

Yeast will survive a wide range of temperatures but it prefers to work within a much smaller range, mostly between 60 and 70 for ale yeast.

I'd probably word that something like this "as brewers we prefer to keep it as between 60 and 70*" the yeast itself is perfectly happy at 90*, but as you mentioned it spews off stuff we don't want.

 

[Captain Damage]

i have always been told not to use purified water.
i think spring water was good but not purified.

Purified (distilled or RO) water is ok, even preferable, for extract brewing. With extracts you're getting the water profile from the maltster. Some spring water is pretty hard.

 

[srl135]

is there a better water option than purified or spring? My next batch is going to be a grain based recipe.

 

[DregAddict]

You should be fine cooling in an ice bath and then topping off with colder water. I would try to get my temp down to 70 though. Just be patient. You already spent the time with all the other steps, so don't rush to pitch your yeast. Also, one problem a lot of people have when they top off with extra water is an inaccurate OG reading because the newly added water doesn't initially mix well with the wort. Just spend a couple minutes giving the wort a good stir after you top off. This will also help to aerate the wort before you pitch the yeast. This should help to minimize any chance of getting a bad OG reading.

 

[srl135]

I thought the cold break was supposed to be a process done as quickly as possible?