dry hopping under pressure

[mhb69]

I presently use a 50L sanke as my fermenter, but not under pressure. I'm slowly getting the gear together to ferment under pressure and have been reading up on the process. While I think I've got the process pretty well worked out from start to finish in terms of ramping temps and pressures, one thing that I just can't figure out is how people are dry hopping their pressure-fermented beer. If I open up the fermenter to add the hops, won't I lose a lot of the CO2 (in a huge burst of foam from what I read)? And then the real question is how to rack the beer off the hop sludge? Do people cut their spears? If not, won't it just clog up when trying to push the beer to a secondary or serving kegs? So how do those of you doing pressurized ferments solve the dry hopping questions?

Thanks for info!

 

[eastoak]

i wonder if carbonic acid would affect the dry hopping in some way?

 

[acidrain]

Just because you ferment under pressure doesn't mean you serve from the same keg.
I ferment in Sanke's, and here's what I do...

• Transfer, pitch, and oxygenate into a cleaned and sanitized Sanke.
• Attach the spunding valve and put in the fermentation chamber.
• Adjust spunding valve so that it blows off most of the pressure... maybe 1 or 2 psi.
• Check activity daily by releasing a bit of pressure, then turn it up a little more (everyday) until after about the 5th day, you're up to 10 psi.
• Ferment out until you reach final gravity, and have given enough time to clean up.
• Switch the fermentation chamber to cold crash, and crash it for a day or two.
• Hook the Co2 up to it and transfer (drawing clear beer only) to a second cleaned, sanitized, and purged keg. This is when you will add the dry hops if wanted.
• Continue carbing. If you have dry hopped, keep it at room temp for the dry hop period. At the end of the period, de-pressurize and pull the hops.
• If you're not dry hopping, put the secondary keg in the fridge and carb normally.
• After the beer is carbed in the fridge, you can either bottle it, or serve from the keg.

Having said all that, I skip some steps...
I serve from the second keg, and I don't pull the dry hops, so I throw the hops in, put it directly in the fridge, and force carb it at 30 psi for 24-48 hrs. Then purge and lower to serving pressure.

The bottom line is, the primary fermentation will not carb to serving pressure... the Co2 won't fully dissolve in warm beer, and you can't cool it while fermenting (except lagers, and even then only partially) or the yeast won't work. Also, you want to draw the clean beer off the yeast and trub.

I love fermenting in Sanke's... it has made kegging/transferring so much easier, but it doesn't do everything.

 

[mhb69]

Hi acidrain, thanks for that. I was working under the impression that people were dry hopping in the primary (which is what I do currently). But it makes sense to rack to a clean and purged secondary with your dry hops already in there. Because you say you de-pressurize and pull the hops, I guess you are using a sock or net of some sort. That sounds like a must, but I was hoping to let the little guys swim naked (which is what I do now).

thanks again

 

[acidrain]

I use either a strainer bag or a ss mesh ball and just toss it in. The cornies are great for hopping... the Sanke's not so much.

 

[gnor]

Acidrain, what is the size of the sanke keg that you use to ferment? I'm trying to figure out the headroom I need for a 5 gallon batch.