Floaters

[keatz85]

Finished my 4th all grain batch and have been noticing 'floaters." Mash tun is homemade and a rectangular cooler w the steel dishwasher hose as a filter and a ball valve then nipple. I do about 8 quarts of vorlauf after the mash. There arent chunks of grain and the wort is pretty clear but there are little floaters in it if you look closely that the vorlauf wont get out. I do batch sparging then repeat the vorlauf. I could have the ball valve too open. I start slow but end up with it fully open. I do Irish moss the last 15 of the boil. The particles get bigger during the boil. After the boil and chill i pour the wort through a steel strainer. There are still floaters and I think they get bigger during fermentation. I haven't noticed floaters in the final product though. Picture below which is about 24 hours into fermentation. Is this normal and I'm being a worry wort? Or should I work up a filter after the ball valve or something else?

 

[keatz85]

Better pic attached now

 

[jro238]

just looks like grain particulate/husk to me. Ideally you won't transfer much of this to your boil/fermentation, but it certainly isn't the end of the world to end up with some. It'll all just settle out.

 

[cluckk]

Nothing to worry about here.

 

[mjackson]

I use a 70 Qt cooler as a MLT, I vorlauf way more than 8 quarts. I usually starts a wide open to just flow liquid. I never shut the valve off, just raise your hose above the level of the tun and your water flow will stop. I run about 8 Qt at full blast then I throttle back on my output, usually i run about 1/3 to 1/2 the way open. I tend to get much cleaner wort this way. Main thing I would really stay away from is opening and closing the valve, each time you do you create a bit of a water hammer that could disturb the grain bed and cause you to collect more grain particles than you would otherwise.

I am no expert but this is what works for me on my setup.

 

[pondochris]

Worry wort sounds liek such a brewing term. All my brews look like that. just clumps of proteins and yeast looks like to me. They'll settle out within a couple weeks.

Here's the first youtube I found when I searched for "high krausen"

 

[mdennytoo]

I see protien break and residual trub. This looks normal. According to Palmer, Michael Lewis, and Mr. Wizard, a little trub needs to go into your fermenter for yeast health. (free amino nitrogen- F.A.N.) A half inch to 2 inches or so is good for the yeast. I can pour (apparently) completely clear cooled wort into my fermenter, but an hour later there will be a layer of trub on the bottom and when fermentation gets going, there is the swirl storm you see in these pics you gave.

 

[pdietert]

It is just yeast flocculation