Is this poor practice, and why?

[Mrakis]

So, in most kit instructions it says to drop the wort temperature to say 100 degrees, as quickly as possible before transferring to the primary. Then top off with cold water to reach 5 gallons. If i am doing a partial 3 gallon boil, and i put 2 gallons of water in the freezer while boiling, can't i top off the cooling wort with the cold 2 gallons in order to drop he temperature of the wort faster (in addition to the ice bath)?

 

[h22lude]

Yes you can do that. Just make sure to boil the water first and use a sanitized container. Or you can put store bought gallons in the fridge.

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

You can do this.

 

[TTB-J]

Nope, that's a perfectly acceptable practice - I would suspect that most people that do partial boils will chill their top off water to aid in getting the wort to pitching temperatures.

 

[rhamilton]

Until the wort gets down below 80°, you risk oxidation -- so I don't transfer at all until it gets in the 70°-75° range.

Using colder water is fine.

 

[MotorcycleMatt]

You don't risk oxidation, you need to aerate your wort so the yeast have oxygen

 

[H-ost]

I think Rhamilton is referring to Hot Side Aeration, this has only been thought of an issue for All Grain and it is during the transfer from MLT to Kettle. However, my personal experience is that it has not created issues for me but because I have never payed attention to avoiding it I don't have a good basis for comparison.

 

[ThatGuyRyan]

You don't risk oxidation, you need to aerate your wort so the yeast have oxygen

You don't aerate hot abouve 80 or you will risk oxidation.

 

[rhamilton]

I based the oxidization claim on - http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter6-9-3.html

 

[IrregularPulse]

You don't aerate hot abouve 80 or you will risk oxidation.

yes, if you live in the homebrewing community 5-10 years ago you risk HSA. If you live in the current homebrewing community, you realize that while in theory it may have some truth to it, in practice, its a big boogie man myth.

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

yes, if you live in the homebrewing community 5-10 years ago you risk HSA. If you live in the current homebrewing community, you realize that while in theory it may have some truth to it, in practice, its a big boogie man myth.

Which one Travolta or Wahlberg?

 

[TTB-J]

I based the oxidization claim on - http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter6-9-3.html

At most, you should add chilled top off water carefully, trying not to slosh it too much. Palmer is very conservative, so some of the things he describes are really above and beyond what you need to do to prevent bad things from happening to your beer. I've known many homebrewers that poor chilled top off water into still hot wort, myself included, and none of us have ever had a problem with oxidation from that practice.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

Until the wort gets down below 80°, you risk oxidation -- so I don't transfer at all until it gets in the 70°-75° range.

Using colder water is fine.

You don't risk oxidation, you need to aerate your wort so the yeast have oxygen

You don't aerate hot abouve 80 or you will risk oxidation.

hot side aeration is debatable. i've seen plenty of video of breweries moving hot wort in a manner that has to introduce oxygen to some degree. there was just a thread about this the other day.
here's the link. there's a video linked a few posts in that shows this.

OP, your brew's fine. when i did partial boils, i would chill my wort to ~80, maybe a bit cooler, and then add refrigerated spring water to top it off. i'm sure there were many a time i transferred >80 degree wort and i've yet to taste an oxidized homebrew. i think you'd probably have some issues if you transferred 160 degree wort, and then added cold water, but like i said above, that's debatable.

 

[IrregularPulse]

At most, you should add chilled top off water carefully, trying not to slosh it too much. Palmer is very conservative, so some of the things he describes are really above and beyond what you need to do to prevent bad things from happening to your beer. I've known many homebrewers that poor chilled top off water into still hot wort, myself included, and none of us have ever had a problem with oxidation from that practice.

Not to mention, the online HTB is Edition 1. Even Palmer has changed his ideas and views in later editions.

 

[BrewKnurd]

I defer to Dr. Charlie Bamforth on the HSA issue. His opinion is that you certainly shouldn't intentionally slosh the hell out of your hot wort, or do other things to go out of your way to add oxygen to hot wort, but O2 added at packaging is going to have a much greater impact on the finished product, particularly in regards to staling, than anything you'd do in normal handling post boil.

That said, a reason to add cold water later in the cooling process is that cooling is driven by the temp differential between the wort and whatever you're cooling with. So you will get faster cooling if you let the ice bath take care of the initial cooling (when there's a large temp delta) and then top off at the tail end, when the heat transfer to the ice bath is slowing down.

 

[unionrdr]

I normaly do a 3 gallon partial boil,& cool the BK in a sink full of ice that's topped off with water. More ice that way. I cool it down to 70F in 20 minutes. Then pour that & cold top off water through a fine mesh strainer to aerate & get the larger paticles,hops,etc out of it. Then stir roughly for 5 minutes. Better to start out low & come back up temp wise.

 

[gr8shandini]

. . .
That said, a reason to add cold water later in the cooling process is that cooling is driven by the temp differential between the wort and whatever you're cooling with. So you will get faster cooling if you let the ice bath take care of the initial cooling (when there's a large temp delta) and then top off at the tail end, when the heat transfer to the ice bath is slowing down.

Before I switched to an immersion chiller, I did something similar for the same reason. I'd initially place the kettle in a sink of just cold water until it got to about 100-120F, then drained the (now hot) water in the sink and re-fill with ice and water to finish the cooling.

So far as HSA goes, I'm of the understanding that it's a long term shelf-life problem. If you're like me and consume most of your beers within a month or two of their "born on date," I don't think it's really an issue.

 

[unionrdr]

I still have to of my Burton ales I brewed for Christmas in the fridge. Good head,decent carbonation & flavor. And no ill long term effects since I try to get things right the first time. I just think it's better to chill down to pitch temp in the BK,then top off with cold water in the FV.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

I defer to Dr. Charlie Bamforth on the HSA issue. His opinion is that you certainly shouldn't intentionally slosh the hell out of your hot wort, or do other things to go out of your way to add oxygen to hot wort, but O2 added at packaging is going to have a much greater impact on the finished product, particularly in regards to staling, than anything you'd do in normal handling post boil.

So far as HSA goes, I'm of the understanding that it's a long term shelf-life problem. If you're like me and consume most of your beers within a month or two of their "born on date," I don't think it's really an issue.

gr8, i think that's a big part of it. oxidation is a concern because it accelerates the aging/staling of the beer. if you're careful to keep the sloshing of hot wort, and ready to package beer to a minimum, then it shouldn't be a big concern. especially if you consume your beer quickly. for a beer you plan to shelf, take extra care to not splash already boiled, hot wort, or ready to transfer beer, and the introduction of o2 should be minimal and the beer should age properly.

 

[jpietraski]

The goal is to achieve your pitching temperature as fast as possible.
This is done faster by cooling the hot wort, then adding the additional water/ice; Rather than adding the water/ice, then chilling.