Snood
Well-Known Member
Hi Guys,
a couple of weeks ago i did my first brew using pellet hops, well actually a mix of pellet and whole leaf. Up till now I've only used 100% whole leaf without issues. The reason for getting pellet hops is that my homebrew shop didn't have all the varieties I wanted in whole leaf form.
This brew was a messy disaster, everything was going okay until it came to draining my boiler. First I tried pumping over to the fermenter but within seconds the filter was clogged with the pellet hops. I then tried to use the autosyphon but the leaf hops clogged that. Eventially I had to resort to pouring it out through a kitchen sifter in small batches, clearing the sifter after each pour. I did my best to minimise infection and it seems to have fermented okay and the sample I took the other day didn't show any signs of infection (fingers crossed it will stay that way)
Naturally I'm now very nervous about using pellet hops again, i have another brew planned for the Easter weekend and the recipe once again calls for these hops so I'm desperately trying to figure out how i can effectively drain the boiler without too much of an issue.
I fear that my equipment doesn't lend itself well to using these hops. My boiler is the second one on this page but i've modified it so that there is a copper tube which goes down into the element sump so that i don't waste the few litres of liquid left down there. There's a couple of other modifications, i'll post a picture tonight when i'm home from work. The pump I use is only a small one and I don't think it would handle the pellets very well if I allowed the sludge to go through it.
Is there perhaps anything (bag?) which can contain the hops during the boil but still allow good liquid flow to the hops thus not harm the utilisation too much? any other recommendations?
a couple of weeks ago i did my first brew using pellet hops, well actually a mix of pellet and whole leaf. Up till now I've only used 100% whole leaf without issues. The reason for getting pellet hops is that my homebrew shop didn't have all the varieties I wanted in whole leaf form.
This brew was a messy disaster, everything was going okay until it came to draining my boiler. First I tried pumping over to the fermenter but within seconds the filter was clogged with the pellet hops. I then tried to use the autosyphon but the leaf hops clogged that. Eventially I had to resort to pouring it out through a kitchen sifter in small batches, clearing the sifter after each pour. I did my best to minimise infection and it seems to have fermented okay and the sample I took the other day didn't show any signs of infection (fingers crossed it will stay that way)
Naturally I'm now very nervous about using pellet hops again, i have another brew planned for the Easter weekend and the recipe once again calls for these hops so I'm desperately trying to figure out how i can effectively drain the boiler without too much of an issue.
I fear that my equipment doesn't lend itself well to using these hops. My boiler is the second one on this page but i've modified it so that there is a copper tube which goes down into the element sump so that i don't waste the few litres of liquid left down there. There's a couple of other modifications, i'll post a picture tonight when i'm home from work. The pump I use is only a small one and I don't think it would handle the pellets very well if I allowed the sludge to go through it.
Is there perhaps anything (bag?) which can contain the hops during the boil but still allow good liquid flow to the hops thus not harm the utilisation too much? any other recommendations?