Preventing trub from making it on the fermenter

[Dadux]

Ok. So I have been improving my process in the last batches but one thing bothers me slightly. Turb. I dont care about the turb in my fermenter per se. But i use 16L buckets, biab, and a 15L pot. This results in 14L of post boil wort making it into my fermenter. Of those, 2L are junk. This means i get 2 liters of beer less. For me this is a mild problem. I do not wish to buy extra equipment like a bigger pot or much to solve this. But i thought i might be able to do it or at least mitigate it with my current equipment.
I have two ideas but i wanted advice before going through with any.

1- sparge with a couple liters of water, boil them in an extra pot. Then put the 14L i get post boil + those 2 extra in a bucket after chilling. Let it sit overnight (8h?) to sediment and then siphon out the clear wort.
Pros: removes most of the turb, allows better yeast repitching.
Cons: would i be risking contamination? Would the turb sediment in 8h (after cooling to 28°C) or it needs more time? Would it help to put some towels and take it outside (5°C) overnight?

2- my biab bag has somewhat big holes on the bottom, not enough for filtering, but i can fold it and put its sides in a strainer. The sides have smaller pores. Then i could run the wort through this.
Pros: really easy to do
Cons: dont know how much this would remove, or if any. Could this damage my bag even if it says it can be boiled? For some reason i cant find paint strainers here where i live so thats a no-no. I could also use hop bags in a funnel.

3-sludge skimming. I dont bother to skim the brownish foam during boil. Should this be done if pellets are added or whould i be actually removing the hops? I also dont do a strong boil, i just let it sit at 100°C since my pot is so full its too easy to cause boilover.

So any comments would be highly appreciated. If i would manage to get even an extra liter of beer it would be great. Also repitching would save me considerable money.

 

[Mer-man]

First, rack your clear wort to fermentor, and start fermentation.

If you sanitize some tall, narrow soda bottles you can pour your trub-filled wort into them and put them in the fridge overnight. It will separate nicely and then you can just decant the clear wort off the trub into your fermentor.

I did that a few times and even posted a picture of it.

 

[Dadux]

That is...smart. Couple 1.6L glass jars could make the trick. Do you propose whirpooling to concentrate it before splitting? or what? Just let cool in the pot and then siphon? I dont have an inkersion chiller i just split the batch in two pots and cool in the sink. Takes the temp to 50° in less than 10 minutes so it works for me

 

[Mer-man]

I used 1,5L Pepsi Max bottles -- you want as narrow as possible.

I bag my hops and always get a loose hot break, so whirlpooling gets me nothing.

I suggest that you chill like normal, wait for the trub to stabilize at the bootom, carefully rack the clear wort to your fermentor, and then rack the trub-laden wort into the bottles.

 

[Dadux]

YEah my fridge sucks and i dont think i can put those bottles straight in it....but maybe i can just put them outside. Its cold AF at least now.
Ok i see. I will try this next time. Seems like it might prevent a good deal of that turn making in it. I will probably give a try to running it through my biab bag if noone thinks its dangerous, since it seems simple enough.

 

[RM-MN]

I'd suggest putting the trub right into the fermenter but leaving your beer there longer so the trub compacts down a bunch before bottling. Chilling the beer before bottling will help compact the trub too.

 

[portguy]

Make a higher original gravity wort that fits your pot. Dilute with cold water to match your wanted gravity. Concentrate and dilute. And speeds cooling time.

 

[Dadux]

I'd suggest putting the trub right into the fermenter but leaving your beer there longer so the trub compacts down a bunch before bottling. Chilling the beer before bottling will help compact the trub too.

I've been bottling after 3 weeks. I see no extra compaction from week 2 to week 3. In my limited experience that is. So im not so sure that would help much.

 

[helibrewer]

Are you using kettle finings? If so, how much, if not, you should.
Cool the wort, then whirlpool for a few minutes, let the wort settle for 15-20 min then rack off from the edge of the trub pile. Wide, shallow pots work best for whirlpooling but if you are going to transfer to a separate whirlpool vessel, do it before you chill otherwise the transfer will destroy that nice fluffy trub and it will not settle well at all.

For whirlpooling, it is the rest time that forms the trub pile, not the time of the actual whirlpool stirring.

EDIT: Too much kettle fining is as bad as none because it will break the trub up too fine to settle properly.

 

[Zimm9]

I pour my wort through a strainer into the bucket. That catches a lot of trub, aerates the wort, and lets me get a lot more of the wort into the fermentor.

 

[Dadux]

@helibrewer I dont do either since as i said my brew pot contains only as much as my buckets so all goes to the fermenter. I can consider whirpooling but should i stirr and then cool in those 15-20m or let it stand at 100ºC? I ask since if you dont cool, the hops are "boiled" for much longer. Also without inmersion chiller chiling in only my brew kettle is possible, just not as fast. Thats why i transfer half to another pot to double the speed of cooling. I can also do this before chilling and then whirpool in both.

 

[helibrewer]

@helibrewer I dont do either since as i said my brew pot contains only as much as my buckets so all goes to the fermenter. I can consider whirpooling but should i stirr and then cool in those 15-20m or let it stand at 100ºC? I ask since if you dont cool, the hops are "boiled" for much longer. Also without inmersion chiller chiling in only my brew kettle is possible, just not as fast. Thats why i transfer half to another pot to double the speed of cooling. I can also do this before chilling and then whirpool in both.

You can use whirlfloc in the last 10 minutes of the boil to assist with the coagulation of break material, for your brew size, one tablet.

Since you are using a bath, cool the wort, then do the whirlpool. If you split between 2 pots; split, cool, whirlpool

 

[Dadux]

I will not be using whirlfloc next time since the malt is already ordered and i have no LHBS but i might give it try at some point.
Is it important not to disturb the wort between chilling and whirlpooling? What i mean is, is the coagulation of the trub from the chilling necessary for whirlpooling? or it doesnt matter?
Will try whirlpool in my next two batches that i will be making side by side in 1-2 weeks. Cool to 60ºC then whirlpool. Worst case scenario i will transfer the last part to some containers and cold crash it as was already suggested in the thread.
I will do a trial run with the turb from the beer in my buckets when i bottle them to see if my collander with strainer bag can keep the trub out or not.

 

[pvpeacock]

Make a higher original gravity wort that fits your pot. Dilute with cold water to match your wanted gravity. Concentrate and dilute. And speeds cooling time.

Ditto that. I sometimes make 10 gallon batches with only a 10 gallon brew kettle by using more grain in the mash for a higher gravity wort. I then split the post boil wort evenly into two fermenters and top off with cold water to get the desired quantity into the fermenters and the desired original gravity.

 

[RM-MN]

I will not be using whirlfloc next time since the malt is already ordered and i have no LHBS but i might give it try at some point.
Is it important not to disturb the wort between chilling and whirlpooling? What i mean is, is the coagulation of the trub from the chilling necessary for whirlpooling? or it doesnt matter?
Will try whirlpool in my next two batches that i will be making side by side in 1-2 weeks. Cool to 60ºC then whirlpool. Worst case scenario i will transfer the last part to some containers and cold crash it as was already suggested in the thread.
I will do a trial run with the turb from the beer in my buckets when i bottle them to see if my collander with strainer bag can keep the trub out or not.

At the start of the boil you get hot break. The boil keeps that all in suspension. When you chill there will be cold break too. The chilling stops the circulation that you had during the boil and causes the hot break and cold break material to settle. You want as much settled as you can get before you start the whirlpool so that material all ends up in the center of the whirlpool.

 

[eric19312]

Get a bigger fermentation bucket and don't worry about the trub! Fighting the trub is a waste of time on brewday. It will compact on the bottom of your fermentor just fine as you already see. You imagine you are losing beer because it takes a bit of volume for that compacted trub in your fermentor. In reality you are gaining beer because whatever you do to eliminate trub on brew day will still waste some of the wort. Maybe a little with a very good technique but some. Get all all that wort into your fermentor and you end up with more beer at the end. Your challenge is your fermentor is too small but brew buckets in the 6.5 gallon range are easy to find and not expensive.

 

[Dadux]

Easy for you maybe. I got 16L buckets and can buy 30L buckets. And im not filling 30L...
I can also get pet carboys of 19L but they are rather "expensive" (i got a very limited budget here. Next time i will just buy a bigger pot and bigger buclets and thats it. But for now i will do with what i have).
Im not loosing much sleep over the trub. But if i can easily remove some why not. And also 15% of the volume is not "a little bit"

And one tjing i have learned in brewing is that you cant let other peoples failiures stop you from trying. Maybe whirlpooling does not work for you. Maybe it wont work for me. But its really not that much effort to try it once. If i see its not worth it i will keep just dumping everything without second thought

 

[flars]

I like to harvest clean yeast. Used to do this with my wife helping to hold the funnel and bag in picture #1.

Now I use the set up in picture #2 to keep the hop debris and break material from going into the fermentor without needing a second person.

I don't save as much yeast anymore. Filling two pint jars with yeast topped with the leftover beer is sufficient.