Hot / cold break

yegnal

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I was thinking of pointing my dip tube up and leaving behind about a gallon of wort in the pot. This gallon hopefully containing all the hot and cold break, after allowing it to settle, so not to put it into primary..

My efforts to eliminate break in the primary by other means havn't been successful, this may work but I'm not sure if it's wise and fairly certain it's inefficient.
 
That’s the theory that I use. I have a spigot that’s about 1” off the bottom. I like to let it sit for 3-4 hours before I drain the kettle into the primary for that reason.
 
The other concern I have is when adjusting my beersmith equipment profile to leave 1 gallon behind causing a 1 gallon dilution of the wort to account for the volume, but beersmith is still anticipating the same gravity..

It should be slightly less.
 
i transfer mostly everything i let it sort itself out in the fermentor but hardly ever leave beer on the trub longer than 3 weeks in fermentor.
 
i transfer mostly everything i let it sort itself out in the fermentor...
Same here. Everything goes from the Boil Kettle to the fermenter through a hop filter. No kettle losses for me!
 
Break material in the kettle is your friend...let the yeast have access to it. Stop throwing away perfectly good beer. Kettle loss of 10 to 20 percent is a high price to pay. It's different in a commercial brewing situation, but on a homebrew scale we can easily deal with the break material in the trub layer once it's fermented. If you don't use a hop bag and go commando, you gotta do something to keep that from gumming up the works but otherwise don't sweat it.
We should make a post with a survey and pin it to the top of the page...this discussion comes up every few weeks. :D
 
What do you use for a hop filter?
I have a couple of these. They are thoroughly cleaned and sanitized between brewdays and this is the only thing I use them for. The photo shows clear wort. But at the beginning and at the end of the transfer between BK and FV, it runs pretty full of break and hop debris.

https://www.morebeer.com/products/drawstring-mesh-bag-6-8.html

I’ve attached a photo of when we use it between the Boil Kettle and the fermenter.

Ps Photo is of our Kolsch that is almost all gone.
 

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A kettle fining like whirlfloc and a decent whirlpool give me solid results , I don't mind a little cold break making it to FV but I do try to avoid hop matter getting in
 
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I use a nylon bag / hop spider so hop matter is not an issue.
 
I have a hop spider as well, but there was no difference... so less work and all the wort! Win win!
 
If the brew has more than a couple ounces of hops I use a spider. For several years I used a bazooka screen as well and left about 6 qts. of break laden wort in the kettle. I recently started recirculating and got a dip tube that draws from against the side and right on the bottom. Transferring a lot more trub but saving over 1/2 gallon of wort too. Not having a problem with the trub/hop matter in the fermenter. It settles out into a solid cake with the yeast.

Here are links to some pretty neat parts I used for the kettle build:

http://www.norcalbrewingsolutions.com/store/Whirlpool-Recirculation-Tube-Weldless-NPT.html
https://www.brewhardware.com/product_p/diptube_whirlpool.htm
https://www.brewhardware.com/product_p/hexnippremium.htm

Here's another find I'll use for BIAB once the warmer months arrive:

https://www.brewhardware.com/product_p/biabbottom15.htm
 
I use a hop sock that is nylon from the brew bag guys, but that;s mostly to reduce the particulate. I transfer the whole kettle to the fermentor after though. The hot/cold break is nothing to worry about, with a good cold crash/gelatin fine it all settles to the bottom anyway.
 
Same here. Everything goes from the Boil Kettle to the fermenter through a hop filter. No kettle losses for me!
What type of filter do you use? I've tried mesh, cloth and steel strainers. They clog up after the first quart. I reckon this is mainly the trub from hop pellets.
filter2.jpg
 
That's primarily why I use the bag when I boil so the hop residue is in the bag and then I squeeze the bag out. Though with pellets they would likely go through the dip tube without much issue.
 
That's primarily why I use the bag when I boil so the hop residue is in the bag and then I squeeze the bag out. Though with pellets they would likely go through the dip tube without much issue.
We too use the hop sock (mesh bag), which let's out the nastiest little trub, whilst keeping in the big flaky stuff.
 
What type of filter do you use? I've tried mesh, cloth and steel strainers. They clog up after the first quart. I reckon this is mainly the trub from hop pellets.View attachment 2565
See reply number 8 above. Yes.... I have a couple hops bags that my wife and I play tag team on cleaning and sanitizing throughout the transfer. The first and last quarter of the transfer has a lot of debris, but approx half runs clear. I suppose I could buy a few more nylon hop bags and just clean them all at once as the bags are pretty inexpensive, but our system works for us. As Hawkbox states above, he uses a bag during the boil. We used to, but the hop spider got in the way when calming down the boil during hop or other additions. To each his/her own. Either way, you get ALL the wort into the fermenter. You work hard to create it.... why dump it?
 
I would not give much thought to the trub that flows on to the fermentor. Doesn't really cause any trouble. I do have a screen in my kettle to keep the leaf hops behind. I put all the pellet hops into the spider to keep them from plugging up my screen. This seems to work well.
 

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