“Flameout” procedure

Josh Hughes

Josh Hughes

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I’m expecting there to be quite a few different ways. Before I got my gigawort I turned off the heat and put my kettle in an ice bath Immediately. Now I immediately turn in the spigot and transfer through a strainer to a kettle that then goes into an ice bath. I imagine bitterness is affected with how quick I transfer the strained wort especially when im adding flameout hops. I thought I’d start Getting out the hop bag, stirring in the kettle to help with cooling and create a whirlpool or something close to leave some sediment. Once I get a wort chiller do I start that right away? What do you guys and gals do?
 
Josh Hughes said:
I’m expecting there to be quite a few different ways. Before I got my gigawort I turned off the heat and put my kettle in an ice bath Immediately. Now I immediately turn in the spigot and transfer through a strainer to a kettle that then goes into an ice bath. I imagine bitterness is affected with how quick I transfer the strained wort especially when im adding flameout hops. I thought I’d start Getting out the hop bag, stirring in the kettle to help with cooling and create a whirlpool or something close to leave some sediment. Once I get a wort chiller do I start that right away? What do you guys and gals do?
Click to expand...
Depending on recipie if adding WP hops or not.
Let's say I'm chilling on brew day as I've just been letting the lot just sit in the kettle well covered with alfoil lid on ect and letting it cool down wort hops break and all and transferring next day I've done this on a helles Lager and my latest Vienna Lager and I can fault em on flavour.

But on brew day my chill method is Imersion chiller in 15 to go pump back on same time then. I tried chilling using pool water via my submersible pump I got with the bucket blaster but flow was too slow.

As for the hops I don't do much for their removal just the whirlpool is all.
 
At flameout, I disconnect the hops bag from the hop spider, and suspend that bag in the wort, with the lid on the kettle. Then the kettle goes into an ice bath - today it took about 70 minutes to cool the wort from boiling to 72*F. While in the ice bath, I submerge a cloth in the iced water, and rub that wet, cold cloth on the sides of the kettle to promote cooling. When temperature is about right, I pull the hops bag, then pour the entire contents of the kettle into the fermenter, pitch yeast and hope for the best.
 
I've done it a few different ways, and I'm not really happy with any of them. Excited to see all the different methods that everyone uses and try to shake things up for myself
 
After the boil, I turn off the heating elements and (if recipe calls for it) add whirlpool hops in a bag. I then use the pump to circulate hit wort through the home-made counterflow chiller to sanitize it. After maybe 10 minutes, the cooling water is turned on, and when the output wort is cool enough, I take a hydrometer sample and put the hose into the fermenter.

In winter, i have to restrict the cooling water or it gets too cold. In summer, I restrict the wort so it cools enough. The hydrometer sample gets put back into the hot wort, sanitizing it again and adding a little to fermenter volume.

Depending on temperature I either pitch the east right away or wait for it to cool off or warm up to pitch.
 
My set up is very basic, as is my approach to brewing. One pot for mash, boil and ice bath. At flameout, if I’m adding “whirlpool” hops, the hops go in loose, a big stir with the spoon and the pot will sit on the stove for some predetermined amount of time...or the pot will go right into the ice. 30 minutes to cool, give or take, until I pitch. Not very exciting, but simple.
 
I start circulating through the plate chiller at 10-15 minutes before flame out. I add flame-out hops to the hop bag just as I turn off the heating element and leave the pump circulating as I start the chill water through the plate. At 185 I stop the chill water and add the whirlpool hops to the bag and let it run for 20 minutes. I then resume chilling, pump running and pull the hop bag when it gets below about 120 so it's not too hot to handle. If I'm not doing a whirlpool addition, I just run everything until it cools to about 120 and pull the bag.
 
I connect my plate chiller to the kettle and open the valve/pump 5 min before flameout to sanitize. turn element off & add flameout hops to hop sack. start recirculating from the chiller to whirlpool in kettle. (add whirlpool hops after temp drops, if recipe calls for them.) when done, move recirculation line to the fermentor, close the exit valve on the plate chiller most of the way and slowly run into fermentor.
 
I’ve personally never really noticed any bitterness gained from an extended chilling time. I’m sure it happens but maybe the type of late hop additions I use just don’t translate into increased bitterness. You will have to just use your palate to decide if you are noticing anything.


I use a plate chiller that I sanitize with boiling water at the start of the brew day. At flameout, I stir to get a whirlpool and let it settle for 10 minutes or so. I then run the wort through the chiller at a rate around 1 gpm. So the wort that is in the kettle stays pretty hot until it comes out of the kettle.
 
At flameout my immersion chiller has been in the boiling wort for about 10 minutes. When I cut the flame, I will then cover my kettle with a couple of clean dish towels with clothes pins that I occasionally remove to stir my wort while I'm running cool water that is now in my mash Tun and recirculate that until my wort temperature is down to about 150 F. The next step is to drain off some of the water from the mash tun and replace it with ice that I use to chill down the wort the rest of the way to pitching temperature. I'll then do a quick stir for whirlpooling after pulling the chiller out if I'm doing a pale brew simply because I find clarity in a dark beer kinda pointless.
 
Josh
Every time I think about detailing my process, I am on my phone, better to do this when in front of a PC, so here it goes.
I use an immersion chiller, and add it to the kettle at 15 minutes so it gets sanitized.
When I kill the power, I start chilling right away.
Most brews I do however have a hop stand / whirlpool, this is how I do this.
I preset the controller to maintain the desired WP temperature, and kill the chilling water about 7-8C higher than desired WP temperature as there is some thermal transfer that continues to take place after turning off the water.
I built my own chiller which is 100 feet of 3/8"OD copper tubing, with two separate flow paths.
I don't measure chilling time in minutes any more, I measure it in amount of water used.
My last few batches with really cold ground water, and only chilling to 30C, it took less than 3 buckets.
To get from 30C to 20C takes about another bucket.
This will change with the warmer weather coming, I plan to overcome this by prechilling the water by running it through another chiller coil that I have in a bucket of ice water.
If you don't have the ability to solder copper pipes, and make your own chiller, the Jaded, or Cus.s three path units are well worth the money in my opinion. I suspect that there are others either already on the market. If not there most likely will be.
Jaded is the original, and I believe that the Cus.s guy was formerly a part of Jaded.

Here is a video from Beer & BBQ by Larry on the Cus.s unit (they come in different shapes and sizes).

Here is my home made unit: Frankenchiller!!!!!
I have added 16g copper wire to spread the coils out since I took this picture.
It was a design as I was building situation, and I realized once I start fitting it together the two flow paths are going in opposite directions.
There was actually no way to avoid this, so my story is that this was the plan all along:D
Between the two flow paths and the wort circulating in a whirlpool fashion, thermal transfer is excellent.

Frankenchiller.jpg
 
Immersion chiller 10-15 minutes before flame out.
Then tap water (which is river water = about 22-26 oC). Cool as much as possible. Not easy in summer.
Give up at some point in time, move everything (trub and all) into fermenter and put everything in the fridge till the right pitching temperature has been achieved.
You can't imagine how happy I am with Kveik :)
 
Craigerrr said:
Josh
Every time I think about detailing my process, I am on my phone, better to do this when in front of a PC, so here it goes.
I use an immersion chiller, and add it to the kettle at 15 minutes so it gets sanitized.
When I kill the power, I start chilling right away.
Most brews I do however have a hop stand / whirlpool, this is how I do this.
I preset the controller to maintain the desired WP temperature, and kill the chilling water about 7-8C higher than desired WP temperature as there is some thermal transfer that continues to take place after turning off the water.
I built my own chiller which is 100 feet of 3/8"OD copper tubing, with two separate flow paths.
I don't measure chilling time in minutes any more, I measure it in amount of water used.
My last few batches with really cold ground water, and only chilling to 30C, it took less than 3 buckets.
To get from 30C to 20C takes about another bucket.
This will change with the warmer weather coming, I plan to overcome this by prechilling the water by running it through another chiller coil that I have in a bucket of ice water.
If you don't have the ability to solder copper pipes, and make your own chiller, the Jaded, or Cus.s three path units are well worth the money in my opinion. I suspect that there are others either already on the market. If not there most likely will be.
Jaded is the original, and I believe that the Cus.s guy was formerly a part of Jaded.

Here is a video from Beer & BBQ by Larry on the Cus.s unit (they come in different shapes and sizes).

Here is my home made unit: Frankenchiller!!!!!
I have added 16g copper wire to spread the coils out since I took this picture.
It was a design as I was building situation, and I realized once I start fitting it together the two flow paths are going in opposite directions.
There was actually no way to avoid this, so my story is that this was the plan all along:D
Between the two flow paths and the wort circulating in a whirlpool fashion, thermal transfer is excellent.

View attachment 15085
Click to expand...
Nice thanks
 
My process is kind of a blend of Craig and Zambezi's. I use a big drum of water and a pond pump, eventually the water gets to warm to effectively chill any further at which point I transfer and put the fermenter in my mini-fridge ferm chamber to finish chilling. Or I pitch Kveik if I am doing a double batch.
 
Here's my system. I put immersion chiller in 15 min before power off. I fill a cooler with ice, aquarium pump and just enough of cold water to start the pump. Once the power is shut off, I start the pump. If I am whirlpooling hops, I stop the pump at about 190F and drop the hops in the hop spider, basket etc. and let them stay until fully chilled to desired temp. It usually takes about 40 mins to go from 190F to 70F.
 
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