Filtering Out The Hops

[WarmBeer]

I did a Brewcraft lager kit on the weekend, which came complete with a bag of hop pellets to add to the boiling LDME & water. Added for a minute at slow boil, then steeped for 10.

When I went to strain the resultant liquid into the fermenter, I used a (sterilised) kitchen strainer, so a bit (but not a whole lot) of green hop sediment went into the fermenter.

Will this green stuff settle into the trub at the bottom over time, or am I likely to end up with a slightly green tinge to my beer?

Cheers,

Brett

 

[Interloper]

I did a Brewcraft lager kit on the weekend, which came complete with a bag of hop pellets to add to the boiling LDME & water. Added for a minute at slow boil, then steeped for 10.

When I went to strain the resultant liquid into the fermenter, I used a (sterilised) kitchen strainer, so a bit (but not a whole lot) of green hop sediment went into the fermenter.

Will this green stuff settle into the trub at the bottom over time, or am I likely to end up with a slightly green tinge to my beer?

They will settle and fall out as fermentation stops. You may want to rack that lager after initial fermentation and you'll find the longer it sits, the clearer it gets as more gunk drops to the bottom.

 

[MCT]

It'll settle out mate, don't stress .

edit: beaten.

 

[brotom7]

I never strain the hopps when racking from pot to fermenter, I tried a couple of times but the fine stuff created by the hop pellets just gets stuck and blocks up the strainer so it takes forever to clean the strainer for each liter of wort, I just gave up and now I dump it all in the fermenter.
I rack to secondary after a week and it's settled by then as I've never seen any hopp residue floating around in secondary.

 

[amiddler]

I have strained and not strained my boiled hops in the past and find the tap on the fermenter gets blocked when I transfer to secondary if I don't strain. My solution was to use a coarse (say 1-1.5mm) sieve that catches the coarse hop leaves and the fine stuff that goes through settles out and doesn't get stuck in the tap.

Drew

 

[WarmBeer]

Thanks guys, was planning on racking this one, so I don't think I'll have much to worry about.

As a newbie, it's easy to get all hot 'n' bothered that you've made a mistake with your latest batch, but I'm beginning to get the impression from the old hands that the best approach is: "relax, have another beer, your brew will be alright"

Cheers,

Brett

 

[rich_lamb]

Well look at that - he's already learned more about brewing than most

 

[Disco_tezz]

What about if you have a brew with 100 to 200 Grams of hops?
Will leaving Wort cause any issues? or will the biggest issue be a blockage of the tap?

 

[Interloper]

What about if you have a brew with 100 to 200 Grams of hops?
Will leaving Wort cause any issues? or will the biggest issue be a blockage of the tap?

Fair call - I had a tap trauma just recently that would have been funny if it wasn't so stressful so I understand your worry.

Suggest you prop the racking cube/fermenter up at the front and tilt the brew away from the tap. I have a PET bottle top under mine at the moment that gives just enough angle to ensure gunkage (yes that is the technical term ) stays away from my tap.

 

[Bribie G]

Yesterday I bottled an ESB 3kg Czech Pilsener. Obviously it contains a fair shot of straight pellets because during fermentation I noticed a big 'mat' of green hop material on the top of the wort. This settled out before bottling but the tap became half clogged with hop and it took me half an hour to pipe off into the bottles as opposed to the normal ten to fifteen minutes. If the ESB turns out ok, next time I'll rack into secondary and leave the crud behind.

I don't normally dismantle the entire fermenter between brews, just flush the tap well and run sterilizer through it. In this case I'll have to do a full pull-down as there's still hop fragments in there. A couple of my vessels I can't dismantle them because I araldyted the taps in place due to 'weeping' from bung hole (Morgans brand fermenters, disappointing) so I won't be doing a pellet brew in either of those.

 

[JWB]

Not pulling your tap apart and not taking it off your fermenter after every brew is playing with danger.
It doesnt matter how careful you may seem to be in sterlizing and soaking if you unscrew the tap you will find gunk around the threads in the fermenter.
Also if you pull the tap apart you will find gunk in it as well.

Unscrewing the tap from the fermenter is the easy part. Just unscrew and see the gunk around the thread. Yuck :angry:

The tap is a little bit harder but not impossible.

I immerse my tap in boiling water for 2 to 3 minutes then with a large pair of multi grips I grab the handle and pull it apart.
I always find gunk in the tap.

After cleaning and boiling in wter for a few minutes I put a smear of vasilene around the inner part of the tap and push it back together. It turns much easier and is relatively sterile.

A mate of mine complained about infected brews until I pulled his tap apart. :huh: You could do science experiments with the gunk

Cheers

JWB

 

[BusinessTime]

Why not just bulk prime in another vessel (boil up some water and add the sugar/malt you would have split amongst the bottles) then rack from your fermenter to that and then bottle. You will get a far more consistent rate of priming and avoid all the issues involved in using taps etc .... If you rack carefully you will leave all the crud in the fermenter...

 

[Interloper]

Why not just bulk prime in another vessel (boil up some water and add the sugar/malt you would have split amongst the bottles) then rack from your fermenter to that and then bottle. You will get a far more consistent rate of priming and avoid all the issues involved in using taps etc .... If you rack carefully you will leave all the crud in the fermenter...

Yup, I agree, would never go back to hand priming. Besides the sanitisation factor it also means you can use 330ml, 375ml, 480 ml grolsch bottles, Hobgoblin 500ml bottles and 750ml bottles and not need to worry about ratios per bottle.

 

[BusinessTime]

Its also hard to pass up the level of consistency in the carbonation of the beer too.

 

[rich_lamb]

I have removed the taps from my fermenters - disgusting things. I reckon they would account for a fairly high percentage of infected beers.
The whole problem goes away if you rack (siphon) instead. This does assume if you are bottling you are racking into a bottling bucket for bulk priming - which I'd always recommend anyway.

I have an "autosiphon" for racking. Love it.
Though I'd be interested to know what other are using for racking, and how they start the siphon...

 

[Benniee]

I immerse my tap in boiling water for 2 to 3 minutes then with a large pair of multi grips I grab the handle and pull it apart.
I always find gunk in the tap.

After cleaning and boiling in wter for a few minutes I put a smear of vasilene around the inner part of the tap and push it back together. It turns much easier and is relatively sterile.

I don't mean to hijack this thread - but I'd love to see some pics of a tap clean. Perhaps in another thread - if it doesn't exist already.

Benniee

 

[BusinessTime]

I 3/4 fill my clean racking tube with no-rinse sanatiser and just let that pull the wort through initially, I probably loose a few ml of wort initially, then just let the rest siphon into my bottling bucket. Easy and clean =)

 

[KGB]

^^^ Good tip

 

[JWB]

I rack all my beers but I dont syphon them

I have a length of silicon tubing a bit over a meter long. After boiling it for a few minutes I push it onto the tap of the fermenter with the beer in it and place the other end in my sterlized fermenter on the ground. Then I turn the tap on and it drains into the clean fermenter.
Before anyone jumps up an down....NO I dont get gunk and yuck from the bottom of the fermenter.
I stop the flow when I see the gunk start to flow down the tube.
This leaves all the gunk and trub in the old fermenter and my precious brew ready for cold largering in the fridge for a few weeks.

I have done it this way for a few years and not had a problem.

Cheers

JWB

 

[muckey]

+1 JWB

Have never siphoned.
A little care and all the unwanted stuff stays in the fermenter