Whirlpooling and cold break!!

[lethaldog]

Hey lethal, nice to bump into you at G&G today, I'm super jealous of your aluminium CO2 bottle, I got my steel one a week ago and it weighs a bloody ton (for those who don't know, G&G have been having trouble getting a sufficient supply of their normal gas bottles, so air liquide have been giving them aluminium ones for the same price as steel, which is like $27 instead of $100).

Anyway, kinda strange to see a forum member in the flesh, but yeah.

Yeah bonus on the ally, it cost me $18 rental for the year and i thenk it was about $44 so a total of $62 which is cheaper than my locals rental for the year , good to bump into you to mate, next time hopefully ill have time for a chat and compare notes and stuff, if i know in advance that im coming up then maybe ill bring a few samples in an esky next time

Well the kegs are full and gassing up as we speak so i cant wait to try them tomorrow, the beer had been lagering so was already cold, ive set the preasure at about 43 psi which hopefully should carb me up alright in 24 hours, if nott ill just leave it longer i guess

[SpillsMostOfIt]

I've been thinking about it for a while and the above couple of posts have made me do something about it (what I am now doing).

What do the Melbourne or Nearby types think of the concept of getting together with a few of our best brews to do all the sorts of things that getting together allows you to do (and drink a beer or three)?

[lethaldog]

I would be keen providing the time was right as im a pretty busy man these days ( workwise) but yeah its deffinately something to have a chat about, maybe start a thread and see how many takers are out there

[beernut]

I'm in. It only takes two like minded people to start a club.
You'll have to organise your lift home though.
Cheers Glenn.

[beerdrinker]

did my first ag during the week! went down pretty well,heaps of crud in the fermenter,blocked the tap while racking had 2 kettles and 3 saucepans boiling to get enough mash and sparge water used us56 and it seemed to finish fermenting in two and a half days at 17C??? puttin her in the other fridge at 5C for a while before bottling

[beerdrinker]

my mash volume was over by a coupla liters would this effect the beer? added cold water then ice cubes then boiling water to get the right temp

[rwh]

Hope your ice cubes were not contaminated in the freezer... Generally speaking it's best not to add ice directly to the wort.

[beerdrinker]

i added the ice cubes to the mash

[rwh]

Ah no probs then.

[illywhacker]

Generally speaking it's best not to add ice directly to the wort.

my current practice is to sanitize a few takeaway containers and put them in the freezer 24 hrs before brewday.

i then add the resultant giant ice cubes to the wort (apprx 8 litres - minimash) in order to quickly reduce the temp to pitch yeast.

is the only potential problem infection, which i have avoided through good sanitization, or is there some other kind of risk?

[Ed]

Infection is the only risk as far as I know. I used a similar practice some time back. But you know unless the water has been boiled first, there can be bacteria in there already. What I did was use some big Tupperware containers which can take a fair bit of heat. Boil water up, pour directly into the containers, lid directly on, and let cool to ambient before placing in plastic bags and then to freezer. The boiling hot water sanitises the container, the plastic bags keeps the outside free of any freezer bugs.

Cheers, Ed

[illywhacker]

unless the water has been boiled first, there can be bacteria in there already

i've often wondered this myself.

we go to the trouble of healthy sanitization paranoia, but top up freshly boiled wort with 12L of water straight from the tap, bacteria beasties and all.

of course, this concern doesn't apply when doing AG as you're boiling all water that goes into the fermenter, but if you're doing partial, like myself, is this a potential for harm?

or is it simply the fact that, ideally, the yeast is pitched without delay and is too strong to let any bacteria from the water take root?

[Ed]

Yes it's a real problem, I know of several brewers where we believe the source of infection can be traced back to the water. Those brewers have now overcome the problem by pre-boiling the whole volume.

Cheers, Ed

[rwh]

Yep, depends on the quality of your town water. Melbourne is generally considered fine, Adelaide not so fine. As for Sydney... it's fine most of the time...

[beerdrinker]

do you take the chiller out before whirlpooling? cant believe how much sludge ended up in my fermenter

[Cortez The Killer]

Try using a hop bag from Ross

The two AG I've done didn't have any gunk worth mentioning

Cheers

[beerdrinker]

2nd AG and hardly any crap in there! added irish moss,chilled colder and let it sit for 15mins after whirlpooling last time i had a few too many and was whirlpooling while it was draining into the fermenter tastes great though