Reducing / filtering trub

Methods, ingredients, advice and equipment specific to all-grain (mash), partial mash (mini mash) and "brew in a bag" (BIAB) brewing.

Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Friday May 14, 2010 11:23 am

Hi All,

What little tricks are there to reduce the amount of trub getting into the fermenter when the siphon is getting close to the bottom ?

I've added whirlfloc for 15 mins, chilled wort with a coil, then gently whirlpooled to make the trub go to the middle of the kettle, and left it for about an hour to settle.

I siphon carefully from the close to the top of the wort, but when I get to around 3 Litres left, no matter what I do, cant avoid pulling up the white settled stuff on the bottom.

Is it OK if a bit of the white stuff gets in the fermenter ? Or can it be filtered ?

3 Litres seems like a lot to throw out :(

Cheers,
Chris
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby hirns » Friday May 14, 2010 12:05 pm

Do the same but squeeze the siphon hose flat towards the end to reduce flow. I find that by doing this, the reduced suction does not pull from the whirlpooled pile of trub. I use one of those stainless steel jiggler siphon attachments as well to make thinks cleaner and easier :D .

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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Friday May 14, 2010 12:44 pm

Good tip, thanks Hirns,

where would i see one ofthose 'jiggler' dooverlackies ?
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Friday May 14, 2010 1:02 pm

Is there much problem if you get a bit of the white stuff in the fermeter, I do rack after 2 weeks if that makes a difference ?
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby drsmurto » Friday May 14, 2010 1:22 pm

Hopscreen does the trick for me although i use a plate chiller so the cold break is in the fermenter. I've never bothered to rack off that before pitching yeast.
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Friday May 14, 2010 2:24 pm

Cheers Doc,

As I siphon from the kettle to the fermenter, If I had the hopscreen in the kettle, it would get air in and break the siphon before the level was low enough ?

Or am I missing the point ?

cheers :)
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby drsmurto » Friday May 14, 2010 3:14 pm

The hopscreen is only for those of us with ball valves installed on the kettle.

If you siphon out the top of the kettle then not sure what you would do.

A pic is worth a thousand words.....
Image
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Friday May 14, 2010 3:29 pm

Again, Thanks Doc,

Yes, I see what you mean now, I can do that no problems...

I use hop pellets, and the trub from those stays in the bottom no problems, so I have no coarse bits of trub.
Its just the very fine white stuff that I'm concerned about, but it seems that you just let that go into the fermenter anyway if you drain like that.

If its only the green hop trub that I need to avoid, then I'll siphone the white stuff as well maybe ?

Cheers,
Chris
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby drsmurto » Friday May 14, 2010 3:39 pm

The 'white stuff' is underneath the 'green stuff'.

Hot break stays in the kettle but as i use a plate chiller the cold break (formed when the wort cools down) ends up in the fermenter. There is some debate as to whether this is ok.

The picture is obviously of whole hop flowers (last years batch using homegrown chinook) but i also use pellets quite a bit.

I whirlpool after switching off the heat and this allows the trub to form a cone in the centre which slowly collapses as the liquid level drops.
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby warra48 » Friday May 14, 2010 4:15 pm

Grog wrote:Good tip, thanks Hirns,

where would i see one ofthose 'jiggler' dooverlackies ?


I used to drain my kettle with one of those, before I got up the courage to drill a hole and install a tap.
I bought mine at an auto accessories store.
Be aware they come in two sizes. The big one drains too fast, in my opinion, as it sucked up a lot of trub towards the end. It was also difficult to start. I then bought and used the smaller of the two available. From memory it was somewhere around $10 to $12.
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Friday May 14, 2010 4:40 pm

Cool,

I might try leaving it settle a bit longer next time, and slow down the siphon at the end as Hirns suggested.

I saw at TWOC in Perth at one of Roys demo days, that he has a copper tube ring around the bottom of the kettle, with small holes in it that draws the wort vrty slowly thru the holes, maximising the amount you take, and minimising the amound of cold break (I guess thats the white stuff) that goes into the fermenter.

Might have to look at making something like Roy has.

Thanks lads for the feedback...

And go the mighty Dockers tonight :)

regards,
Chris
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby hirns » Friday May 14, 2010 8:52 pm

I purchased I stainless jiggler on ebay and I have a hard plastic "supercheap" job as well. I often see brass ones at local markets for about $3-$4. I have also used a wedge of any discription after whirlpooling to raise by an inch one side of the pot, and draw from the high side. You loose a bit of liquid, but the trub is less likely to be drawn upwards. I now simply let mine sit flat as I really don't believe the wee bit extra won't settle out in the fermenter anyway. I let mine settle at least 15 min after whirlpooling. Remember, I'm onto my fourth Ag batch and I'm certainly no expert, but you asked for ideas :) .
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Saturday May 15, 2010 10:44 am

Thats cool Hirns, every bit of info appreciated, and thats exactly what I did, but i left it a lot longer, probably 3/4 hour at least while I had tea.

so how much liquid do you leave in the fermeter then ?
I left about 3 Litres, thats half a pi$$up !!!

cheers,
Chris
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Tuesday May 18, 2010 10:42 am

Have been doing a bit of reading on other forums as well, and it seems that there is no perfect way of removing all the cold break material, and there is also some comment that you shouldnt remove it all anyway, as it can be beneficial as a yeast nutrient.

Having done a brew last night and getting cheesed off because of the amount of fluid being left in the kettle ,on my next brew I'm going to...

1- Start siphoning from the bottom of the kettle into a sanitised container, and remove most of the heavy trub / break material first.
2- Siphon the rest into the fermenter.
3- Let the first container settle for an hour or 2, then tip any clear liquid off the top into the fermenter.

Will let you know how it goes...

Cheers,
Chris
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Monday May 31, 2010 1:40 pm

Well, I had a go at bottom siphoning of the kettle to take out most of the trub before transferring into the fermenter, and it works a treat, as far as I can remember...

First I started by having about 6 beers while mashing etc. This was a good idea, because I had 76% efficiency :) :)

Then I kept going by boiling and having about another 6 beers, this also was good, because I never had a boilover :) :)

Then I had a few more while the wort chiller did its job.

I had the kettle on an angle while it settled after removing the chiller, and I waited about 3 - 4 more beers, and then started syphoning from the bottom of the kettle.
I took out about a Litre, and then could see that a huge chunk of the white trub was gone.
So I waited about another 4 beers for the trub to settle...
Then I drained it into the fermenter, and cracked another one.
It gets blurry after that, I think I was actually quite maggotted...

NEXT TIME:
Most importantly, I will put more beer in the fridge beforehand.
I'll gently take out about 3 Litres from the bottom into a sanitised container, gently circling the siphon around the bottom of the kettle and vaccuum most of the trub up.
Then I'll let the trub container settle until the next morning and pour the clear liquid off the top.
(I would love to get a small conical vessel for this, it would work very well, I will look into it).

I will keep you posted about how this affects the brew, as there is some talk on other forums that maybe a bit of the white trub is actually good for the yeast.

Cheers to all,

:)
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby warra48 » Monday May 31, 2010 2:57 pm

I've tried whirlpooling etc, but no matter how much of a cone I build up, nor how slowly I run off, I always get a lot of my trub into the fermenter.

Now I've come to the stage where I've organised mrs warra to make me a double thickness swiss voile bag, ala BIAB, but to fit the fermenter instead, and to use it as a giant strainer. I won't have to worry about whirlpooling, just run off, and drain the bag when all drained to the fermenter.
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Monday May 31, 2010 3:28 pm

Hi Warra,

it really does come out easily if you siphon from the bottom first, I would just like to collect it in a smaller container, let it separate and then pur off the good stuff from a smaller container say the next morning...

:)
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Re: Reducing / filtering trub

Postby SuperBroo » Tuesday Jun 15, 2010 1:09 pm

Well, I did this last night...
After wort chilling, then whirlpooling the kettle, I left it for about an hour, then syphoned as much of the white gunk on the bottom into a sanitised 5 Litre jug, and ended up with about 4.5 Litres of haevy gunk in the jug. i avoided the middle, as thats where the heaviest trub is.

NOTE - A good light over the kettle makes this easier.

Then syphoned the rest into the fermeter, avoiding the trub in the middle, and had approx 400 mls of trub left in the kettle, all pretty clear fluid in the fermenter.

I put gladwrap over the 5L jug, and put it in with my fermnenter overnight.

This morning, I poured off 2 Litres of really clear wort, and left 1.7 Litres of thick trub behind.

So syphoning the white gunk off first worked really well for me, i will keep doing that from now on,

I guess the downside is the extra handling / infection risk. But its not that hard to do.

Cheers,
Chris.
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