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Poll

Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?

Yes
13 (25%)
No
34 (65.4%)
Never thought about it before
5 (9.6%)

Total Members Voted: 50

Author Topic: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?  (Read 17291 times)

Offline tygo

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #15 on: December 03, 2010, 06:57:34 pm »
I don't care about it at all at the moment.  Maybe when everything else in my system and process works perfectly with no flaws I'll get around to worrying about transferring break material to the fermenter.  It's way down the list.
Clint
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Offline witsok

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #16 on: December 03, 2010, 07:40:32 pm »
Nope, switched to a CFC years ago and never had problem I'd contribute to cold break.  Even though I have a conical, I don't bother with removing cold break.

Offline tschmidlin

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #17 on: December 03, 2010, 10:27:10 pm »
I use a CFC and don't worry about it at all.  No problems.
Tom Schmidlin

Offline majorvices

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #18 on: December 04, 2010, 08:23:23 am »
I don't care about it too much though I will say I think it is far better to leave as much hops and trub behind in the kettle as possible.

Also, if you are not dropping the temp down below 45 degrees and letting the wort sit for several hours you won't get much cold break anyway, so there is no need to worry about cold break at all unless you are brewing lagers and have the ability to actually drop the cold break after chilling and setttling.

Offline cheba420

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #19 on: December 04, 2010, 08:49:18 am »
I havent spent too much time worrying about it. I pull some into the fermenter but not much. I typically wind up with about 2 qts of break material and beer left in the kettle.
Matt
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Offline James Lorden

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #20 on: December 04, 2010, 09:12:33 am »
Also, if you are not dropping the temp down below 45 degrees and letting the wort sit for several hours you won't get much cold break anyway, so there is no need to worry about cold break at all unless you are brewing lagers and have the ability to actually drop the cold break after chilling and setttling.

To quantify Majors point

Table II: Cold trub precipitation in a Munich Helles Bier (from which hot trub has been removed).*
Wort Temperature
°F          °C          Cold Trub Precipitated (g/hL)          Percentage of Total Cold Trub
170          80                  1.5                                                          6.8
140          60                  2.4                                                         10.6
104         40                   4.2                                                         18.7
86           30                   6.5                                                          28.5
68           20                 13.1                                                          58.0
50          10                  19.3                                                          85.3
41           5                    21.5                                                          95.1
32           0                   22.6                                                            100.0
James Lorden
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Offline tom

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #21 on: December 04, 2010, 09:47:13 am »
The chart shows that at 50F 85% settles out and at 68F 58%, so there's still some settling going on.

Denny, Joakim didn't state which type of beer he compared - do you know? Did he ever have anyone else try it?

Anyone try the flotation method mentioned in the Brewing Techniques article?

"In flotation, the cooled wort is saturated with sterile air. As the air bubbles make their way to the top of the tank, they carry cold trub with them. After 2-3 h, a brown, compact head forms at the top of the wort. Wort is then removed from the bottom of the tank, leaving the cold trub behind. Even more cold trub (50-65% of total cold trub) can be removed if wort stands 6-8 h before being racked (3)."

Seems like it could be part of a typical homebrewer aeration method, then transfer out from below into another fermenter.
Brew on

Offline majorvices

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #22 on: December 04, 2010, 10:19:41 am »
I guess I have seen other numbers somewhere. But, regardless, time plays into it as does how quickly you chill. IIRC a lot of lager brewers drop the wort all the way down to below 45, some even to close to freezing, to drop break. I have often noticed that is takes my lagers nearly over night to drop the majority of break material.

Offline denny

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #23 on: December 04, 2010, 12:18:22 pm »
Denny, Joakim didn't state which type of beer he compared - do you know? Did he ever have anyone else try it?

Sorry, Tom...it was a pils.  He stated that in a different thread when he started discussing the experiment he was going to do.  AFAIK, no one else ever tried it.  Of course, it's only a single data point, but a very interesting one!
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Offline James Lorden

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Re: Do you care about cold break in your fermenter?
« Reply #24 on: December 04, 2010, 07:58:33 pm »
Seems that chill haze is the main issue here for home brewers.  We generally drink beer to fast to be concerned with the packaging issues.  That said, if a home brewer is re-pitching yeast then perhaps more care should be taken to avoid moving significant volumes of cold break to subsequent batches.  How important is clear beer - that seems to be the question.  I happen to filter most light colored beer so after reading through the responses in this topic a few times I'm not sure that I'm as concerned as I used to be about cold trub in the fermenter.
James Lorden
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