Equipment upgrade

Hi All

I'm pretty new to homebrewing have done a couple of extract brews and a few BIAB. I'm pretty happy with my mash and boiling process, but the fermentation and bottling part is not working very well.

I just have a fermenting bin with a tap. In to that goes everything out of my boiling pot. I've got a little bottler that fixes to the tap.

For the last few brews I've had real trouble with bottling. Everything seems to get bunged up with sediment and bits of hops. So I need a better way of doing this, can anyone recommend a good solution?

I'm happy to buy some new bits. I'm thinking about getting another fermenting bin with no tap and doing the fermentation in that. Then getting an auto siphon and siphoning into the bin with the tap, hopefully avoiding sediment and hops. Then bottling using the tap and little bottler. Does that sound reasonable?

When I dry hopped my last brew, most of the hops floated, so how do you avoid the hops when siphoning?

Cheers.

Some cheapo muslin bags would sort out your hop problems, crash cooling before bottling would help as well :)

Or the little nylon bags like the ones that come with Festival kits.

If you're going to get another bucket my advice is get one that's exactly big enough to hold your standard brew. Your main FV needs headspace, but if you're going to put it in a second vessel after fermentation has finished you don't need the headspace, and a smaller bucket is easier to store and contains less air to mess with your creation.

I usually make 15L-20L brews. I have a 30L bucket to ferment in but then a couple of 15Ls for when I want to move the beer about, there's enough headspace for when my brews get closer to 20L. I can stack two of the 15L buckets in the same fridge as one 30L which gives more options for experimenting with dry hops, for example.

Nigel Norris said it well. You sound like you want to up your game in brewing. You obviously studied the mash, boil, hops, sanitizing and so on. What many home brewers forget is the fermentation part is actually the most critical part. Get a secondary FV and autosphone. You won't get all of it out but you'll get most. Let it settle, expect the first 500 ml to be wasted, and let your beer settle out.

Here goes:

1. "Yes!" get a second FV without a tap (Wilco do a great one) and use it purely as a fermenting vessel.

2. Rinse out the FV with the tap and call it your "Bottling Bucket".

3. Wait AT LEAST two weeks before attempting to transfer a brew from the FV to the Bottling Bucket. (By this time, most of whatever is in the FV is either floating or sunk.)

4. When it comes time to transfer the brew from the FV to the Bottling Bucket use one of these.



The copper tube allows me to control the entry into the FV. There is a notch cut into the bottom end of the copper tube to stop it sealing off the flow up the syphon tube.

I got the filter on the end from here ...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01M74BJW3/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

... and if there's a lot of "stuff" in the FV I wrap the fine filter in an old hop-bag.

5. In my opinion, an Auto-Syphon in more trouble than it's worth. The Wilco syphon kit has a tap on the end. You can suck the brew into the tube, stop it off with the tap and then remove the tap before leading into the Bottling Bucket.

6. With a clear brew your Bottling Wand will work a treat.

Enjoy! :thumb:

JapanBrew said:

Let it settle, expect the first 500 ml to be wasted, and let your beer settle out.

Click to expand...

I happily now corny keg all mine,,, however, the keg dregs are bottled then stored;

a) Loads of yeast if I want to culture a new brew :thumb:

b) I do not waste any brewings :thumb:

Just a thought for the future :whistle:

I dry hop many of me beers and there are 2 things that will help clear it

1) Cold crash those suckers ! At least 2 days drops most sediment to the bottom of the FVs

2) Gelatine ! Add some of that just before cold crash and you'll have crystal beer

However once the crud is on the bottom make sure your careful not to disturb it whilst transferring to a bottle bucket.

I've also found that leaf hop for dry hopping is more likely to float. Pellet on the other hand drops like a stone. I'll use leaf during boil as it creates it's own filter and pellet for dry hopping for this reason

Thanks for all you replies. I'm not sure I have the skills to make something like in that photo so i'll just buy a siphon, perhaps an auto-siphon, and tie a hop bag round the end.

Unfortunately I don't have the ability to cold crash as no room for an extra fridge. Think I will just use pellets for dry hopping in future, did seem to be mainly the leaf that was floating.

Cheers!

Dutto said:

Here goes:

1. "Yes!" get a second FV without a tap (Wilco do a great one) and use it purely as a fermenting vessel.

2. Rinse out the FV with the tap and call it your "Bottling Bucket".

3. Wait AT LEAST two weeks before attempting to transfer a brew from the FV to the Bottling Bucket. (By this time, most of whatever is in the FV is either floating or sunk.)

4. When it comes time to transfer the brew from the FV to the Bottling Bucket use one of these.

View attachment 9812

The copper tube allows me to control the entry into the FV. There is a notch cut into the bottom end of the copper tube to stop it sealing off the flow up the syphon tube.

I got the filter on the end from here ...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01M74BJW3/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

... and if there's a lot of "stuff" in the FV I wrap the fine filter in an old hop-bag.

5. In my opinion, an Auto-Syphon in more trouble than it's worth. The Wilco syphon kit has a tap on the end. You can suck the brew into the tube, stop it off with the tap and then remove the tap before leading into the Bottling Bucket.

6. With a clear brew your Bottling Wand will work a treat.

Enjoy! :thumb:

Click to expand...

I'm very tempted by that filter. I currently attach tubing to my FV tap and empty straight into a cornie keg. Do you know what size tubing would fit over the filter attachment?

carlewarl said:

... Think I will just use pellets for dry hopping in future, did seem to be mainly the leaf that was floating.

Click to expand...

Just the conclusion I came to, although I'm probably dealing with very different kit (and kegging in Cornys). Just spent a good part of yesterday getting spent dry hops out of taps, pipes, vessels, my hair, and so on.

But be careful; pellets sink but break up into loose muck. If you are not drawing the beer from above the muck all the above advise to tie on mesh bags to the racking wand, etc., wont help.

Crystal_Ball said:

I'm very tempted by that filter. I currently attach tubing to my FV tap and empty straight into a cornie keg. Do you know what size tubing would fit over the filter attachment?

Click to expand...

The standard rigid syphon tube fitted okay (as per this) ...

http://www.homebrewcentregy.com/1-meter-syphon-kit

... but I had to drill the one in the photograph out in order to fit the 8mm copper tubing.

Hope this helps. :thumb:

I dry hop either in hop bags or a tea ball.I also rack my beer into a spare FV for about four days(i put a small bit of voil over the end of my syphon which helps stop crud going up the tube) before going into my bottling bucket,doing a batch prime and bottling via wand.
I know lots of people will say it's a bad idea,racking that is, BUT it works for me,never yet had any problems with my beers and all bar one have been really nice and clear.
I will continue in the same vein unless i suddenly get problems.