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  • Recirculating dry-hop-back

    Wondering if anyone has experimented with recirculating beer through a whole leaf filled hop-back, attached to their fermentor? Our pale ale is going to be dry hopped, and I'm not looking forward to plugging the filter. Have read through all the pro-brewer posts on dry-hopping, and thought this might be worth a shot. Would act as a pre-filter like a BK hop-back, so might improve filtration...? Might speed up dry hopping times?

    Anyone see any potential disasters here..?
    Daniel ADDEY JIBB
    Microbrasserie Le Castor
    Organic Ales - Bières Biologiques
    Rigaud, Quebec, CAN

  • #2
    Something like Sierra Nevada's Torpedo?

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    • #3
      Ya, like that, only smaller.

      Originally posted by Chaz
      Something like Sierra Nevada's Torpedo?
      I tried to find technical info on the Torpedo, and the quote I found is below. Basically what I was thinking of - just a loop through a hop back from the conical. Love to hear if anyone else is doing it.

      "The Hop Torpedo is a cylindrical stainless steel vessel that was developed to harness the essential oils and resins in hops, without extracting bitterness. The device essentially works like an espresso machine. A stainless filter basket is packed full of whole cone hops loaded into the vessel and sealed against pressure. The device is then placed in the fermentation cellars where beer from the cylindroconical fermenters is pushed down from the tanks, through the pressurized column of hops and back into the fermenting tank. The flow of beer out of the tanks, into the Torpedo and back into the fermenter can be controlled to extract different levels of flavor, aroma and bitterness. Essentially, it is a new way of dry-hopping that extracts all of the oily resin without the residual bitterness of the traditional method."
      Daniel ADDEY JIBB
      Microbrasserie Le Castor
      Organic Ales - Bières Biologiques
      Rigaud, Quebec, CAN

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      • #4
        Free State Brewing in Kansas has a very nice set-up. Check them out.

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        • #5
          dry hop

          Originally posted by nohandslance
          Free State Brewing in Kansas has a very nice set-up. Check them out.
          Thanks Lance, we like it. We have about a 50 gallon stainless tank on wheels that we have fitted with strainer baskets on the inlet and outlet. We fill it with hop flowers, purge with CO2 and fill with beer. We use a small magnetic drive pump to circulate beer from the fermenter, through the "dynamic dry hopper" and back to the fermenter. It works quite well and we found that it decreased the amount of hops required significantly. We do have to be careful about how long we run it for. Overdoing it (more that about 5 days) tends to start giving a rather grassy character to the beer that takes a while to condition out.
          Steve Bradt
          Regional Sales Manager
          Micro-Matic Packaging Division
          Eastern United States and Canada
          sbradt@micro-matic.com
          785-766-1921

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          • #6
            Originally posted by sbradt
            Thanks Lance, we like it. We have about a 50 gallon stainless tank on wheels that we have fitted with strainer baskets on the inlet and outlet. We fill it with hop flowers, purge with CO2 and fill with beer. We use a small magnetic drive pump to circulate beer from the fermenter, through the "dynamic dry hopper" and back to the fermenter. It works quite well and we found that it decreased the amount of hops required significantly. We do have to be careful about how long we run it for. Overdoing it (more that about 5 days) tends to start giving a rather grassy character to the beer that takes a while to condition out.

            Thanks for your comments Steve - glad to hear it works. Does it help yeast harvesting & filtration? Could you offer any estimates on how to convert from conventional pellet dry-hopping to dynamic whole leaf dry-hopping? We were going to go with around a 1/2 pound per HL (how's that for unit confusion).

            cheers,
            Daniel ADDEY JIBB
            Microbrasserie Le Castor
            Organic Ales - Bières Biologiques
            Rigaud, Quebec, CAN

            Comment


            • #7
              Originally posted by DanLeCastor View Post
              Thanks for your comments Steve - glad to hear it works. Does it help yeast harvesting & filtration? Could you offer any estimates on how to convert from conventional pellet dry-hopping to dynamic whole leaf dry-hopping? We were going to go with around a 1/2 pound per HL (how's that for unit confusion).



              cheers,

              We recurculate the hops in the fermenter we have a setup to allow us to use for 1-2 hour a centrifuge and we get a very good aroma but also astringency. So we are looking to use a diferrent technique in our beer maybe dry hop at room temp but we have seen that when you add the hops they react with the beer and starts to realease CO2 so i dont know if i have to do it at roomp temp with the top valve closed or do it once the beer is cold

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              • #8
                Originally posted by letsbrewit View Post
                We recurculate the hops in the fermenter we have a setup to allow us to use for 1-2 hour a centrifuge and we get a very good aroma but also astringency. So we are looking to use a diferrent technique in our beer maybe dry hop at room temp but we have seen that when you add the hops they react with the beer and starts to realease CO2 so i dont know if i have to do it at roomp temp with the top valve closed or do it once the beer is cold
                May I ask what is the vessel in question? I'm looking for something I could do this recirculating/dry hopping with, but also potentially infuse spices and/or sugars for much larger beers. I think I have a concept of what it would look like, I guess I just don't know if I can go to the local hardware store to get one Is it just a large hop back? How does it seal?

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Smlsound View Post
                  May I ask what is the vessel in question? I'm looking for something I could do this recirculating/dry hopping with, but also potentially infuse spices and/or sugars for much larger beers. I think I have a concept of what it would look like, I guess I just don't know if I can go to the local hardware store to get one Is it just a large hop back? How does it seal?
                  You should look into Stone's dry hopping setup.

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                  • #10
                    torpedo

                    Anyone manufacturing torpedos for small breweries yet?

                    Ben Millstein
                    Kodiak Island Brewing
                    bmills@ak.net

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