Pro brewing newbie here. Just wrapping up first round of beers in our new brewery. We are fermenting and carbonating/conditioning in jacketed 10bbl conicals with carb stones. No brite tanks yet. I am having some issues with dropping and harvesting yeast and looking for input.
When I go to dump trub and harvest yeast I target 35F or lower and make sure there is only 2-3 PSI in the tank, then I maintain that head pressure by hooking up CO2 to the CIP arm. Several times I have blown beer out the bottom of the cone after only collecting ~1 gal of trub and early floccing yeast. So here are my main questions:
1) what PSI are you maintaining while dumping trub and harvesting yeast? Is 2-3 PSI about right?
2) roughly what total volume of yeast/trub are you dumping from the cone after a 10bbl fermentation, and approx how much yeast slurry are you harvesting?
3) how much time does it take to dump (or collect) all yeast and trub from the cone of a 10bbl fermenter?
4) is anyone out there using a rubber mallet to *lightly* tap the cone and loosen up the yeast before collection? (I know that nobody will "recommend" this practice but curious if anyone is using it with good results)
I realize that the answers to these questions are very dependent on the amount and type of yeast pitched (I'm mostly using Wyeast 1728 - scottish ale), and it takes a careful visual inspection through the sight glass to determine where to make the yeast harvest cuts. Just looking for some rules of thumb to start with for average strength beer.
Cheers, Kevin
When I go to dump trub and harvest yeast I target 35F or lower and make sure there is only 2-3 PSI in the tank, then I maintain that head pressure by hooking up CO2 to the CIP arm. Several times I have blown beer out the bottom of the cone after only collecting ~1 gal of trub and early floccing yeast. So here are my main questions:
1) what PSI are you maintaining while dumping trub and harvesting yeast? Is 2-3 PSI about right?
2) roughly what total volume of yeast/trub are you dumping from the cone after a 10bbl fermentation, and approx how much yeast slurry are you harvesting?
3) how much time does it take to dump (or collect) all yeast and trub from the cone of a 10bbl fermenter?
4) is anyone out there using a rubber mallet to *lightly* tap the cone and loosen up the yeast before collection? (I know that nobody will "recommend" this practice but curious if anyone is using it with good results)
I realize that the answers to these questions are very dependent on the amount and type of yeast pitched (I'm mostly using Wyeast 1728 - scottish ale), and it takes a careful visual inspection through the sight glass to determine where to make the yeast harvest cuts. Just looking for some rules of thumb to start with for average strength beer.
Cheers, Kevin
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