I want a clear beer.
I’ve 3 full carboys at the moment. Ready to bottle in a week or so. I hear it is best to cool at 33 degrees for a day or two to improve clarity. I don’t have a Johnson control for my spare freezer nor do I have room in my refrigerator for crash cooling.
Here in North Alabama, the night temps will typically get down to the mid-to-high 20’s. If I put my babies outside for a night or two and some of the wort freezes, will that kill/ruin anything?
[quote=“jimexcelcs”]I want a clear beer.
I’ve 3 full carboys at the moment. Ready to bottle in a week or so. I hear it is best to cool at 33 degrees for a day or two to improve clarity. I don’t have a Johnson control for my spare freezer nor do I have room in my refrigerator for crash cooling.
Here in North Alabama, the night temps will typically get down to the mid-to-high 20’s. If I put my babies outside for a night or two and some of the wort freezes, will that kill/ruin anything?[/quote]
You might end up with a shattered carboy or two.
[quote=“Rookie L A”][quote=“jimexcelcs”]I want a clear beer.
I’ve 3 full carboys at the moment. Ready to bottle in a week or so. I hear it is best to cool at 33 degrees for a day or two to improve clarity. I don’t have a Johnson control for my spare freezer nor do I have room in my refrigerator for crash cooling.
Here in North Alabama, the night temps will typically get down to the mid-to-high 20’s. If I put my babies outside for a night or two and some of the wort freezes, will that kill/ruin anything?[/quote]
You might end up with a shattered carboy or two.[/quote]
And no beer 
Well, I wouldn’t place it outside if I thought they’d freeze solid so busted 'boys ought not be a problem. I just curious if a bit if ice in the wort would damage the final product.
Well, I resorted to Googling this. For anyone else who wants to know, a bit of frozen wort should not be a problem at all. About the only danger here is damaging some yeast if it freezes resulting in a delayed carbonation. If the wort freezes, just add some of the same strain of yeast to the bottling bucket before you bottle.
I would just bottle the beer than put the bottles in the fridge (controlled temp) to let them clear.
I’ll tell ya- I’m in Maine and cold crash in my outdoor garage all the time with temps in the teens and even below. So far, never had a problem(knock on wood). If you’re worried, here’s what I do for my longterm cold conditioning(lagers): I put the carboy in a bucket of water(swampcooler). The water in the bucket may freeze a couple inches, but the beer has not…yet.
I’m thinking you should be OK in Alabama.
hello flo-town!!! i lived in killen for a good while. small world! i would be cautious leaving all that beer out for the taking, personally. Unless you have a good guard dog. lol
I think you would need temps that are consistently in the single digits to freeze 5 gallons of beer.
Water freezes at 32 degrees. That is when all of the water is at that temperature, not the ambient air. Beer, with alcohol in it, would likely need a few degrees lower to freeze completely. FWIW, I was trying to freeze-distill some braggot a few years back and had my chest freezer set to subarctic, and could barely get some crystallization (now I grant you that was a 10% abv beverage).
YMMV, but I’d say stick your carboys outside for a few days/weeks, preferably in the garage near an interior wall just to be safe :mrgreen:
