I brewed my first batch of IPA last night with my new keggle. Unfortunately when I went to drain my wort into my primary fermenter my ½” dip tube immediately clogged up with hops. I was using whole hops as pellet hops were not available from the local brew supply shop. How can I avoid this next time? Thanks for any info.
Cold crash your carboy and the hops will fall. Pull the beer off the top and don’t bring hop matter into the keg.
There are a number of solutions out there such as hopstoppers, bazooka screens, false bottoms, etc. All work decent with whole hops but you’ll still need to bag the pellets as they clog everything when lots of them are swimming freely. On my next kettle I’m going to use whirlpooling and pick up from the side instead of the middle where the debris will be. Lots of proven ways to skin this cat if you do some searching.
I find it difficult to build that whirlpool cone in my keg converted kettle.
I used as stainless steel scrubber and stuck my dip tube inside of it. Worked like a charm.
That’s interesting. I’ve tried a copper scrubber and it plugged up right away.
Now I bag whole hops and just throw in pellets. One brew had 10 oz. of loose pellets with no plug ups.
That’s interesting. I’ve tried a copper scrubber and it plugged up right away.
Now I bag whole hops and just throw in pellets. One brew had 10 oz. of loose pellets with no plug ups.[/quote]
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
this is my experience with trying the scrubber. I also bag whole hops and just throw pellets in the kettle. I also have my dip tube at the edge of the kettle instead of the center.
Yeah, I believe it’s that rounded bottom. I just finally got to the point where I transfer close to everything & either dump it from the conical, or if it’s in a carboy I use 2. Let the crap settle out in one & transfer to another one before pitching. One of these days I’ll upgrade to a regular kettle, but it’s about as low priority as it gets on the brewing sheet. I’ll probably use this one until it just can’t be fixed anymore.
Yeah, I believe it’s that rounded bottom. I just finally got to the point where I transfer close to everything & either dump it from the conical, or if it’s in a carboy I use 2. Let the crap settle out in one & transfer to another one before pitching. One of these days I’ll upgrade to a regular kettle, but it’s about as low priority as it gets on the brewing sheet. I’ll probably use this one until it just can’t be fixed anymore.[/quote]
I brewed for years in a converted keg and had no issues getting a good cone in mine.
Yeah, I believe it’s that rounded bottom. I just finally got to the point where I transfer close to everything & either dump it from the conical, or if it’s in a carboy I use 2. Let the crap settle out in one & transfer to another one before pitching. One of these days I’ll upgrade to a regular kettle, but it’s about as low priority as it gets on the brewing sheet. I’ll probably use this one until it just can’t be fixed anymore.[/quote]
I brewed for years in a converted keg and had no issues getting a good cone in mine.[/quote]
Any secret to share except for “stir briskly in a circle?”
No real trick. How is your dip tube setup? Mine was ran against the inside edge with a welded bulkhead fitting.
I usually leave 5-10% of the post boil volume in the kettle, and just factor this in when calculating/estimating volumes. The wort outlet is also an inch or two above the bottom of the kettle.
Hop bags or and/or leave some wort in the kettle for me. You lose a little utilization with the hop bags but adding a bit more is worth the frustration some times.
Every time I am at my LHBS I grab a handful of muslin bags. For $0.45, they have saved me from COUNTLESS headaches when using whole hops
Anybody got a good link on “whirlpooling” and “whirlpool cone”?
In the equipment gathering / building stage right now, and I like the sound and the mentioned benefits of it!
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[quote=“Stealthcruiser”]Anybody got a good link on “whirlpooling” and “whirlpool cone”?
In the equipment gathering / building stage right now, and I like the sound and the mentioned benefits of it!
…[/quote]
They are talking about taking your spoon and creating a whirlpool in the kettle when you are at the cooling stage. I usually do it five or six times through out my cooling phase. By spinning the wort you’re pulling the hops to the center of the kettle then when you are ready to transfer into the fermenter you just syphon from the side.
Another way to do it is the Jamil whirlpool way and that involves a using a pump to pull from the bottom of the kettle and push wort back in through the top of the kettle creating a constant whirlpool. This is the way that I will be doing it after Christmas.
Thanks!
I’ll scope out “Jamil whirlpool”…Think that’ll give some visuals?
