calgary222
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- Jan 26, 2015
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So I had the worst brew day ever on Sunday, supply hose froze and cracked, sparge system clogged, number one chugger pump blew up, heat exchanger completely clogged, batch was saved (i hope) after 24hours of passive cooling in my fermenter. Anyway, my question is around hop management.
For equipment I have 30 gallon pots and have two spiders that I have used in the past, one a fine mesh and one more coarse. I find the fine one plugs up and the coarse doesn't really do much to hold the pellets in until it clogs up. I also have the blichmann hop blocker.
Lately In an effort to get more of the hops exposed to more of the wort, particularly the late addition hops, I have only used the Blichmann blocker, but that may have led to my exchanger jam up...
Procedurally, I let the whirlpool hose circulate for 20 minutes prior to flame out, at flame out give it an extra swirl with the paddle, turn off pump and let rest for 10 minutes and then pump out - the heat exchanger drops temp in one pass. I also clean in place and reverse flow the exchanger after each use.
The batch was an ESB with about 12 oz of pellet hops.
While cleaning my exchanger, I was pumping through various agents and then filtering the output across one of my wife's kitchen strainers and I started thinking that a filter in front of the exchanger might not be a bad idea... My only other thought is to just try a larger spider. Any thoughts on how to maximize contact while protecting the exchanger from clogging?
For equipment I have 30 gallon pots and have two spiders that I have used in the past, one a fine mesh and one more coarse. I find the fine one plugs up and the coarse doesn't really do much to hold the pellets in until it clogs up. I also have the blichmann hop blocker.
Lately In an effort to get more of the hops exposed to more of the wort, particularly the late addition hops, I have only used the Blichmann blocker, but that may have led to my exchanger jam up...
Procedurally, I let the whirlpool hose circulate for 20 minutes prior to flame out, at flame out give it an extra swirl with the paddle, turn off pump and let rest for 10 minutes and then pump out - the heat exchanger drops temp in one pass. I also clean in place and reverse flow the exchanger after each use.
The batch was an ESB with about 12 oz of pellet hops.
While cleaning my exchanger, I was pumping through various agents and then filtering the output across one of my wife's kitchen strainers and I started thinking that a filter in front of the exchanger might not be a bad idea... My only other thought is to just try a larger spider. Any thoughts on how to maximize contact while protecting the exchanger from clogging?