Never getting "hot break"

[BamaPhil]

And by that I mean the "egg drop soup" flakes everyone talks about.

In 40 or so all grain batches, I've only gotten the flaky hot break one time, and I have no idea why. I think that beer was heavier on what so that could be the explanation, but I've had other wheat beers not "flake" too.

My beer still clears well enough after cold crashing, but I still feel it could be better. I've recently gotten into water chemistry manipulation so I think I've got that under control. I've heard having the right pH should do it, but I've consistently been between 5.3 and 5.5 for mash pH. I've also heard having the right amount of calcium helps, but I'm over 100 ppm for my current batch and it's still the same as others.

Any ideas?

 

[The_Bishop]

What are you boiling on? A stove, an outdoor burner?

The hot break forms at the very beginning of the boil. It's a two stage process as the wort approaches boil; you'll see the hot break begin to coagulate as the liquid begins to move around via convection. The foam the forms at the beginning of the boil is the second part of it.

The hot break 'flakes' aren't very large, usually. The speed of reaching boil has a bit to do with the size of them, as well.

 

[GotPushrods]

You are probably thinking of cold break. A fast chill with some Whirlfloc gives me egg drop soup every time. You might just be looking in the wrong place.

 

[BamaPhil]

I'm on an outdoor propane burner and get a pretty good boil out of it.

I've seen good cold break (occasionally, I don't have a very good chiller), so I know that when I see it. Maybe I just have unreasonable expectations.

 

[shanecb]

You are probably thinking of cold break. A fast chill with some Whirlfloc gives me egg drop soup every time. You might just be looking in the wrong place.

Hot break looks pretty "egg drop soup"y to me usually.

 

[schematix]

Are you measuring mash pH or estimating with a calculation tool?

 

[BamaPhil]

Are you measuring mash pH or estimating with a calculation tool?

A calibrated pH meter, I feel pretty good about their accuracy.

 

[killian]

Maybe try checking the preboil pH? How are you sparging?

 

[Hanglow]

Homebrew boilers aren't very good for forming a hot break, although we pump quite a lot of energy into the wort, it tends to move in a circular motion. A good break depends on the flocs smashing into each other to become large enough to drop out of suspension at the end of the boil. commercial breweries manage this by pumping wort forcibly into a baffle or shooting superheated wort into their internal calandria. A homebrewer could probably rig up something similar, personally I've never felt the need KISS etc

You could boil less vigorously (too vigorous a boil has the opposite effect and pulls them apart) and/or for longer if you think getting bigger flocs will help your beer. But if you have clarity problems it could be plenty of other things, such as a too high protein grists, infection, low flocculating yeast, hop haze etc etc.

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Measure your preboil pH. A good hot break with big flakes happens at a pH of about 5.2 or a bit lower (room temp reading), above that the floccs tend to be smaller. For my lighter coloured beers, I always add some phosphoric acid at the start of the boil to get it into this range (roughly 5.2) but find it's not normally needed with darker beers. I'm guessing that the one beer you had with good 'flaky' hot break was a mid to dark coloured beer?

 

[killian]

Measure your preboil pH. A good hot break with big flakes happens at a pH of about 5.2 or a bit lower (room temp reading), above that the floccs tend to be smaller. For my lighter coloured beers, I always add some phosphoric acid at the start of the boil to get it into this range (roughly 5.2) but find it's not normally needed with darker beers. I'm guessing that the one beer you had with good 'flaky' hot break was a mid to dark coloured beer?

What's your typical amount of phosphoric?

 

[Gnomebrewer]

What's your typical amount of phosphoric?

It varies a bit, depending on the recipe and mash pH. The last pils I did (94% pils malt, 6% carafoam, 7gal batch) used 2mL of 85% phosphoric to get the boil pH down to 5.18 (no-sparge mash pH was 5.31). That's fairly typical for a very pale beer. If my pH is high, I normally add between 0.2mL and 1mL of acid then re-measure until it's where I want it. My next pils, I'm going to try a 5.5pH for the mash, so I'll need more acid in the boil.

I find that my boil pH doesn't drop significantly on pale beers during the boil (most sources say it should). YMMV.

 

[The_Bishop]

How much your boil PH changes would depend on the mineral content of the water, especially the alkalinity.

 

[Yooper]

Hot break doesn't look like 'flakes'.

I have a few pictures of hot break vs cold break in this article: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/clear-wort-clear-beer.html You can see very fine particles, nothing at all like flakes, in the sample. That is what hot break looks like- very fine particles of coagulated proteins.

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Hot break doesn't look like 'flakes'.

Hot break does look like flakes at a slightly lower pH than what is commonly found in homebrewing. The following is from "Essays in Brewing Science" by Michael Lewis and Charlie Bamforth; p.48:

Particles of hot break tend to be rather larger at up to 0.8cm in diameter, with those of cold break seldom rising above 1mm in diameter

They go on to talk about the typical wort pH (5.2 to 5.4) being at the isoelectric point for many proteins, making those proteins less soluble than if the pH was a bit lower (the break would look more powdery). Thus, the flakes may not be seen until the end of the boil when the pH is typically lower.

I can also confirm from experience that a 5.2 (or slightly lower) boil pH leads to a flaky hot break.

 

[BamaPhil]

Maybe try checking the preboil pH? How are you sparging?

Measure your preboil pH. A good hot break with big flakes happens at a pH of about 5.2 or a bit lower (room temp reading), above that the floccs tend to be smaller. For my lighter coloured beers, I always add some phosphoric acid at the start of the boil to get it into this range (roughly 5.2) but find it's not normally needed with darker beers. I'm guessing that the one beer you had with good 'flaky' hot break was a mid to dark coloured beer?

I batch sparge, and my preboil pH is usually around 5.4, never as low as 5.2. Strangely, the odd beer out with bigger flakes was a saison, all pale malt and a bit of wheat.

Hot break doesn't look like 'flakes'.

I have a few pictures of hot break vs cold break in this article: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/clear-wort-clear-beer.html You can see very fine particles, nothing at all like flakes, in the sample. That is what hot break looks like- very fine particles of coagulated proteins.

That's encouraging, that's pretty much what I usually get for hot break material. Really I don't even have any clarity problems in my final beer, I'm just starting to nitpick issues since I'm getting better overall as a brewer.

For you guys that do drop the boil pH with acid and get bigger flakes/flocs, did you find your yield improved at all?

 

[Gnomebrewer]

For you guys that do drop the boil pH with acid and get bigger flakes/flocs, did you find your yield improved at all?

No, it's not about yield. A lower pH (to my tastes) reduces the harshness of the finished beer, but also lowers the extraction of bitterness from hops (so you need more hops). It's most noticeable in pale lagers.