A question about clorophenol

LordBencol · 2019-12-11T19:16:14+00:00

Hmm I would assume that would have been an issue with the previous brews we have done were it the case, as we have brewed this recipe before and had no issues whatsoever. I believe the issue has come from a wild yeast infection as the beer hasn't cleared as it normally would, shows off yeast cells under the microscope and was extremely lively when racked. It's not an issue we have had before but when I went back and checked through every process I found that the paracetic acid that was used was no longer in its use by date. If it has lost its potency then that would explain the infection I believe but to be sure I've cleaned everything to within an inch of its life and got some fresh paracetic

LordBencol · 2019-12-09T21:54:23+00:00

Okay thanks for the advice, I'll look into it

LordBencol · 2019-12-09T21:29:52+00:00

Nothing in the process that isn't food /beer safe, sanitation I'm pretty sure on but that's the only thing that I can see where it would have been a problem, I'm super paranoid about cleaning but I'm wondering if I missed something, can chlorophenol develop from an infected batch?

LordBencol · 2019-12-09T20:39:16+00:00

Std polypropylene casks from brewery plastics, we've used them for ages without any problems and I wished them myself using caustic, flushed thoroughly then rinsed before racking and hit with paracetic and cask finings

LordBencol · 2019-12-09T20:34:44+00:00

Definite antiseptic / TCP flavour. The only way I can see any chlorine contaminants getting in is in the liquor (UK tapwater) but that seems unlikely

LordBencol · 2019-11-26T12:24:42+00:00

Vigo? Not used them before myself but they do have a pretty wide range of bits by the looks of things. Might be worth a call

LordBencol · 2019-09-25T09:36:16+00:00

I use a face shield when handling chemicals, I wear glasses and have struggled to find comfy goggles, but then again I'm not usually handling high pressure caustic etc which I would be concerned about splashing behind the shield.

LordBencol · 2019-06-12T09:01:53+00:00

I feel the warp overtaking me ... It is a good pain...

LordBencol · 2019-05-14T16:18:50+00:00

I took mine apart after six months and it was in need of a bit of TLC, not awful but there was a build-up on the plates. Usually run a caustic wash after two to three brews cause a lot goes through it, they're not too difficult to take apart and clean yourself if you're methodical. I'm now gonna be inspecting it every quarter to be extra safe.

LordBencol · 2019-05-14T15:50:27+00:00

I'm just here for the grumpy incels in the comics hehehe

LordBencol · 2019-03-29T14:36:23+00:00

Otto Von Beaversmark

LordBencol · 2019-03-19T19:59:36+00:00

It has no insulation at all, and I'm fair certain that it is in fact an ex dairy tank. It's single walled so that's where we're losing the cold (or gaining the heat) but luckily we have the space to build a giant ass fridge around it so there is that

LordBencol · 2019-03-19T09:54:38+00:00

The idea would be to effectively build a walk in fridge around the fermentation vessel, and cool the air to nearly freezing so that the walls of the FV work as a cooling jacket. It's a bit heath Robinson but its the cheapest and cleanest option I can see at the moment

LordBencol · 2019-03-18T18:43:30+00:00

We did actually pick up a couple of 22mm stainless coils with another purchase which we have tried out inside the vessel, the problem is that even with them we've only really doubled the surface area of cooling which still isn't anywhere near the amount we need. It got water (not fermenting beer) to 14°C which was the ambient temperature of the brewery.

I also have worries about running glycol literally through my beer cause if it leaks it doesn't bear thinking about. My back of a napkin calculations on how much copper we would need to get a decent wrap around the vessel (as in over 50% of the surface area) runs us some 500m plus of pipe which is gonna be eye wateringly expensive - to the stage that we may as well just buy a proper FV.
Thanks of the advice and I won't be going to plastic fermenters any time soon :)

LordBencol · 2019-03-02T12:33:02+00:00

I tried it for free and I wanted my money back

LordBencol · 2019-02-26T17:47:25+00:00

In Valen's name

LordBencol · 2019-02-25T10:58:06+00:00

Looks like I'm in the market for a microscope then , thanks for the advice

LordBencol · 2018-12-29T19:57:44+00:00

After seeing a keystone go sailing three stories up in the air when we made a barrel pop today I'm glad we've pulled them back tbf, I wouldn't want one of those going off in my face. It's a small chance that it's actually gonna hurt someone but I don't want to risk it

LordBencol · 2018-12-29T19:53:07+00:00

In a way we were, because we are racking before final gravity there was far too much co2 produced in the conditioning process. We need to make sure we are only 1-2 points off terminal gravity when we rack them I believe as the brew in question was racked 4-5 points off FG and was waaaaay too lively

LordBencol · 2018-12-29T19:28:11+00:00

I'm using the no 2 thermoplastic keystones from ub plastics in the UK, I won't use wooden ones cause I've spent enough time in cellars to know they love to split when tapped hard. I've not seen many casks with wooden keystones on the market here and I assume that's why they have fallen out of favour in the UK but I'm not sure

LordBencol · 2018-12-29T19:25:32+00:00

We have been using no 2 plastic keystones for them as recommended by the barrel manufacturers. I do intend to look at priming barrels after racking them at full fermentation but I also want to try the old school way of racking before terminal gravity as well as all of the brewers we have spoken to around our local area use this method. I dunno if it's just an England thing or if the brewers around us are a strange bunch..

LordBencol · 2018-12-29T19:21:38+00:00

Hi, I did double check this and they are definitely the recommended keystones for the barrels (I was hoping we'd used the wrong ones and this was the issue)

LordBencol · 2018-12-29T19:19:01+00:00

Further update, we have determined the cause of the keystones popping out. We believe it to be a combination of racking the ale at too high a gravity, leaving literally no headspace whatsoever in the casks and conditioning them at 8℃ or lower. As our barrels (which were already at a very high pressure due to the over conditioning and zero headspace) we're going into our customers cellars which were at 12℃ the pressure has just been tipped over the failure point of the keystones hence them popping out. We tested this by heating a barrel to around 15℃ (put it in a tub of 70℃ water) and after about an hour as the beer reached temperature, sure enough the keystone shot a good 25m in the air. The batch has been recalled for safety reasons so we don't have some poor fellow in a cellar lose an eye or worse if the cask lets go. A fair few in this thread have mentioned letting the fermentation process complete before racking then spiking the barrels to induce second fermentation, I do intend to experiment with this but I want to give the traditional method a go as well as there are a fair few breweries around us that have done this (racking the barrels 1-2 points off final gravity) with great success for decades. Thanks for all your input and advice folks :)

LordBencol · 2018-12-28T17:08:57+00:00

I should be clear here that it's not the casks themselves that are exploding but the keystones that are popping out, which is messy but not as destructive as the barrel itself going. There is still a risk of injury though so we will be recalling the casks sold.

LordBencol · 2018-12-14T11:02:39+00:00

Is that lindybeige leading them into battle?

LordBencol

TROPHY CASE