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Getting rid of CO2 by vaccuum pre-bottling

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Thanks for the input guys. It looks like this is a very tough one to get absolutely right. I just wrote Denice Ingalls at Sky river brewing to see how she does it. I know her meads are absolutely crystal clear, so whatever she is doing must be working.

Just hope it will also be able to work into my own plans.

One thing I should probably add is that when I pump out of the secondary, it's from a valve sitting about 50L up. If the fining works, like it should in there then I think I agree with Medsen that using only one filter-type should be enough. It's unlikely to get much goo that high up. The main problem, is that degassing those tanks doesn't really work. Maybe with some form of huge drill/whipper, but not with a vaccuum pump. And one thing I really want to avoid is several unneccesary journeys back and forth between the tanks.
 
Mead Eruption?

Medsen Fey said:
Step 1 - De-gas the mead. That will speed clearing. Letting it come up to room temp will drastically shorten the time it takes to de-gas.
Click to expand...
Has anybody used one of these Whip Wine Degassers? It seems to me that it could be VERY dangerous, even for a carboy that has been done with fermentation for quite a while.
the-whip-wine-degasser-from-fermtech.jpg
 
I didn't recieve any response yet from Sky River. And I need to be buying my fining agent yesterday. So I thought I'd continue my questions here, and see if I can get to a setup I feel comfortable with.

I've been thinking about this, and one thing that I can probably do is get myself, one or three movable cooling jackets, that I can wrap around my secondaries. In order to chill while fining. That should eliminate the immediate need of degassing, since in a cold liquid any haze and particles should clear even with slights amounts of CO2 lingering, right?

For fining in this cold enviornment I'm considering a combination of Kieselsol and Gelatin (after reading up on clarifiers it seemed to me that gelatin was one of few that will clear the haze, which also is what is most difficult to get rid of, except maybe CO2).

So to sum up, this is what I would be doing step-by step.

1. After 4-5 months of aging, I start cooling down the secondaries to near 0 C
2. I add gelatin and kiesesol (should I drop it in from the top, or pump it in from the side, and then pump the mead around? The former would be much less messy.
3. I let it stand cool for about 2 weeks (any longer and I will need extra cooling equipment)
4. I filter from the secondaries into my pre-bottling tank.
5. I let the mead temperature rise to at least around 15 C (preferably more)
6. I de-gas for 1-5 days
7. I bottle while still keeping pressure lower than 1 atm.

Please provide any input of anything you would have liked to do different here, if it were you.
 
This looks like a good plan

This looks like a good plan (basically the plan I have for my batch #2). Here are some experiences and tweaks/comments.

1. You will need more than 2 weeks for cold stabilization down to 0c. I would plan for three weeks to get to that temp (depending on cooling capability of your setup and volume you need to cool).
2. I would add the fining agents before you begin to crash cool. Give them a day to incorporate, then start your cooling.
3. Your de-gassing plan and temperature plan for after your crash look good to me.
4. Bottling less than 1atm? Do you mean under vacuum you will bottle?

MMclean
I knew you would love that level of insight ;)

Ian
 
Thanks for the input Ian.

Regarding point 1. I know that it will definately not take more than a week for 0 C to be reached. The cooling I have on my fermentation tanks is very effective and can get the mead (around 3 cubic meters) down to 0 C in less than 24 hours. This cooling with the movable jackets won't be as effective though, but I'll need to decide how many vessels I want to be able to do at a time. One cooling generator should be able to handle around 3 vessels, which is the amount I want to be bottling in a 2 week period, once things are rolling. If I want the period to be more than 2 weeks, I'll need another machine and another 3 movable jackets.

Point 2. Yeah, this is probably smart.

Point 4. Yes, under a very small vaccuum. The bottling pump will work better if it doesn't get a natural flow towards it, since it is meant to pull the liquid (It's a tiny diaphragm pump), and I think it will also help ensure CO2 won't be built up in the bottling process in some strange way.
 
To rack or not to rack?

Medsen Fey said:
I'm not a commercial producer so take my "homey" approach with a grain of salt.

Step 1 - De-gas the mead. That will speed clearing. Letting it come up to room temp will drastically shorten the time it takes to de-gas.

Step 2 - Using fining. You can test for protein stability and should probably do bench trials to determine the lowest amount needed to prevent protein instability.

Step 3 - Filter with 0.5 micron nominal filter. This will remove any left-over fining agent and leave things crystal clear. After fining if it has cleared enough, you may be able to do filtration in one stage rather than two.
Click to expand...
I currently have a buckwheat mead that has been fining about three weeks. Which methed do you find more effective? Do you rack before filtering with the 0.5 micron nominal filter, or do you carefully filter from above the finings to avoid disturbing them during racking?

What do you use for degassing? Gentle swirling, a long spoon handle, or a mechanical degasser (or other)?
 
I work with degassing pumps in medical equipment and have found that you only need a vacumn of 24-25 psi to pull air out of liquid. It also will help if you have something for the dissolved CO2 to collect on. Running a second pump that produces a flow of mead across a bed of marbles which are on the bottom of the tank will help pull the CO2 out of solution. You don't need marbles, anything that increases the advailable surface area in the vacumn chamber will help. It works a little like dumping a little salt in a soda or a beer, you get a whole lot of CO2 coming out of solution faster because of the increase in surface area.
 
I'm confused.
What we take to be 0 psi is 1 atmosphere of pressure.
The lowest you can go is pure vacuum, space. Which would be -1 atm or -14.xx PSI
what do you man by a vacuum of 24-25 psi?
Or is my thinking on this: very wrong?
 
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