Can you cool wort too quickly?

[mr pharmacist]

I'm fairly new to home brewing but have about 20 brews under my belt so far and most have been a success.

I've also been improving my equipment, with my most recent addition being a pump to pump the wort through my counter flow cooler. The main reason I did this was because my cooler was way too efficient and the wort was coming out at about 13 degrees unless i turned the cooling water flow right down to a trickle.

Now with the pump its coming out at about 22 degrees and takes about 15 minutes to empty my kettle, which is a pretty good time saving.

However, since i started using the pump my beer is cloudy / hazy. Leaving it in the FV for 3 weeks or so doesnt seem to help. Crash cooling doesnt help either. So could the fast rate of cooling stop the cold break from happening as effectively so more proteins are left in? Or could it be that the pump is pulling through more of the trub than gravity would?

The beer is hazy regardless of whether it is warm or cold so its not chill haze.

Any other ideas?

[Sadfield]

In a word, no. Fast cooling forms the Cold Break which precipitates proteins out of the wort. The problem may lie with the difference between immersion chillers and counterflow. An immersion chiller cools the wort before it is drained from the kettle, so any cold break material is filter out, along with hop matter and Hot Break material. A counterflow chiller creates Cold Break material after this point of filtration and adds it to the FV. Presuming this is what you do, or do you recirculate the wort in the kettle whilst cooling, and then drop through the filter into the FV?

[mr pharmacist]

That makes sense.

I pump the cooled wort straight into the FV. Do you think I might have less of an issue if i recirculated back into the kettle?

[Sadfield]

Sorry, I think I may have misunderstood your original post and assumed you moved from Immersion Chiller to Counterflow with a pump, I now realise you have added the pump to speed flow through the chiller. Dropping to 22C in 15 minutes, I would imagine is more than enough to produce a Cold Break, which should settle as trub in the FV anyway. I wonder if the speed at which the pump is pulling wort out of the kettle is disturbing and dragging Hot Break material into the FV.

Recirculating may help, but ditching the pump and returning to a method that worked would be simpler.

[mr pharmacist]

Thanks for the response - I will try cooling the old way to see if it solves the problem.

The reason i started to use a pump though was to speed it up - it was taking 45 minutes to get an 18 or so litre batch through the chiller. I should have gone for 8mm copper in the chiller rather than 6 i think...

[Mr. Dripping]

There are many reasons why a beer may be hazy.
IMO I don't think it is anything to do with the way you are cooling the wort.

Are you brewing the same few recipes?
Have you increased the hop loading?
Cold crashing close to zero degrees is one of the best ways to remove haze IME.
How are you cleaning you CF chiller??.....infections will also cause haze.

[mr pharmacist]

None of the beer I have brewed recently has had any high hop content so it's not that.

Cold crashing hasnt helped either, other than slow bottle carbination right down (and in a couple of bottles it hasn't happened at all).

The chiller has plenty boiling water run through after the brewing session and then again during the next brew session before its used again so am pretty sure it's not infected

[Graham]

I would say that your original 13 degrees is about ideal. The colder the temperature the more cold break drops out. Some people say that the faster the cooling the more cold break drops out, but that is a fallacy; it is the temperature that you get the beer down to that is important, no matter how quickly you do it. Having said that; many people cool to just room temperature, sometimes by natural heat loss (no cooling apparatus) and do not experience significant clarity problems. I suggest that you look into your copper finings usage. If you live in a soft water area and do not perform water treatment, you may be suffering from a calcium deficiency which will cause clarity problems.

[Waffty]

As Graham as mentioned, do you use any Copper Finings, such as Irish moss for the last 10 to 15 mins?

I use Irish moss for the last 15 minutes of the boil, I then crash cool to circa 18/19c and leave it in the boiler (covered) to settle out for at least 30mins, more if I have the time. The result is a relatively clear wort into the fermenter. If you're using a plate chiller, you could still use the copper finings and maybe, some kind of filter on the fermenter side. I used to do this, as not only does it remove most of the trub into the FV, it also helps to add air/oxygen.

After I'm happy that the fermentation has finished, I also crash cool into the FV, as this also helps to settle out the yeast/remaining trub. I cool to around 6c for a couple of days, before racking to a corny/bottles. If bottles, I just add sugar to the bottle, let it condition and 9.9 times out of 10, by the time it's had 4 weeks or so to conditions, it's also dropped bright.

If you're still having issues, then you may need to look at Auxiliary finings, followed by a normal finings to finish off.

[mr pharmacist]

Yes I use Irish moss for the last 15 minutes.

I didn't have this issue until I started using the pump though - hence my original question. It could be something else of course, but just thought I'd ask about the cooling as thats the main thing that has changed recently.

My take off from the kettle is right in the middle of the kettle - thats why i was thinking maybe the pump is pulling more stuff through.

I will try without the pump next time and see what happens.