Whirlpooling with a pump

[Matt in Birdham]

I'm rebuilding my brew rig at the moment, and am considering adding a pumped whirlpool - the benefits I suppose being primarily that I wouldn't need to keep stirring whilst immersion chilling, and perhaps some better utilisation of hops from flameout additions.
A few questions for anyone that has done it:

Is a TD5 pump going to give me enough juice to create a decent whirlpool in a 37 litre pot? (typical batch size 21 litres)

Any tips on plumbing? I think I'd like a permanent port in the side of the pot. so that I can keep the lid on tightly during chilling. The problem is that I am struggling to think of how to attach the return hose in such a way that I can then remove for wort collection, without making a mess. What I'm thinking is a new 1/2 inch port in the kettle with bulkhead fitting and a small tap on the outside - obviously shut for most of the boil, then towards the end of the boil link normal tap outlet to pump inlet, and pump outlet to the new port that would be near the top of the liquid level. That's fine for pumping, but what happens at the end? The easiest option that I can think of is simply to shut both taps and not worry about the wort left in the pump - it won't be alot. Another option would be to then disconnect the pump return from the whirlpool inlet pump wort through this to the FV. Could get messy on disconnect, and I'd worry a little about the external sanitation.

Last question - for anyone that has done it, it is actually worth it?

[Matt in Birdham]

Bit of experimenting today with 22l of water and some crushed crystal, running the TD5 at full bore with a very simple return of just a 90 degree angle, hose barb and short length of silicon. Results seem pretty good - a definite central pile of trub:





At the moment the pump is plumbed straight in, but I'll need a more elaborate setup to brew with. Current thinking is to put a mini ball-valve tap on the upper port, which will obviously be closed when the kettle is first filled, along with an equal T that can accept a temp probe. This will give me a chance to clean up the mash and pump, and then attach hoses towards the end of the boil. One thing I am struggling with is how to minimise loss of wort at the end of the boil. The simplest thing to do would be to recirc with the pump, then close both kettle taps, remove hoses and drain wort from kettle as usual. My rough calcs suggest that this will lose about 1 litre of wort from hoses/pump - although some can be put to use as hydro sample. THe other option is to pump into the FV - i.e. close upper return tap, disconnect hose and run to FV, turn pump back on. Issues with this are 1. sanitation (the outside of the tube, and the connector) and 2. how to detatch hose without spilling wort? Maybe its better to just lose the tube contents? Keen to hear any ideas.

Also reading online about slower whirlpools being better, and limiting the duration - apparently the pump breaks the trub into smaller & smaller pieces, which settle less effectively. Any insights here?

[Hairybiker]

If you are worried about sanitizing the hose then spray it with some starsan. Personally I just drop it into the FV, never had any issues from there.

[Matt in Birdham]

If you are worried about sanitizing the hose then spray it with some starsan. Personally I just drop it into the FV, never had any issues from there.

Yeah that's the plan I think. I just tried with a small tap on the top port - close both taps, remove top hose and drop in bucket, then open bottom tap. Everything siphoned through the pump and I ended up losing about a hydro sample's worth of wort in the pump. Much better than I expected will be giving it a go for real later this week hopefully..

[Kev888]

Looking good, nice to see the pump is up to it, too. One alternative to the top valve would be to have the rigid inlet tube tall/long enough that your hose connection point is above the level of wort in the kettle, so you can't forget to turn anything off when disconnecting, although thats not totally foolproof against back-syphoning in some situations.

FWIW my main challenge with whirlpooling in the past (with real wort) is that I've tried to combine it with hop filters/stoppers that only really worked 'after' the hops settle on them, as they were pants at handling suspended break directly. Its only worked well for me without a hop stopper (or by manual stirring). Of course, your situation/intention may differ and I've hardly tried all the filters/stoppers out there so just mentioning it as something to be aware of.

Re the pipework and losses, yep, I too like to use the exact same outlet, pump and tubing to empty to the fermenter that had boiling wort recirculated through it, due to it being internally disinfected. Its particularly good if the pump was used for (non sterile) wort at the mash stage, as it saves the need to chemically clean it whilst the boil is on. And yes, as mentioned, a quick acting disinfectant/sanitiser around the bits that may have got dirty or exterior areas not been sanitised by the boiling wort. This does unfortunately lose wort left in the tubing when the pump starts to suck air, I suppose you could drain it out into a sterilized jug but for me the extra risk of infection outweighs the recovery of small quantities of wort.

BTW: You may also find that you lose more to hop retention etc with a pump, because the pump needs a minimum rate of supply; as the flow starts to dwindle off you have to stop the pump earlier than if you could let it drain freely. Again, you could collect that by other means if you think it worth the extra risk of infection. One good thing about pumping out IMO is that you can keep it a sealed system, no wort exposed to those damn flies that spring out of nowhere the moment brewing begins, and thats something I like not to compromise.

Best of luck with it,
Kev

[Matt in Birdham]

Thanks Kev. The way I see it there are two possibilities - either detach the top connector (circled in yellow) and pump the wort into the FV via that hose, or detach the inlet connector to the pump (red circle) and drain the kettle using that hose (stick a jug under the pump first of course). Either would lose a bit of wort, but I'm not *too* bothered about that - sanitation is definitely the priority. What would be really nice is an auto shutoff valve on a camlock connector, although it doesn't seem like there is such a thing. I guess I could fold the hose, detach and throw into the fermentor - whether I could do that without spilling too much wort or compromising sanitation I don't know. I only use pellets so and no filters, so hopefully blockage won't be an issue - we'll find out later this week

[Fil]

my kettle has a recirc return fitted with 2 x 90 degree bends and a hex nipple with SS m20 thrust washers and silicone baking sheet seals i have a 1 piece SS valve on the outside and attach to it with a female terminated camlock hose.

on the inside its fitted with a hose tail and 1/2" silicone tube, i can lift this out for recirculating the boil through the hop spider, or drop it to curl with the pot wall to promote a whirlpool.




on disconnecting i close the valve to stop the bulk draining back out as the return is generally below the liquid level, and catch the hose contents in a bucket, i got a special (ebay £12) Stainless steel bucket for the job, but have yet to tip the hose volume back into the bulk..

[Kev888]

Yeah, auto-shutoff vales would be nice, but most I've seen need significant pressure either to open or to shut off, and have complications wrt cleaning. I think in general, a manual valve or clamping the tube or (as fil mentioned), simply catching the drips is a typical way to do it.

As it stands, disconnecting the hose at the yellow position (assuming a valves to stop wort coming out the kettle) would be much more certain at avoiding leaks than the red position. That would let you pump out or (if the pump has a large enough orifice) let the wort run through by gravity when you direct the hose into the FV. Closing the bottom valve should cause suction to at least slow the hose emptying whilst you reposition it in the FV.

If however gravity and the red position is your preference and you don't want to catch drips, then perhaps you could find a way to allow the pump to be lifted up above wort level temporarily, it would let wort drain back to the kettle (assuming open valves) as you begin to break the seal, then close the valves and disconnect at the (elevated) red position fully. The fixed pump perhaps isn't letting you take full advantage of the flexible hoses.

(Obviously, you could have a valve in the hoses either side of the pump to let you do almost any combination, but that way lies more cleaning.)

[Matt in Birdham]

Thanks chaps - think I'll start with the top connection and take it from there. It will certainly gravity feed from there via the pump when testing with water - it will be interesting to see if hop & trub make that more difficult.

[Secla]

ive thought about recircing/whirlpooling with my chugger but i can see it just clogging up with trub etc.
does anyone have this problem and if so is there a way to avoid it ?

[Jocky]

I could see any pump getting clogged when using leaf hops, but not when using pellets.

[john luc]

A chugger pump will chew pellets but not leaf hops.

[Secla]

That's fine, I use pellets anyway

[Matt in Birdham]

Well I have to put this one down as a failure. I did a pale ale brew this morning with about 115g hops in total in a 23l batch. Rigging up the whirlpool was fine, and it ran with reasonable velocity (a few rpm of the whole kettle contents, which apparently is enough). The issue seemed to be that the break and hop material was being macerated by the pump into much finer particles than usual - so it wasn't flocculating and consequently wasn't dropping as quickly. At one point with the IC in the kettle I could see this phenomenon very clearly, as the IC coil was protecting the inner part of the wort which was showing proper "egg soup" type break material, whilst the spinning outer edge was a uniform green sludge. After cooling, I removed the IC and continued to whirlpool for another 10 minutes, before leaving the kettle for an hour and draining off. I actually had less of a cone than I normally do, and the trub was of a *much* finer consistency - nothing fluffy about it.
My main objective from whirlpooling was to aid in cooling, and although that was useful I just don't think the extra effort & clean up is worth it, so I don't think I'll be trying it again. Glad I did though, and if I have stuffed up in some way please let me know. Does anyone here get good results whirlpooling with a pump?

[Fil]

Some ideas need implementing to prove their worth imho, and just as much fun can be had from the experiment.. Then when you hit on a winner it makes it all worthwhile.. Next time...

While i fitted the capacity into my kettle the use of a hop spider negated the need for a whirlpool, the drains 'suck radius' limited its pick up of the break material sediment to the initial drain slug without a hop filter assembly to widen the area the drain is drawn from.