Going to be using my new Oxgenating Kit this Saturday for the first time. 5 Micron wand with regulator hooked up to a Bernz-O-Matic Pure Oxygen tank. A few questions: 1. How far do I open the regulator? What's the goal? Bubbling like crazy? Or a slower rate of Bubbling? 2. How long do I let it go? 1 Minute? 2 Minutes? How would you really measure with any accuracy how much oxygen you are infusing into the wort? Is it really all that critical to know exactly how much you are infusing? What is your standard operating procedure? Recommendations? Thanks in advance!!
Hopefully that's 0.5 microns. 5 Microns would be way too big. Kind of a complex question/answer. It would depend on how much wort, of what gravity, and the type of yeast. BrewCipher (and maybe other tools?) recommends how many seconds to infuse at 1 liter per minute. In a pinch, you won't usually go too far wrong with 60 seconds for 5 gallons of mid-ish gravity ale wort. If you have a true regulator, you should be able to set it for 1 liter per minute. But you mentioned the Bernzomatic tank, which, unless they make something else I don't know about, fits the simpler "regulators" (marked on/off) typically sold by homebrew stores. With those, I'd say you'll be close to 1 Liter per minute if you see some bubbles reaching the top of the wort, but little if any agitation. To know for sure, you'd need a dissolved O2 meter. But the vast majority of best of show beers have been made without one, if that helps answer the question about criticality.
Yeast usually requires 8-10mg per liter. Such concentrations are achieved in 2-3 minutes (if it is pure oxygen and zero start concentration). Yeast producers declare that there is no need for aeration (all included ???). Aeration is probably necessary for 2-3 yeast generations. A Chinese household «thermoхimer» (What is the English for?) costs around \$500.
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Producers make that claim for dry yeast, because they are dried at a point when they (theoretically) have maximum possible levels of sterol reserves. But no such claim is made for liquid yeast.
There is a different logic. The aerobic period of yeast life is associated with their reproduction. If the amount of added yeast (or the amount of yeast in the starter) corresponds to the recipe, then further extensive reproduction of yeast is a violation of the recipe with unpredictable results.
A Bernzomatic oxygen source is not likely to be food grade oxygen. There might be traces from oil (or whatever else) due to pressure handling? It's not going to kill anybody. But you sound detail oriented, and some impurities might affect head retention, for example.
I use the red bottle from H/D only gas no oil comes out. I put the entire hose and stone into a pitcher of sanitizer before and after and turn it on to flush the stone. Gas-it until foam is appearing on the surface usually 45 seconds or so, how do we know if longer is better? we don't, move the hose around in the fermenter. Bubbling will tell you how far to open it. I never had an activation issue if I don't use o2 but I would use it with liquid yeast, I use dry yeast anyways.
Oxygen under pressure + oil (or any oil) is tremendously dangerous. Explosion risk is very real. There is not any oil in a Bernzomatic red cylinder. There is probably nothing that would be unsafe to be sure. The supplier would need to pay for testing to guarantee a food safe supply, but realistically and in practice these bottles are fine for brewing. I mean, from collective experience.
