Who here brews with a hop spider? I plan on building one with my spare time out of a SS drain cover and prob some copper tubing rig to try to reduce hop trub in my primary. Anyway I always dump my hops from my boil into my primary, don't know why but I have always done this as well as tossing in my dry hop additions without any nylon or bags. I have noticed most people that use hop spiders rarely transfer the hop bag from the kettle to the primary after the boil. I plan to hop burst and it doesn't make sense to me to leave behind all of the late addition hops (15, 10, 5, flame out, and additions while chilling) in my hop spider after cooling and pitching the yeast. So my question is.... Has anyone removed the hop bag from their hop spider, tie it off, and suspend in primary with a marble and dental floss? I will also add my dry hop additions in a nylon bag with floss and a marble as well.
I wanted to switch to using a hop spider. It seems a lot of hop spider users leave out the bag of hops after their boil. My question would be..... Does anyone that uses a hop spider ever try what I mentioned above? (removing the nylon bag from the hop spider, tie it off, and add to the primary) I want to see if others have tried this method, or if I would be the first to try it this way
I late/KO hop a lot and Dry Hop...but I've never left my late hops in (other than what makes it through my strainer). I think hops in the primary with fermenting yeast would be a waste, but not sure it would really hurt anything.
GreenKrusty101 For well hopped beers it would actually reduce the volume of finished beer you end up with in the end. The beauty & utility of the hop spider is that it easily separates the hops from the beer prior to putting it in the fermentor. I am sure it is clear in the OPs mind, but since he didn't state it, I am a little confused as to why you would even want to use a hop spider if you just want to dump all the hops into the primary fermentor afterwards anyway. I suppose you are trying to extract every little bit of flavor from the hops that you can get, but hops are relatively cheep, and at that point you are getting more of the vegetal / off flavor from the hops that have seen heat, so I would just throw those out and use fresh for the dry hopping.
It's clear as day to me in my head. I usually add everything that was in the boil into my primary, hops and all. I was instructed to do so by a very reputable homebrew shop. The purpose of a hop spider is to contain the hop additions in a nylon bag, the point being that the hops are sealed in a nylon bag. So why would taking that sealed nylon bag and placing it in the primary would be considered dumping freely? The hops will be remain contained in the nylon bag the whole fermentation, then removed to add another nylon bag with a fresh dry hop addition.
The amount of trub would be the main difference. If I add 7 to 9oz of loose hops, it would result in a lot of trub. If they were contained in a nice nylon bag, it would result in less trub if my theory is correct. I just find it really difficult to believe I can achieve my desired aroma and flavoring results without the flavor and aroma hops remaining with the wort. If you removed the hops from wort after flame out (being mostly late additions 15, 10, 5, flame out, post boil), it would basically be like steeping the hops for the required length of the hop addition (if you get what I mean). This is how my mind is working. If I am wrong about the last part with the hops not having enough time in the boil, just tell me I'm wrong ha. I just want to understand it. Thank you all for your patience, cheers!
The late hops have enough time in the boil. Some folks like to leave their flame out hops in for awhile while whirlpooling/chilling. Otherwise, you'll get plenty of aroma and flavor from late additions without having to move the hops over to your primary. I don't know of anybody who does that. I have hop material that makes it into the fermenter that I don't worry about it, but the point of hopspiders, false bottoms, hoprockets, etc. is to keep hops out.
I totally get the purpose of the hop spider and etc. is to keep the hop particles out of the primary and I respect that. I was thinking more along the lines of a non-practical/thinking outside the box routine. So you guys answered my question, I should get my desired flavor and aroma without the hoppy trub. Thanks you all for your help and patience BAs!
