I recently built a circulating arm and attached it to a March Pump, to be used for circulating the wort during chilling, since I often make lagers and need to get the wort down to about 55 F. During my last brew, the temperature dropped fairly rapidly using the circulating arm, but I ended up with about 3 or 4 inches of very thick foam that lasted for a long time. I had the flow set to about 3/4 maximum speed. Is this foam a normal occurrence while recirculating? If not, what may I be doing wrong? Thanks.
Any time you're agitating wort/beer, you may make foam. I would reduce the speed and/or adjust the configuration to get a "smoother" circulation. BTW, the foam you're seeing is subtracting from the potential foam at serving time. The proteins in foam are "use once only." ETA: Unless you're also circulating in order to whirlpool hops, I'd recommend circulating ice water through the chiller instead of circulating the wort. It would be more effective, it wouldn't make foam, and it wouldn't risk HSA.
I'm just getting into lagers. I do not recirculate but when one is fermenting, does the protein 1 use , apply these and should I use fermcap or another product while fermenting?
Disclaimer: I've never used Fermcap. But I have read and thought about it. On the plus side, the foam that doesn't form in fermentation should mean more foam positive proteins available later. On the minus side, if any of the product ends up in your finished beer, it could inhibit foam. Much has been made about Fermcap sinking to the bottom of the fermenter after fermentation, and therefore not getting into the finished beer. I strongly suspect that at least a little gets into the finished beer with most racking techniques. And my wild ass guess is that the positive and negative impacts to beer foam tend to offset each other. Lager fermentations tend to be pretty subdued. Last thought... a good bit of the "foam" formed in krausen isn't the kind of foam we're talking about. There's a good bit of yeast, hops, and non-foam positive proteins in that krausen too.
I don’t get any foam recirculating. You might check that you connections are tight, so that you are not pulling in air on the suction side of the pump.
I'm having a hard time visualizing your "circulating arm" Like this? https://byo.com/color/item/377-build-a-recirculating-wort-chiller-projects Or this? https://www.ebay.com/itm/25-Homebre...ating-Arm-and-Soldered-Fittings-/141908380551
I must have lost most of my potential foam. I'll try reducing the flow rate even more next time, although it didn't seem to be too aggressive. The purpose for the circulation is not necessarily for whirlpooling hops (not often required when making continental pilsners or Kolsch's, which I did this time). I already have an immersion chiller through which cold tap water flows (currently about 55 F - 65F is cold enough for a Kolsch), and am using the circulation arm to move the wort over the chiller, rather than me having to stir manually for up to 45 minutes, while standing outside in the cold air. Stirring increases the rate of chilling significantly, and the circulating arm was successful in automating this procedure. It also gives me additional time to clean up while waiting for it to chill. The only downside seems to be the immense amount of fine foam.
If you are making foam with a pumped wort circulation/cooling system where you are removing the wort from the kettle, you are doing something wrong. March type pumps are made to pump hot wort without aerating...in fact the pump won't work right if it does aerate (cavitate) Try jogging your pump initially to get any trapped air out ahead of your wort.
That's possible. There was a bit of air at first, but once that was gone, there did not seem to be any further air - there was no other source of air. One end of the pump was directly attached to the bottom tap of the boiling vessel, and the other was securely attached to the circulating arm, which reached to within 2 or 3 inches from the bottom of the vessel. I did attach the hoses securely to the pump, but it is possible that I didn't tighten them enough or that they loosened slightly and let in some air. I didn't check that afterwards.
