Whirlpool Strategy

I do steeps at 150-170F for 20-30 minutes most of the time and still use plenty of hops in the 30-5 minute range. Typical amounts for an IPA would be 5oz in the boil and 3oz for steeping. 70-90ibu. Pretty happy with the results. I can't say the lower temperature steeps are causing muddled flavors.

 

What I took away from our Whirlpool experiment was that hop flavor wasn't much dependent on WP temperatures like the variety of oil flash point temperatures would lead you to believe. Of the four temperatures (200, 180, 150, 120) we looked at and put a panel too, none stood out statistically. However, I also believe my statement may only hold for the hops we used (Centennial, Chinook, Cascade). Other hops with different oil contents may be more temperature dependent. That would be another good experiment that I would like to try next year.

I also DH'd the same four WP beers with the same hop combination, and there was a statistical difference compared to the non-dry hopped versions. ie it was easy for people to pick the DH vs non-DH beers apart. However any differences between the four DH'ed beers (200,180,150,120) weren't shown to exist.

So, personally I tend to stick to the 180F whirlpooling temp for ~30min merely based on what I hear other brewers doing. But I'm very loose with those numbers. I think they can vary quite a bit with no discernible differences.

I think there is still a lot to learn about capturing and targeting the oils you want to extract from the hops.