Do I really need to boil my coil?

[guypettigrew]

Like many other people, I drop my copper cooling coil into the boiling wort 15 minutes before the end of the boil to sterilise it.

It's a pain. The hops, especially the ones which also go in at 15 minutes, collect inside the coil. It has to be repeatedly lifted up and down to free them.

I almost always add hops after the boil, at 80C, steeping them for 30 minutes or so.

Here's the query. If I drop the coil into the wort as the power to the boiler is turned off, then use it to drop the temperature to 80C, and then leave it in the wort for the 30 minute steep, would it be sterile?

Guy

[Dennis King]

Personally I would not take the risk.

[Kev888]

In theory it would still be sanitised if the wort is hot 'enough' but it takes longer as the temperature lowers and isn't as certain.

So like Dennis I prefer not to risk it - I put it in slightly earlier in fact as I find it tends to take the edge off the boil for a bit. Some hops do get trapped in it but they still seem to diffuse their hoppiness well enough, and I've found them easy to clean out by putting it out in the yard and blasting with a hose. For me its no biggie compared to risking infection.

Cheers
kev

[trucker5774]

As per the previous two. Mine goes in with about 20 mins to go. Yes the odd leaf sticks to it but they just rinse off later. I wouldn't want to waste 5 hours work for the risk of an infection. I'm just cleaning mine now, only a 2 minute job.

[guypettigrew]

Cleaning it off after the boil is no problem. A blast under the cold tap and the hops have gone!

My main concern is about the way the hops collect in the centre of the coil and don't circulate in the wort for the last 15 minutes. But perhaps I shouldn't worry?

Any advice from people who know about sterilising things would be welcome.

Guy

[trucker5774]

I wouldnt worry about the hops being in the centre. The wort is moving sufficiently to get good utilisation.

[Capped]

Blimey,you're a bunch of fusspots aren't you? I use a CFC and I sterilise the inside by attaching a plastic tube and funnel and running a kettle full of boiling water through it. Never had an infection,touch wood. So... I'd say a few seconds at 100C ( and a sugary wort probably boils higher than that?) would be sufficient to kill all bugs.

[Kev888]

Any advice from people who know about sterilising things would be welcome.

I wouldn't say I was an expert but this is what i know:
Boiling water won't kill some spores so its not absolute sterilization, but it does get most things so theres only a small risk of something getting through (and I'm not about to start autoclaving my IC..). As long as you're above 80c, thats considered good enough to sanitise food utensils and for and pasturisation, so you would 'probably' get away with it if your lag time wasn't big, but its not really sterile. Below that things get rapidly worse and more and more stuff will survive it - by 65c legionella will be killed quickly, but it will take half an hour at 60c, for instance.

EDIT: Also of course, the risk depends on how clean the IC is - I don't do more than rinse mine after use, but I may do more if it wasn't going to be put into the boil.

This is why I personally like to boil it - theres NO effect I can detect of the hops being caught up in the IC, whilst the potential results of sanitation problems are quite bad.

Cheers
Kev

[danbrew]

But you ferment in an fv that isn't sterile, it's merely sanitized... not to mention all the airborne stuff that goes in buring aeration of the wort prior to pitching.... can't see it being a problem personally...

[Kev888]

I guess it depends on if you consider (and treat) the IC pre-boil or post boil. I make my FV and all other post-boil stuff very clean (soaking in cleaners) and sanitising as well as possible. If you did the same with the IC then yes I'd agree that the risks would be barely any worse - but if you just rinse the IC off like other pre-boil stuff then it would be a different matter.

I would clean it and add it post boil if there was a reason for the effort, but to be frank I'd be addressing a problem that doesn't really exist, since the hops being in the middle of it doesn't seem to matter in practice.

Cheers
kev

[guypettigrew]

OK. Getting some thoughts.

Thanks kev888. Here's the plan for the next brew; Drop the coil in a minute or so before turning the power off. Leave it there for the 80C hop steep.

Should work fine

Guy

[coatesg]

I really wouldn't worry about the hops all getting caught inside the IC - you'll have enough wort movement from the boiling to get decent utilisation. I drop my IC for 15 minutes at the end - I've not had an infection since starting to use the IC, nor have I had lack of bitterness or aroma (at least for these reasons...)

[darkonnis]

Well, its one of those things, people wrongly assume that every single bug known to man that is harmful is in the wort and just waiting to do one over on you.
If this is something that actually concerns you, you could boil your chiller separately, or you could find some solution or other specific to cleaning and sanitising copper, copper by the way has a long documented history (recently proven) in destroying a vast array of germs and fungi as standard.
You need to weigh up the risks, I do my best to make everything and sterile and sanitised as i can, but i dont go to the extremes. I use the method I learnt from NBC drills:
Clean an area,
mark is as clear (for me its the entire counter)
move everything (i do mean everything) away from it,
place your cleaning solution/method between the dirty stuff and the clean zone
clean it items one at a time and put them in the "clean" area. It is now as clean as is reasonably practicable.

You probably do something similar, and my theory is if its good enough to stop you getting covered in CS or other real nasties, it's good enough for my beer.
In the few brews i've done, i havent noticed any hops getting trapped in the cooler. Mine sits below the surface, i drop the hops in the middle (protafloc o nthe outside) and give it a stir, job done. Quick blast with the hose when it comes out, dry with a towel and back into storage ready for next time.

[micromaniac]

i put mine in an fv full of vwp while i,m sanitizing that . quick swill under tap job done

[smeggedup]

i've a cfc i found the best way to sterlise it, is to recirulate with the hot running wort 10 minutes before the end, that way i can get rid of any air blockages and test it before use, if i run into any problems that then gets called a 80'c steep.