I am making a new boil kettle for my brewery, and I was wondering what people’s opinions are about including copper at some point in the brewing process. I have heard that it is important for yeast health to have some copper leach in to the wort, but I am not sure about how this happens. Can it happen in the mash tun, or does it have to be in the kettle?
The traditional method would be a copper kettle. I’d imagine more would dissolve into the boil than into the mash anyway.
On the other hand, from what I understand an all-malt wort has plenty of copper to begin with, and there may not be any benefit to adding more. There’s a reason they’re called micronutrients.
My old kettle had a few copper pieces inside to hold a hop strainer. My new one does not. I don’t think it made a difference and plenty of great brewers don’t have copper. So I don’t know, but you probably don’t need it.
other than throwing an immersion cooler in for a few minutes i doubt there is much more benefit from doing anything more.
I didn’t even think about my wort chiller. Lots of copper contact.
I think it is a bigger issue if you are constantly repitching yeast and not using a yeast nutrient, the copper will eventually become depleted. Copper ions are highly toxic, so cells are able to rapidly bind them up in harmless form - this means that there is not a lot of free copper floating around for new cells to take up. Every time a yeast cell divides it loses some copper to the daughter cell - when you throw out half of your yeast, you’re throwing away half of the copper too. There should be plenty in your yeast nutrient to make up for it.
Sound good, thanks for the advice guys. I don’t use an immersion chiller, but I think I am going to use a copper diptube in the kettle. Easy to put in, and it can’t hurt.
About yeast nutrient…well maybe I will start a new thread.