Have you considered keg hopping? I dry hop during primary and in the keg for NEIPAs. My NEIPAs experience rapid change initially probably due to some oxygen exposure due primarily to keg hopping, the keg hop oils dissolving, and yeast dropping out. Typically (well 3-4 batches) my NEIPAs stabilize after 2-3 weeks and stay strong for 3 months.
I have. In fact I just bought one of these:
http://arborfab.com/115-Dry-Hopper-for-Corny-Keg_p_66.html
I’m still curious about alternatives, as well as measuring the effect of force carbing on my other beers.
I hear ya. I’m interested in making further improvements too. Anyway, based on my experience with hops staying fresh for 3 months after adopting closed transfers, my welding grade CO2 (which is almost gone) seems to be OK.
I have one of those. FYI - They work well for APA level dry hopping, but for IPA hopping (4+ oz), the hops can compact and not fully dissolve. Picture a compact green turd when you empty it (sorry for the image) :). That’s why I like the paint strainer bags - they let the hops circulate freely.
That is why I’m going to run the dip tube through the lid of mine. Toss in the dry hops, and the push to another keg when finished. I found them useless for dry hops. Big, dry in the center, turd is accurate. I think good for spice and wood though.
I keep telling you guys, dry hop commando in a keg with a sure screen and then closed transfer to another purged keg. way better than the canisters, although Jon’s large paint strainer is probably as effective.
I’ve recently just been dryhopping in primary after dumping yeast.
back to OP - I’m interested to hear your trials. I’ve personally not experienced this on an IPA - usually first week is meh, followed by 6-10 weeks of greatness before starting to trail off.
I suspect that all the oils and other particulate that was holding the goodness that you like settled. I don’t know about you, but the sediment right around the diptube gets sucked out initially but then after that theres a ton stuck around the rest of the bottom.
even if it is the impurity of the CO2 (I think small probability), its hard to believe it would present itself that quickly.
what about flipping the keg upside down for a couple hours, right it, and then pour a pint?
I’ve had good luck wth the paint strainer bags also, and at 3 for$3 they’re not bad either.
I’m wondering if the DO in CO2 is also a bit of a Boogeyman. The recent brulosophy experiment found 45-117 ppb of oxygen using reasonably simple bottling techniques. Without bottling I imagine it’s lower. I guess it depends on rate of oxidation for hop compounds at low temperatures.
Curious to those who use the canister: do you dry hop at room temperature or lagering temperature? In my fermenter the pellet hops float until I chill, and then they promptly compact nicely at the bottom. I would hope that filling it half way and starting warm when fermentation is still active would let them all hydrate, but I guess I’ll find out!
Marvin, did you use any other low oxygen techniques? Reason I ask is because it’s REALLY amplifies the sharp decline.
If you suspect your CO2 has O2 contamination, you might want to look into sparge carbonation.
https://tapintohach.com/2014/01/27/how-the-purity-of-sparged-carbon-dioxide-affects-the-oxygen-concentration-of-beer/
I’ve given it 5-7 days @ room temp for IPAs and ended up with partially dissolved pellets in the middle. To be clear, I dry hop AIPA/IIPA 5-6+ oz per corny. At my dry hop rate of 2.5 - 3 oz for APA, the canister worked fine. There’s definitely a volume threshold.
Yeah, that’s been the catalyst for me, for sure. Hop quality and longevity has never been better in my beers since I started brewing low O2. Ever. In 24 years. Just personal observations on recipes brewed many, many times.
Well… there are some short comings in the test. Firstly he did a 45 second purge with a stopper. Greatly differing from the normal instructions. However, commercially the accelerated staling tests are more often held at room temperature. The reason i bring this up is because he left them sit at room temp for 3 weeks, basically staling both samples. Not to mention the bottle cap ingress, this is also a real thing and documented. When I pulled a triple vacuum purge cycle ( the gold standard of packaging) I noticed a decline in flavor after 1 month. My fill was easily sub 45ppm.
Here is my blog post on the subject.
http://www.lowoxygenbrewing.com/uncategorized/low-oxygen-bottle-filling/
Also filling a bottle with already carbed beer is going to accelerated the staling due to the pick up of O2 from the bottling.
I provided the measurements. I assure you it’s not a boogeyman. All professional brewing literature mentions the purity needed for the co2 for force carbing, and the stuff we get is not even close.
Fascinating… I had no idea there was a difference. This perhaps answers some of my questions about home vs commerical force carbing and why there would be a difference, aside from possibly getting better CO2.
Which size canister is this? I ordered the 11" one, which they claim can hold 10oz comfortably.
https://www.utahbiodieselsupply.com/brewingfilters.php#cornydryhopper
Good question 8) I didn’t necessarily want this to turn into a low-o2 brewing thread, but yes, I did. The water was preboiled and a mix of smb/aa/brewtan went into the liquor as well as some more brewtan before the whirlpool. The non-low O2 aspects were a copper pickup tube and a therminator (copper brazing, I think), and not spunding. I’ve noticed marked changes after force carbonating in the past, so this isn’t just a lark, and it hasn’t really mattered if the beer was in the primary for 2 weeks or 4; the change happens quickly after kegging.
I think my plan of attack is to split this recipe next time into two kegs: one primed before transfering to naturally carbonate, and one that is actually transferred on day 4 and allowed to finish in the keg with a spunding valve and the dry hops in the strainer canister.
Without delving into the how’s and whys. Reading your original post resignated with me. It brought me back 2.5yrs in my basement going WTF. That’s why I asked. I will leave it at that.
Two things to add:
Using CO2 to pressurize a troublesome keg after a transfer (when spunding) shouldn’t be that evil, as there will be active yeast to consume the oxygen. Others more knowledgeable than myself can chime in.
I know that with cask ale this is why you rack to cask while there’s still some extract left to ferment out in the beer. This is why rolling a cask of beer around the brew yard that wasn’t racked in a closed way doesn’t result in carboard water.
The second thing is that this deleterious effect for beverage grade CO2 can be leveraged to simulate cask condition oxidation. ~7-10 days after an open transfer, my force-carbed ales are about dead on to my cask versions in terms of both carbonation and oxidation.
I don’t want to make it sound like I’m downplaying DO being bad in beer. I also have a lot to work on in my brewing before I really consider myself an “advanced” brewer. I’ll also apologize in my small role in turning this into LODO, but I appreciate the great reading material.
To go back to the brulosophy experiment…I was under the impression he purged without the stopper, but that wasn’t clear. Including the time to me indicated that a stopper wouldn’t be in place, as I’m sure Malcom knows CO2 stops flowing once pressure is equalized. I was under the impression that the fill occurred with a stopper in place. Also, a note on the measurements, he listed ppb or parts per billion. That made me also think that oxygen may not be a factor.
That’s a nice setup, I like the addition of the vacuum pump for bottling.
Anyway, probably not the cause, but hop oils are supposed to transform. Maybe a slow transformation of different hop oils to a less desirable kind? Man, that sounds like I’m reaching on that one.
Ironically, the 18" from these guys:
http://www.stainlessbrewing.com/Dry-Hopper-with-twist-cap-currently-out-of-stock_p_155.html
In theory, should’ve given a buttload of hops plenty of room to dissolve fully. Didn’t dissolve fully in the center at IPA rates. In fairness, most of the goodness had to have gotten out because I didn’t perceive a major dropoff. But I just didn’t want to put hops into it at IPA rates to only mostly dissolve.
Yeah, I have two of those from Stainless Brewing (a 10" and an 18"). I agree that you probably don’t want to put more than 3 oz. of pellets in the smaller one.
That said, I think they work well if you don’t overload.
Maybe I should add rice hulls 
I’m going to try it with 7-8 oz in the keg and let you know. The beer will be fermenting the last 4-6 points so maybe the action and rising CO2 will help mix.