What is the best/most efficient way to deaerate strike water?
Boil it is the easiest
Is it? I don’t really know if it is for my system and batch size. I prob should have stated that I strike with 13± gallons. Underletting, so strike and sparge are tied. Is there another way?
I agree that it is prob the easiest but…
sauergut
Yeast and sugar. I collect water and deaerate the night before brewday. It takes 20 min to reach zero and lasts 2+ days at zero DO. Heating to strike temp kills the yeast and further drives off DO.
Re sauergut, I’ve seen it written somewhere but it’s mostly incorrect.
Common sauergut strains are homofermentative.
This said, if you culture sauergut from malt you may get lucky and get wild yeast and lacto hetero cultures that survive the process (or unlucky).
Sugar/ yeast should work if boiling is not an option.
“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.” - Sherlock Holmes (A. Conan Doyle)
Sauergut is used to adjust pH. Lactobacilli die at mash temps.
The yeast and sugar method takes some time. Then you have to heat to strike temps, killing the yeast, and O2 diffuses in.
Boiled waster has to be cooled to strike temp, and O2 will difuse in while doing that.
I’ve found N-meta added before the stike to work the best for me and how I’m brewing on my system.
German brewers have the ability to strip the 02 from the water, then store the water in an CO2 or N2 purged vessel free from O2.
For completeness, low oxygen homebrewers combine yeast/ sugar or boil with SMB.
Some add ascorbic acid with the SMB.
“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.” - Sherlock Holmes (A. Conan Doyle)
Pure nitrogen works.
Thanks for the correction
ive done this on 2 batches and not done it on 2 other batches this winter. after checking right now which ones, i think simply from my tasting impressions there is a chance this water deoxygenation might make better beer. i used some EEEC118 i think left kicking around in my fridge and a tbsp of sugar. i believe i will keep doing it becuase it takes so little effort and is part of my normal brewday -1 prep
But it takes a lot of it and or special columns and membrane contactors which makes it expensive.
Boiling is much cheaper. Yeast are even cheaper yet.
I have been doing this for the last 12 batches now and I think maybe, possibly it helps make cleaner tasting, longer lasting beers. For 15 gallons of strike water I use 28 grams of sugar and a package of Fleischman yeast the evening before brew day. I also underlet the mash, stir minimally and set the sparge arm below the surface of the mash. It’s easy for my system.
i dont want to get pulled into confirmation bias because i recall low O2 people saying removing oxygen enhances maltiness, but i believe that is it. just an intense malt flavour in the 2 beers, the one had a massive amount of specialty malts so it isnt a surprise, but the other was all pils. so, ill keep monitoring the results.
If low oxygen strike water is the goal (and I’m not saying it is or isn’t) then I am someone who must be guilty of far too much O2 in the mash. BIAB on the stove. I fill my kettle from a faucet above the stove that just splashes away. After reaching strike temp, I dump my grains into the kettle from a bowl and whisk away like the dickens to break up dough balls. I stir the mash regularly, every 5-10 minutes with little subtlety. What it is, what it has been.
But I find this conversation very interesting even if I’m not sure what the end game is.
Yeast and sugar the night before seems beyond easy and having the kettle ready would be time-helpful the next day. Just crank the burner and Let’s go! I’m still not sure why though. 
One question: Do we treat the water with salt/acid along with the yeast/sugar addition, or not until after the O2 is gone. If the latter, how do you incorporate something like Gypsum, the bugger that doesn’t want to readily dissolve, without whisking or stirring in O2?
I add 2 grams/gallon sugar and yeast to my strike water at room temperature the night before a brew. My timer is set to heat the water early the next morning so it will be at strike temperature by the time I finish breakfast. The yeast are killed at a temperature of ~120 F, and the ability to hold dissolved oxygen decreases as the temperature goes up until it is zero at boiling. If you go from 120 to strike temp in a reasonably short time the amount of re-dissolved oxygen should be low. I add my water additions near strike temperature and stir them in gently. Most dissolve better at the high temperature, anyway.
Thanks for that. I may have to give this a try.
Still not sure how to resolve the “mash in” dilemma however. How to get the grains incorporated without ending O2-wise back at square one…
I always mill my grains into a bowl, set the bag in the kettle, gradually dump the grains into the kettle and whisk away as needed.
If I milled into the bag instead and then lowered the bag with grains into the kettle, that would be like underletting. Seems like problem solved. I’m just afraid that I would end up with one huge dough ball!
If you keep your strike temp at or below about 135F, underlet at a slower speed roughly ~3/4 gal a minute and your crush isn’t excessively fine, you won’t get any dough balls.
I mill my grains into a food safe bucket and add my salt additions on top. I add the grain to the bag so the salts are now mixed in towards the bottom and I underlet the mash. If I mash in low ~140°F-ish and gently stir as I’m raising to mash temp I get very few (if any) dough balls. I recirculate during the entire mash so I am hoping this underlet/stirring/recirculating incorporates the salts into the wort.
I use the same 1 gram per gallon of yeast and dextrose added to my strike water at 115F for at least 2 hours before mash in. I monitor the ORP and you can watch it start to drop about 90 minutes in.
I add my grain to the mash tun and any salts/k meta/ascorbic etc on top of the grain. Underlet slowly with minimal stirring for the first rest at 145.
Boil the next charge of water for a step to 160F.
Sparge water gets boiled for 5 minutes to de-aerate. I’m considering dosing about 5 ppm sulfite into the sparge water but haven’t yet.
Sulfite test strips show 0 sulfite once kettle is full and ORP is below 100, often under 60.
Seems I’m keeping most oxygen out of the mash and I do believe the effort is worth it as the final beer quality is noticeably improved.