Sanitize
Always sanitize your Conical before filling it with wort. This
includes opening your sample valve and dump ports to
ensure sanitizer makes contact with every nook ‘n cranny.
We recommend Star San or a similar sanitizer. Never use a
bleach solution as bleach will cause pitting and corrosion
on the surface of the stainless steel.
Basic Use
FILLING —
Your conical can be filled by dumping wort
through the top, or pumped in via the sample valve.
FERMENTATION —
With the blow off barb and silicone
blow off hose connected, place the end of the silicone
blow off tubing into a bucket filled with water. We prefer
the silicone tubing as opposed to a rigid stainless blow
off as silicone tubing is much easier to remove and clean
between batches.
TEMP CONTROL —
Controlling your fermentation
temperature is one of the most important things you
can do to make better beer. There are several options for
temperature control. One option is to place your Conical in
a temp controlled environment. The easiest way to do this
is by using a refrigerator that is hooked up to a temperature
controller, effectively turning it on and off as needed
to maintain your set point. Or you can build your own
fermentation chamber using insulation and an AC unit.
The downside of these options is they require more space
and take longer to cool since it’s cooling the fermenting
wort from the outside in. Either way, your BrewBuilt
Conical comes with a Thermowell that allows you to insert
the temperature probe from a temp controller, which will
monitor your fermentation temp and power on the fridge
or AC unit whenever chilling is needed.
For the ultimate in fermentation temperature control,
upgrade to a BrewBuilt CoolStix
™
& Neoprene jacket along
with a BrewBuilt IceMaster Glycol Chiller. Learn more
about using a CoolStix
™
in the X1 + section at the end of
this manual.
DUMPING YEAST AND TRUB —
One of the biggest
benefits of a Conical Fermenter is the ability to dump yeast
& trub from the bottom port. This couldn’t be easier with
the 2" TC Butterfly Valve on the bottom of your conical.
Another added advantage is being able to harvest your
yeast for use on future batches. Regardless of whether
you’re dumping trub, hops, or yeast, you will want to
guide that slurry into a drain or receiving vessel like a
bucket or jar. Be sure to spray the Butterfly Valve down
with sanitizer prior to dumping. Also keep in mind that
you will need to open one of the ports on the top of the
conical to allow air to replace the liquid that is flowing out
the bottom. Another option is the BrewBuilt Flex Chamber
that connects to the bottom of the conical and allows you
to collect and dump yeast and trub. Learn more about
using the Flex Chamber in the X1+ section of this manual.
TRANSFERRING FINISHED BEER —
Racking your
beer with the sample port is as easy as hooking up some
sanitized tubing and opening the valve. Remember that
you will need to either open one of the ports on the top of
the conical to allow air to replace the liquid that is flowing
out, or hook up
CO
2
to the blowoff port to replace the
headspace and limit oxygen exposure. Using
CO
2
also
eliminates the need for the liquid to be gravity fed into the
keg or other receiving vessel. Either way, we recommend
pushing your finished beer into a sanitized keg via the
bev-out body connect port. This will keep splashing to a
minimum as beer will flow down the beverage dip tube
and gently fill the keg from the bottom up. Lastly, pull up
the PRV ring on the keg and set it in the open position to
allow air (or
CO
2
if you pre purged the keg) to escape as
your fresh beer flows in.
OXYGEN FREE AND ULTRA CLEAR —
For oxygen-
free transfers and sample taking, we highly recommend
using our Pressure Pack with Clear Float Technology. The
pressure lid comes equipped with both bev-out and gas-in
ball lock connections. The bev-out fitting is equipped with
a floating dip tube that will pull beer from the top rather
than the middle or bottom of the conical. This coupled
with the gas-in allows you to use
CO
2
to push the beer out,
eliminating any oxygen exposure that can occur with a
standard sample valve. In addition, with the Pressure Pack
your conical can hold up to 15 psi of pressure, essentially
allowing you to carbonate your beer and serve right out of
the conical itself!
USING YOUR X1 CONICAL
BREWBUILT.COM
