BeerBorg

Is there a certain temperature that I should be under before adding in the wort

This will be a vague answer, because you asked a vague question.

I am going to go with the assumption you are doing extract (Mr. Beer / Brew Demon) beers in one of their fermenters and following their instructions of putting a gallon or so of cold water into the fermenter before pouring in the concentrated wort.

The short answer is that the temperature of what you pour into the fermenter when combined with the temperature of the water in the fermenter you added up front and pouring can not exceed the fermenters max temperature rating. I believe this is ~140 degrees in Mr. Beer / Brew Demon LBK/LBC fermenter world, and I would suggest not pushing that at all, and keeping it ~130 or <. You of course can not pitch your yeast when it's that hot so you'd have to let it cool.

If you were diluting 2-1 ratio with the 2 being near ice cold water in your fermenter, then you could add a 1 of near boiling water to that and be ok, you would end up with 90 something degree wort in your fermenter doing that and could pitch your yeast pretty soon after a little bit of ambient cooling. (just don't splash the near boiling concentrated wort all over the sides of the fermenter, it has to go directly into the cold water if you were to attempt this).

At a 1-1 ratio then obviously your max temp of what you pour in has to be lower, more like 165 degrees or there about if your water is near freezing to hit the same temps as above, 180-190 would be "safe", but not going to get you near pitching temps and would require longer ambient cooling before pitching.

But it all depends on how cold you cold water in the fermenter is, if it's 60-70 degree water, you can't get away with the same as you could with 32-40 degree water. IE 190 degree wort with 70 degree water at a 1-1 dilution would be pushing the temperatures of the resulting wort in the fermenter to about the maximum safe level I would be comfortable with in a LBK/LBC, and it's going to take many hours to cool down enough to pitch your yeast if you were to try that.

Did that make sense?

If not, you need to ask a more specific question.

I am using the beer demon extract. So my main concern was that the directions said boil the 4 cups of water and take the pot off the heat then add the cans of extract. My question is what temp does the water have to be before adding the extract.

Makom wrote:I am using the beer demon extract. So my main concern was that the directions said boil the 4 cups of water and take the pot off the heat then add the cans of extract. My question is what temp does the water have to be before adding the extract.

Just add it right away. The reason your taking it off the heat is to avoid the burner scorching the extract on the bottom of the pot before you can get it mixed in. But this won't happen once it's off the heat.

This is true later as well if you start to brew beers with unhoped liquid extracts and boil your own hops for an hour. Always turn off the heat before you add the extract and don't turn it back on until it's fully dissolved.

Makom wrote:... my main concern was that the directions said boil the 4 cups of water and take the pot off the heat then add the cans of extract. My question is what temp does the water have to be before adding the extract.

Just turn off the heat then mix in the extract.
Doesn't have to added instantaneously.

The water is boiled to sterilize it.
Otherwise ... you risk contaminating the wort and contaminated wort does not good beer make ...