Question about transfering yeast to secondary

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Prymal

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I have a cream ale in primary right now that will be at 2 weeks tomorrow. I want to brew my next beer on thursday to get my pipeline filled. The only reason I am transfering at all is to free up the 6.5 gallon carboy. Are there any benefits to transfering the contents of the carboy yeast and all into secondary or should I just move the beer itself?

Thanks
 
Why not just get a bucket to use as a second primary. A pipeline is nice, but quality beers are better.

Like many here, I stopped using a secondary unless I am adding something during the fermentation process.
 
Trying to siphon out that yeast cake sounds like a nightmare. You'll get some clogging, probably have to pump the siphon a few times, and most likely oxidize your beer. If you absolutely must transfer, I'd probably just transfer the beer and leave the yeast. But I would encourage you to just leave that first beer alone if possible.

If you can't go out and get a new bucket, like billf2112 said, here's another idea: why not just leave this beer in the primary, and ferment your new batch in that carboy you were going to use as a secondary? If that's a smaller carboy, either make a slightly smaller batch or use a blowoff. That'd probably be less trouble and better for both beers.
 
shawnbou said:
Trying to siphon out that yeast cake sounds like a nightmare. You'll get some clogging, probably have to pump the siphon a few times, and most likely oxidize your beer. If you absolutely must transfer, I'd probably just transfer the beer and leave the yeast. But I would encourage you to just leave that first beer alone if possible.

If you can't go out and get a new bucket, like billf2112 said, here's another idea: why not just leave this beer in the primary, and ferment your new batch in that carboy you were going to use as a secondary? If that's a smaller carboy, either make a slightly smaller batch or use a blowoff. That'd probably be less trouble and better for both beers.
Click to expand...

Yep!! And the cool thing about primarying in a carboy is you can see everything that goes on. Seeing the fermentation process can really help you understand it.
 
I have a bucket and I would use it but the next beer is a Steam beer so I need to keep the ferm temp low 60-62 and my fermentation freezer won't fit the bucket. Maybe ill just go for trying to use my 5 gallon secondary carboy with a blow off tube since I am using lager yeast I wouldn't expect a huge blow out right?
 
shawnbou said:
If you can't go out and get a new bucket, like billf2112 said, here's another idea: why not just leave this beer in the primary, and ferment your new batch in that carboy you were going to use as a secondary? If that's a smaller carboy, either make a slightly smaller batch or use a blowoff. That'd probably be less trouble and better for both beers.
Click to expand...

I'd say 4 gal.
 
I assume your primary is also a carboy (6 or 6.5 gallons).

I would not make a 4 gallon lager. All that time and energy for only 4 gallons of awesomeness. Any brew that takes an extended time to ferment should be made in the largest batch you can handle (IMHO).

I use a 6 gallon BET carboy, they are not very expensive and much easier to move around without fear of smashing.
 
You still have plenty of suspended yeast in that cream ale. I wouldn't worry about trying to transfer the yeast cake. The cake/trub yeast is essentially out of combat at that point anyhow.

I would let the cream ale sit in the primary and just get another bucket for as an additional primary.

The less transferring of beer the better imo, less risk of infection, spilling, oxidation, etc. etc. etc.
 
A secondary is used for conditioning your beer. No fermentation is going on, so a yeast cake is not needed in secondary. If you decide to do a secondary then you should never transfer the whole yeast cake. The idea is to siphon the beer off of the yeast cake.

You don't transfer the yeast cake, period.
 

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