Oktoberfest & Lagering

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micahwitham

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Primary fermentation in the fridge at 48 degrees for 8 days. Fermentation seemed to stop in the fridge after a few days and when I took it out for the diaycetl rest (24hrs at room temp) the fermenting started up again.
Couple questions:
Is my primary temp too cold?
When I transfer to secondary and drop the temp 38-45 for 3-4 more weeks should I try to get the yeast from bottom to transfer over or am I leaving all in the bucket and really just clearing the beer in the secondary?
 
When you say "fermentation seemed to stop"...are you taking gravity readings to determine that or just watching the airlock? 48F is fine for lager yeast, and typically lagers take me around 2 weeks to ferment. I let them sit at 50ish for 4 weeks, then I'll transfer to secondary (leaving most of the yeast behind) for another few months at 34F.
 
What's the current SG? It should be dropping a bit during the diacetyl rest, if you're doing it when the SG is 75% of the way to FG. Just don't rack until the beer is at FG for at least a couple of days, and then you can begin lagering once that happens and the diacetyl rest is done.
 
"lagers take me around 2 weeks to ferment. I let them sit at 50ish for 4 weeks,"

when you say that are you fermenting for 2 weeks at 60's AND THEN letting it sit at 50ish for 4 weeks or is the fermenting for 2 weeks also at 50 and then you let it sit for another 2 weeks.

Gravity is 1.050 at 68 degrees so maybe more like 1.060 and really active in the airlock
 

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