Leap of faith

OK, I have read a lot of chitter-chatter about the necessity of a secondary. So i decided to use primary only on two beers. One, a 1.060 ESB/Strong with Nottingham 1st week 60F 2nd week 64F. Currently same temp. The other is a 1.081 Saison with wyeast 3711 (aka the beast). 2 days 75, 3 days 79. Just lost my space heater so probably back to low 70's I only have 2 fermentation containers. Would i be better off racking the Saison to a secondary because of OG, which i would have in 5 days. I figure they will take about 3 weeks each. Any help for this novice would be great. My HB supply line is running thin. I am about to start dipping into my green Christmas beer.

i'd just leave each for the 3 weeks, no need to secondary either

it's become very (more?) popular to NOT secondary. unless you keep the brew in primary for months, there is no "need" to secondary. i primary for 4-5 weeks with no issue. some claim benefits in using a secondary, such as clarity (not borne out in my experience), but there certainly is no "need".

edit: just re-read and see that you're planning on 3 weeks - so secondary not needed.

I like to do a secondary just to give myself flexibility on when i bottle in the bigger beers. If you do a good job of leaving the trub off, I think that it'd be OK skipping the secondary.

I've read that the longer secondary can help with covering up some off flavors of the fermentation if they had developed (i.e. under pitching, too warm, too fast, etc.).

Two big reasons that I will use a secondary is to free up a fermenter or to facilitate some post-fermentation activity (like dry hopping or spicing or whatever). Less handling = less oxidation as far as I am concerned.

jsv1204 said:

Two big reasons that I will use a secondary is to free up a fermenter or to facilitate some post-fermentation activity (like dry hopping or spicing or whatever). Less handling = less oxidation as far as I am concerned.

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the corollary being "secondary is you need to. skip it if you don't."

jsv1204 said:

Two big reasons that I will use a secondary is to free up a fermenter or to facilitate some post-fermentation activity (like dry hopping or spicing or whatever). Less handling = less oxidation as far as I am concerned.

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I'll second the freeing up a fermenting bucket.
I use 8 gallon buckets so if I need a bucket and can get it into the carboy, I will do it sometimes since I don't primary in the glass.
I like the bigger volume of the bucket.

dcp27 said:

i'd just leave each for the 3 weeks, no need to secondary either

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Now that my Saison is going to be cooler, is my goal 1.008 FG still within reason.