is 2ndary femnetation necessary w/ dry hopping?

I got an AHS Red IPA kit from Austin Homebrew and am really excited to try it out.

Was not expecting the dry hopping bit -- directions say

(after fermenting and taking FG)

"...add these hops to the sanitized secondary fermenter at this point - 1 oz Cascade."

I would prefer not to buy a 2ndary fermenter...

- skip these hops
- add these hops to primary after it ferments
- suck it up and buy 2ndary

What do you think?

Thank you!

Certainly don't skip them. Old school guys might still use secondaries, and in some cases they are useful, but for most brews, the new school of thought it just a primary. This helps reduce risk of infection and oxidation you get when transferring to a 2ndary.

What I do is age out the beer in the primary until it is 1 week from when I would be able to drink it and it not be green. So, this is usually about a month for my IPAs. So 3 weeks in the primary, then dry hop for a week, then keg and drink. If you're bottling, leave in primary until 1 week prior to bottling, then dry hop and proceed as normal.

You don't need to go get a secondary. Just throw the hops in the promary when it's stopped actively fermenting. If you don't wait it can cause CO2 scrubbing and most of the aroma will go away. Yeast can also eat up some of the aeromatic compounds of hops which is why some might say DH in secondary (lest yeast in suspension in secondary), but I believe that is still up for speculation.

At this point secondary is more appropriate if you want to age your batch together for a long time and/or if you are trying to get a super clear beer.

Awesome!

Thanks so much for the prompt responses & great advice.

Hey!

I am pretty new to brewing and I have a related question.

I have only done brews with a primary and secondary. For the people using just the primary, are you using just a basic primary (ie, bucket with lid) or do you use a primary with an airlock thing?

Thanks for the help!

don't dry hop for too long though, 7-9 days max i would say. Otherwise it becomes very grassy.

mattymc said:

Hey!

I am pretty new to brewing and I have a related question.

I have only done brews with a primary and secondary. For the people using just the primary, are you using just a basic primary (ie, bucket with lid) or do you use a primary with an airlock thing?

Thanks for the help!

Click to expand...

The ale pale(6 gallon bucket with lid that has been drilled for airlock)is very popular choice.

I have dry hopped in primary several times.Don't see a point on cleaning yet another container.

I am doing the Falconers Flight IPA extract brew from AHB. I brewed on 12/8 and wanted to bottle in time to send back a couple with my friend when I see him at Christmas. The recipe says after 5-7 days add the dry hops to the secondary and then after another week bottle. So they are saying 2 weeks total.

Today is day 4 of fermentation (day 5 overall) and it was still bubbling this morning so I know it's not near FG. Question is, will 2 weeks in primary alone be long enough to bottle the beer (want to bottle on the 23rd)? I'm thinking I might be able to push it back to the 26th, but that's the absolute longest I could go to be able to give him some. If I tell him to wait until his birthday (end of January and 5 weeks in the bottle), will that help offset a shorter primary time?

Also, if I leave in primary instead of transferring to secondary and use a hop bag for the dry hops (pellets), do I need to tie the bag to the bucket or just throw the whole thing in the bucket? This is my first time to dry hop and I don't know if the bag will float or settle to the bottom and if it settles, I don't want it to block the siphon when racking to the bottling bucket.