Brew has stopped fermenting after 2 days. Picture of my muck included.

Alright, I just finished cooking this thing up on Wednesday night. It was bubbling like mad for about two days and Saturday morning it was at a stand still and has been since. So I decided to pop the top and get a first hand look. I know this stuff doesnt look the best, but it was a lot more bubbly that i thought it would be. I didnt get a reading on the specific gravity after i cooled the wort. I did a reading on the wort just now and it looked like it was about 1.010 (hard to see with all of the bubbles). Has it stopped fermenting or is it stuck (i know, the eternal newbie question). Also if it is done and I rack it over to my filling bucket, can I let it sit there for a little while as a secondary fermenter? I just didnt know since I've always seen people go from bucket to bottle and not bucket to bucket. I've included a link to the ingredients for the brew that I made, along with a picture. Thanks for any help. -Shawn


http://www.listermann.com/PDF/Winter_Warmer.pdf

At 1.010, it's just about done. Now put the lid on it and leave it alone to rest!

Fermentation isn't pretty, is it? But you gotta love the results!

You need to give it a full week before you start wondering about whether it's finished or not. 2-3 weeks would be even better. There will be no issues aging this beer in this bucket for several weeks, if you check out this forum you'll find that quite a few of us aren't even bothering with secondary fermenters most of the time. Your beer needs more time to clear up, still lots of foam that can settle out.

I would recommend getting a wine thief or turkey baster and a sampling tube to take your readings in, as it will be easier to figure out what is going on.

Welcome to Homebrewtalk.

I second having a sampling tube for your wort samples. I would strongly suggest against putting your hydrometer straight into the fermenter.

Hydros are very thin, easily broken pieces of glass. If you break one in a sample tube, no loss. If you break one in your fermenter, you may have to throw out your whole batch. That or come up with a great name like Lip Lacerating Lager

i really appreciate the quick replies guys. i will go ahead and let it sit till the foam settles. i was really worried because my temperature has been hovering around 68-70 and didnt know if that would be sufficient. I've heard of peoples brew fermenting quickly in warm termperatures, but not room temperatures. Thanks again. -shawn

Glad we could help! As far as "warm temperatures" are concerned, I think 70 is pretty warm since I ferment most of my ales in the 62-64 degree range. It really depends on the yeast you're using- some yeast strains do better at higher temperatures, while some do better at lower temperatures. "Higher" and "lower" though, aren't easily defined since even room temperature means different things to different people.

I like having a stick on thermometer (like an aquarium thermometer) on the fermenter, since it's not the ambient temperature that we're concerned with. It's the temperature of the fermenting wort that we're monitoring. I've heard that a vigorous fermentation might cause the beer inside to be as much as 10 degrees above the ambient temperature. So, when I say that I fermented my last beer at 62 degrees, that was the temperature of the wort and not the temperature of the room.

Welcome to HBT- and welcome to the obsession!

how long do i worry about the dying yeast in the bottom giving my beer and "off taste"? Isnt that why people move to the secondary. Also, how long after bottling will my beer be well carbonated? thanks. -shawn

The yeast dying in the fermenter is known as autolysis. It's one of those mysterious boogeymen of homebrewing that has in recent years been proven to be pretty much non-existent. At a minimum you can leave your beer in the primary for a month. I have heard of several situations where people have went longer than that with no issues.

As for bottle carbonation. 3 weeks for a standard gravity beer is the absolute mimimum for perfect carbonation. Longer if it is a big (high ABV) beer. I will say that there is absolutely nothing wrong with sampling a beer at the one and two week points to see how it is developing, and it is possible for a beer to be perfectly good then.

This link has a great video and other information about why you should wait.

I'd say that unless you were aging your beer for months, I'd not worry about a secondary. Autolysis takes much longer than a few weeks.

That looks like a good beer!

Wait....Rack....Wait....Chill...Drink....

RDWHAHB.

I like the 3x3 method 3 weeks in the primary, 3 weeks in the bottle....chill, drink, rinse & repeat.

Tim

I've only done 3 batches so I'm still very much a newbie but the reason I have transferred to secondary is simply as a way to help clean up the beer. I realize there are risks involved such as oxygenating the beer or getting some bacteria in there but I like to try and separate the beer from the trub as much as I can. (Your siphoning methods are important too when trying to keep the beer clean).

I pretty much perfected this on batch # 3 which came out very, very clear at bottling time.

Dennis