Dry hopping question

This is my forth batch, but my first that requires dry hopping. Last week I brewed an imperial nut brown and this week I wanted to brew an India black ale. I transferred my brown to my secondary carboy to make my primary fermentor available for the IBA. Then I realized I "should" have a secondary available for the dry hopping.

I have a fermenter bucket that I typically only use for bottling. Since I'll be bottling the brown first, should I transfer the brown to the bottling bucket and let it finish there ( I hate to transfer it a third time, seems like I'm pushing my luck) to make my secondary available for the dry hopping or should I just dry hop in my primary? Or any other suggestions?

Thanks for any help!

Bottle the brown and secondary the black ale. Your probably didn't have to secondary the brown.. secondary for adding stuff or long fermentation (stouts / high alcohol brews)

If I bottle the brown it will have only been in the fermentation for two weeks. I'll of course take gravity readings, but are there other concerns with bottling too early?

Normally I wouldn't have transferred the brown but I needed to make room for the next batch.

mikeljcarr said:

If I bottle the brown it will have only been in the fermentation for two weeks. I'll of course take gravity readings, but are there other concerns with bottling too early?

Normally I wouldn't have transferred the brown but I needed to make room for the next batch.

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What is the difference between primary and secondary containers. Probably shouldn't have move brown hill still in active fermentation. Go get one of those home depot orange buckets and use that as a fermenter.

mikeljcarr said:

If I bottle the brown it will have only been in the fermentation for two weeks. I'll of course take gravity readings, but are there other concerns with bottling too early?

Normally I wouldn't have transferred the brown but I needed to make room for the next batch.

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Too early on bottling = exploding bottles and incomplete brews.

Primary carboy is like 6.5 or 7 gallons, secondary carboy is 5.5 or 6 gallons.

mikeljcarr said:

Primary carboy is like 6.5 or 7 gallons, secondary carboy is 5.5 or 6 gallons.

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Let your brown sit 2 more weeks and bottle. Secondary your black with dry hops when your bottle your brown. All good. Or buy more containers.

I would leave the IBA in the primary for two weeks, that should give your brown ale three weeks total primary and secondary conditioning. That should be plenty of time and it'll be ready for bottling. Then dry hop your IBA for 10 days or so and bottle that bad boy.

kapbrew13 said:

Let your brown sit 2 more weeks and bottle. Secondary your black with dry hops when your bottle your brown. All good. Or buy more containers.

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I agree. It is my belief that you shouldn't move to secondary until a week after you hit your final gravity to let the yeast do their thing. Then again, I don't use a secondary vessel unless I am adding fruit or something. Two weeks for your IBA in primary would be a minimum I would think.

I have a plan!

I'll do the primary fermentation in my bottling / fermentation bucket. I'll rack to my large carboy and dry hop. That'll free up my bottling bucket in time for bottling the brown.