Secondary fermenters

My choc. stout recipe that I posted before has been in the fermenter for a bit now. What do you guys do when you rack to secondary fermenters? I know you need to limit churning and oxidation, any tips for someone with a limted budget?

Tx,
Cuch

use autosiphon... you can rack it without any oxidation concern...

have you measure gravity? is it stable?

it's actually not referred to as "secondary fermentation". There is no extra fermentation process that continues when you move it. From what I understand it (and I'm still new too), most people here call it a "bright tank" to help clear the beer up. And most of these same people will say you might as well just leave it in primary for the allotted time unless you need to free up a carboy for another batch or need to dry hop/add fruit.

however, yes...siphon as you would if you were going to a bottling bucket. And the autosiphon is the best $12 I've spent. You wouldn't believe how much cursing and yelling at the siphon it saved me. Not to mention is does a great job of creating a pure siphon without introducing air (I always seemed to have air in the line when I siphoned the old way).

I don't understand og. I've read about it, not sure if I'm clinically retarded or what, but how do you measure it? I know it gives you the malt to hopps ratio, but that's about it.

Cuchalain said:

I don't understand og. I've read about it, not sure if I'm clinically retarded or what, but how do you measure it? I know it gives you the malt to hopps ratio, but that's about it.

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If you don't know what the gravity is, then it is too soon to rack it to your secondary (or bright tank)

Fermentation should be finished before you rack it to the secondary. After the hydrometer reading stays the same for 3 days.

New brewers often rack way too early, and often interrupt the secondary phase because of this, and that is why you often see panic threads about Krausens forming in secondary, because the yeast was really still in the primary phase of fermentation when it was moved.

And it starts building a krauzen house again....

If you do choose to use a "bright tank" it's best to wait til fermentation is complete, you know that by taking 2 gravity readings over a 3 day period. If the grav hasn't changed, then you can rack it without having a krausen develop...though sometimes it does anyway. You could take it on the 7th and the 10th day.

Many of us nowadays forgo a bright tank and just leave our beers in primary for 3-4 weeks, then bottle...We only use a secondary if we are adding something to the beer, such as fruit, dryhopping or oaking the beer, otherwise we just leave the beer alone and let the yeasts clean up the beer at their own pace. Or if we added fruit, like pumpkin in the boil and want to get the beer off the goop.


If you don't know how to take a gravity reading, then read this...

How to Brew - By John Palmer - Appendix A - Using Hydrometers

Hope this helps...

You don't really specify how long your beer has been in primary...."a Bit" is pretty vague.

I wouldn't move it until it has been in the fermenter for AT LEAST two weeks....

Revvy said:

I wouldn't move it until it has been in the fermenter for AT LEAST two weeks....

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Amen to that...I started out doing 7 days (the old 1-2-3 rule), then upped it to 10 and now I wait at least 14 days in primary (as well as a 14 day secondary) and my beer has improved greatly. I really think the extra week on the yeast is beneficial to the final flavor, and I'm seeing better attenuation as well.

I'm ready to bottle my chocolate stout tonight. It spent 3.5 weeks in primary and 1 week in secondary. The secondary was so I could have it sit on a single vanilla bean for a little while.

It looks fantastic. Can I say something that dark looks clear? It's confusing. It's jet black, but not that cloudy, hazy black like a dark hot cocoa... more like a good dark coffee looks.

I was going to give an answer, but couldn't figure out of we were talking about secondaries or bright tanks, so I think I'll pass on this one.

I'm sceptical when someone says no fermentation will occur in a secondary fermenter.What,it suddenly has no yeast left in it?How in the hell could it ever bottle carb. if this were true?And, I HAVE seen FG drop after a few days in secondary.
Some people say "ABSOLUTELY DO NOT SECONDARY" when in actuality they have never done it.If you bottle your beer,and you want less sediment in the bottom of your bottles then it helps to secondary.
If you keg then you draw out the sediment on the first pulls so secondary is really unnecessary.
Choice is yours.You can make great beer either way.

Cuchalain,
while I can't diminish reading about it (How to Brew, John Palmer, or Charlie Papazian's book) - a quick answer to your question about OG:
Original Gravity (also SG, Starting Gravity) is a measure of dissolved solids (sugars) in the water. We can get more complex, but for our purposes, that's close enough. Hops has no measurable impact on OG.
FG - final gravity - represents the work of the yeast. It (they?) has/have eaten the sugar and converted it to alcohol. Your FG will be lower because there is less sugar in the wort. The difference between the FG and the OG tells you the alcohol by volume (not directly, you'll need a chart or perform calculations). It also tells you if your yeast is pretty much finished with it's work. See above posts. Same reading, 3 days apart. or more.

RCCOLA said:

I'm sceptical when someone says no fermentation will occur in a secondary fermenter.What,it suddenly has no yeast left in it?How in the hell could it ever bottle carb. if this were true?And, I HAVE seen FG drop after a few days in secondary.
Some people say "ABSOLUTELY DO NOT SECONDARY" when in actuality they have never done it.If you bottle your beer,and you want less sediment in the bottom of your bottles then it helps to secondary.
If you keg then you draw out the sediment on the first pulls so secondary is really unnecessary.
Choice is yours.You can make great beer either way.

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There's yeast, but if there's no fermentables left then no fermentation will occur. If you racked before fermentation was finished, then you can have fermentation in the secondary, yes.

Do you think that the act of putting your beer into another container causes the sediment to fall out faster? Why can't it all fall out in primary if you leave it longer as opposed to having it fall out in secondary?

If you primary for a week and then rack to secondary, sure you'll get quite a bit of sediment falling out. If you rack it to secondary after a month, you won't. That's because it already fell out in primary. That's what people are getting at when they talk about a secondary not being necessary.

If you do secondary (and I do) you should wait until fermentation is done before doing it if you follow the long primary theory.

here we go again...

ChshreCat said:

There's yeast, but if there's no fermentables left then no fermentation will occur. If you racked before fermentation was finished, then you can have fermentation in the secondary, yes.

Do you think that the act of putting your beer into another container causes the sediment to fall out faster? Why can't it all fall out in primary if you leave it longer as opposed to having it fall out in secondary?

If you primary for a week and then rack to secondary, sure you'll get quite a bit of sediment falling out. If you rack it to secondary after a month, you won't. That's because it already fell out in primary. That's what people are getting at when they talk about a secondary not being necessary.

If you do secondary (and I do) you should wait until fermentation is done before doing it if you follow the long primary theory.

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I agree w/ what you are saying.For me I use fermenters w/ spigots on them and when bottling will end up w/ more sediment thru the spigot if I don't secondary.And for those who siphon-If there's less yeast sediment on the bottom, won't you be less likely to transfer it to your bottling bucket?
And as far as your first question,I was addressing those people who say that if you transfer your beer to secondary before it is done fermenting that it will STOP the fermentation.Total BS.

Edcculus said:

here we go again...

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Damn strait...Rather than having ANOTHER argument about this today, in THIS thread, why don't we go back to answering the OP's question.

OK?

As you can see Sparky decided to link the other thread (don't know why, unless he wants to add fuel to the fire), so Rccola...you can read the arguments and info there....and ALL THROUGH THIS FORUM...every day..and all our citations for and against...It's all there...

Just havin' a bad day & felt like a rant.OH GOD NOT A LINK!!!

LOL

um... and ten characters.

Haha. You guys are FUNNY! I wasn't starting another debate here. I just thought people interested in this thread might find the other one interesting. I was disappointed to see the other one get locked.

That's because people were all turning into pedantic aholes over something that doesn't matter at all. I'd link the appropriate XKCD comic but it's blocked at work.

Alright, I sterilized everything and took gravity on it. I'm confused though, it read twenty and it was under the one, so is it 1.2 or 1.02. Then name of the hydrometer is Wine & beer hydrometer. Picked it up at my local beer store. Also took ph, it was 4ish, kind of hard to tell because my beer is so dark. It is a pretty malty beer, with a ton of black patent. Tasted good after I took the readings though. Look bitter coffee taste, but I think if I secondary with a vanilla been I think it will help. Anyway, can anyone clarify whether I'm at 1.2 or 1.02? Sorry if I'm vague in my descriptions, let me know if there is more info needed. I think this beer no matter what is gonna be tasty. It's a little hoppy for a stout, but man, that chocolate coffee taste is killer, mmmmmmmm..... Any advice is always greatly appreciated. Thanks for bearing with a novice brewer like myself guys.

1.020 is where you're at. If you were at 1.200 as a final you would...

a) have done something horribly wrong
b) have one hell of a HUGE beer and hoped you used 2lbs of hops to balance it.

Unless your original gravity was around 1.080 (which would be a fairly big beer), if you're only at 1.020 now, it sounds as if you've got a bit more fermenting to do. Even if there's no more airlock activity, I'd expect your gravity reading to come down some more. Keep taking readings every few days and don't bottle until the reading is the same for at least 3 days in a row.

As far as the hop flavor is concerned... Your beer will lose a good portion of its hop character as it ages and clears. Remember, hop particles are floating around the fermentor. When you take a taste from primary, you'll likely get some tiny particles which will up the hops taste. Once totally clear, the hop character will continue to mellow after a few weeks in the bottle. If your beer today is only a "little hoppy for a stout," most likely it'll right on the money 4 weeks from now.

We all need some direction when doing this crazy hobby of ours. Everybody gives and takes what they can here. Soon, you'll be giving more than you receive! (now if only I could get there...)