Racked to secondary fermentation early

I'm working on my first batch of beer right now. Years ago I brewed a handful of small batches of wine, but it's been a long time and I've never tried brewing beer before now.

I got the beginner's kit from my LHBS last weekend which is a red ale. I used a tub of liquid malt extract and a small bag of grain that was provided, along with some pelletized hops to make the wort. I pitched the yeast on Sunday, August 30.

The house temperature was in the high 70's and the brew was close to 80 F, so I rigged up a makeshift evaporative cooling setup involving a bin of water, a box fan, a t-shirt, and an aquarium pump. That (plus a couple of trays of ice cubes tossed in the bin) brought the carboy temp down to about 72 F and kept it there.

I pitched the yeast after starting it in a shallow pan of boiled-and-cooled water on Sunday afternoon.

SG at pitching: 1.046

T+1:00 - The airlock finally starts bubbling a bit.

T+3:00 - The krausen is about an inch thick already and the airlock is bubbling faster.

T+12:00 (Late Sunday night) - Huge krausen, foam coming out of the airlock, which is bubbling pretty quickly. The cooling water already smells like beer.

T+20:00 (Monday morning) - Still foaming out of the airlock.

T+30:00 (Monday evening) - The brew is churning like crazy, it looks like a beer snowglobe. Chunks of yeast and hops are flying around and the bubbling is strong. Krausen fell a lot, only about an inch thick. Airlock still bubbling pretty quickly.

T+54:00 (This evening) - The krausen is almost nonexistent and the bubbling from the airlock has slowed a lot.

The instructions my LHBS gave me suggested that the primary "vigorous" fermentation could be done as quickly as 48-72 hours and recommended racking into a secondary fermenter once the fermentation has slowed considerably. I followed this advice, and am now wondering if it was the right choice.

I only have one carboy and one bucket, so I sanitized the bucket, racked the beer into it, then cleaned and sanitized the carboy and racked the beer back into it, minus the sediment at the bottom of the first fermentation.

SG during this racking: 1.018

The beer smelled great, very yeasty and alcoholic when I was racking it out of the carboy today. A big improvement over the fairly unpleasant smell of the hot wort on Sunday. A couple of hours have passed, though, and now I'm looking at my re-filled carboy and it appears to be dead. I see almost no bubbles rising to the beer's surface and the airlock is bubbling about once a minute compared to the previous once per second. The temperature of the brew right now is around 72 F.

I'm hoping that the yeast in suspension will come back to life soon and finish off the secondary fermentation. Please offer words of wisdom and perhaps encouragement. I'd like to buy another carboy this week and start a second batch, so I want to make sure I'm not just repeating a bad process when I do.

There should be no fermentation in secondary, the name 'secondary fermentation' is a bit misleading. The use of a secondary is really just to give your beer time to clear up. So don't worry about the fact that there is no visible activity - cause there shouldn't be.

But.... yes you probably did rack too soon. Just because the activity had slowed or even appeared to stop does NOT mean that the primary fermentation was complete. Only a hydrometer can tell you this. You should only move your beer from primary when you have a consistent SG over a few day period. That being said, it should probably take no less than a week before you would ever consider racking from primary: first ~4 days for the fermentation, then a hydro reading, then a hydro reading 3 days later to see if SG is the same. Even if you do it that quickly you'd still be rushing things. After the yeast have eaten up all the fermentables they will then start eating up the byproducts that they released while fermenting. I'm sure someone will be along shortly to tell you that they don't even use a secondary and leave the beer in primary for anywhere from 3 weeks to 3+ months. Lesson here, don't listen to the instructions that come with the kits.

A quick question about your racking method: why ferment in carboy, transfer to bucket, then back to carboy? Its perfectly acceptable to ferment in the bucket and then transfer to carboy and leave it. Fermenting in the bucket will give you extra head space to reduce blow off risk, you did mention that krausen was coming through the airlock. The more times you transfer will also increase your risk of oxidation.

WELCOME to HBT and your new hobby, ReeseAllen!!!
(Seattle - my hometown!)

+1 to leaving it. At least a couple of weeks before moving. This hobby is all about patience.

Also, to avoid having to clean out airlocks - get a blow off tube for the first several days of fermentation, then you can switch over to the airlock.

Blow off tube- tubing from carboy neck to growler/bucket/bottle full of water, or other similar device.

+1 on the advice above re: using your bucket (if you have a lid with a grommeted hole for an airlock) for fermentation - you won't have nearly the problem with blowoff and losing beer!

Your beer will be fine - it would be a better practice to leave it in primary longer than you did, but you didn't do any harm!

FYI, sometimes breweries use the phrase "brightening tanks" instead of secondary fermentation. This makes more sense to me. As explained above, lots of stuff is still happening, it's just not as visible.

Cheers!

Falcor said:

Lesson here, don't listen to the instructions that come with the kits.

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Lesson learned. The hard way.

Falcor said:

A quick question about your racking method: why ferment in carboy, transfer to bucket, then back to carboy?

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Since this is my first batch, I wanted to be able to see what it's up to without having to open the bucket. It's my understanding that typically the bucket is used for primary and the carboy is reserved for secondary. I can see why, now.

Hang Glider said:

Blow off tube- tubing from carboy neck to growler/bucket/bottle full of water, or other similar device.

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I used this method a few years ago when I brewed a bit of wine and it was pretty effective. I'll have to rig up one of these next time, and save the airlock bubbler cap for the secondary.

Pappers said:

Your beer will be fine - it would be a better practice to leave it in primary longer than you did, but you didn't do any harm!

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What kind of prognosis am I looking at here? Assuming the beer doesn't get contaminated or oxidated, I am guessing that racking to secondary "fermentation" early will mean a weaker (ABV-wise) and sweeter beer, since the sugars have not been fully processed into ethanol by the yeast. Or will it slowly ferment over the next few weeks until the SG stabilizes at roughly the same point that it would have stabilized at more quickly in the primary fermenter?

I'm definitely willing to leave this carboy full of proto-beer in a closet for as long as it needs to if it means I'm going to get something worth drinking out of it eventually. As far as I'm concerned, most of the work involved has already been done and the only thing I stand to gain by dumping this batch is freeing up the carboy to use on another brew. I plan on picking up additional buckets/carboys and doing a second and maybe even third brew this weekend, so if this first batch needs to sit for a month or two before bottling, I'll (hopefully) get these new batches right and get to taste my own beer by the end of September. And then maybe this batch will come of age to surprise me later this fall...

Anyone care to speculate?

ReeseAllen said:

What kind of prognosis am I looking at here? Assuming the beer doesn't get contaminated or oxidated, I am guessing that racking to secondary "fermentation" early will mean a weaker (ABV-wise) and sweeter beer, since the sugars have not been fully processed into ethanol by the yeast. Or will it slowly ferment over the next few weeks until the SG stabilizes at roughly the same point that it would have stabilized at more quickly in the primary fermenter?

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Your beer should finish fermenting down in the secondary just fine over the next days. I don't think it will be weaker ABV-wise.

Let it sit a week (or two), then take a hydrometer reading. Take another the next day, and then another. If they are the same, then you can bottle. If it is still dropping, wait a week, then repeat. The yeast will do their job, and there is no harm in letting them have 2, 3 or 4 weeks to do it. A bit extra allows for them to clean up after themselves too. Sounds like you are on the right track - so relax, and just think about that first sip of homebrew...

Yeast are very good at fermentation. Racking when you did just means it will take longer to finish.

Kit instructions are written on the assumption that you're in a big hurry and will drink anything.

bah! I hate how people just say, 'there should be no fermentation in secondary." That is wrong. You may not do it that way, but that doesn't make you always right.

What you did is close to perfect if you are going to use a secondary fermenting vessel. PLease read my blog for a quick snippet of how a secondary fermenter should be used.

http://blogs.homebrewtalk.com/Boerderij_Kabouter/Secondary_fermentation_and_why_it_makes_me_crazy/

I do not advocate the "Just leave it in primary" technique unless you are unsure of what you are doing. It will not ruin your beer to leave it in primary for extended aging, but it isn't helping either. The only yeast that are doing significant conditioning are in suspension, not the yeast that have gone dormant and dropped to the floor. The attitude of secondaries are dumb gets my goat around here.

Cue Rev's entrance (seriously, I am right)

To reiterate, by racking with ~2/3-3/4 of the fermentables consumed you are doing several very good things:

getting hte beer off dead yeast cells

getting beer off trub and other vegital matter

rousing the still active yeast that is in suspension

allowing the yeast to finish and condition the beer away from the trub and "scrub" any O2 out of the secondary thereby avoiding any oxidation concerns that are more likely to occur when using a "bright tank" without CO2 purging.

ensuring you have a good proportion of strong and healthy yeast in your beer to condition it

IMO and the opinion of many many many professional brewers, getting beer away from the trub and dead yeast is a great idea for producing clean, professional tasting beers. Also, this is the case in my experience.

I read your blog and am not sure I am sold. You state that if you let the beer ferment fully in the primary and then transfer to secondary there is not enough yeast left in suspension to condition the beer. But there is enough yeast left in suspension to carbonate the beer. Are you saying that it takes significantly more yeast cells to clean up the beer than to carbonate? Could you please elaborate, also if anyone has any references I could check out on this topic I would love to read them, the primary/secondary debate is one that I am really interested in.

Donkey sniffer and I have the highest regards for each other (so much that he lets me call him donkey sniffer since I still can't spell his name ), and both acknowledge that there are more than one way to skin a cat...And actually there's a point where both out takes intersect each other.

And someday we are going to just post our different views together in one sticky....

We no longer debate this topic....it's pointless to do so..it ultimately comes to your preference...and what seems to work...and what source material you use...

So in the interests of full disclosure, while Donkey sniffer and I head out to the pub...here's the other side of the coin.

Revvy's take on the tired discourse of where "Secondary Fermentation" happens.

I'm buying the first round Boerderij_Buddy!!!!!!

Whether you rack after fermentation is complete or 2/3 of the way...you are STILL going to come out with great beer.

Boerderij_Kabouter said:

bah! I hate how people just say, 'there should be no fermentation in secondary." That is wrong. You may not do it that way, but that doesn't make you always right.

What you did is close to perfect if you are going to use a secondary fermenting vessel. PLease read my blog for a quick snippet of how a secondary fermenter should be used.

http://blogs.homebrewtalk.com/Boerderij_Kabouter/Secondary_fermentation_and_why_it_makes_me_crazy/

I do not advocate the "Just leave it in primary" technique unless you are unsure of what you are doing. It will not ruin your beer to leave it in primary for extended aging, but it isn't helping either. The only yeast that are doing significant conditioning are in suspension, not the yeast that have gone dormant and dropped to the floor. The attitude of secondaries are dumb gets my goat around here.

Cue Rev's entrance (seriously, I am right)

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I would say in my extensive reading on this site over the past few weeks that I haven't really seen the attitude of "secondaries are dumb", just more of a secondaries aren't necessary. From my own very newbie point of view the simpler process the better the process for me. Less things for me to screw up.

IM(inexperienced)O it seems to me everytime you move your contents from one vessel to another you're risking making a mistake which could undo the work you've put in. Contamination, spillage, or some other stupid thing.

Right now in my process I'm looking for good results not great results and eventually working into the great catagory. I will be extremely happy to end up with a product that is enjoyable and tasty. If its not potentially award winning I'm fine with that. I want to develop my process as I learn and keep my hobby budget in check as much as possible. I can definitely see playing and experimenting with racking to secondaries in the future, but for the learning process I'm going to go the primary direct to bottle route.

Cheaton said:

I would say in my extensive reading on this site over the past few weeks that I haven't really seen the attitude of "secondaries are dumb", just more of a secondaries aren't necessary. From my own very newbie point of view the simpler process the better the process for me. Less things for me to screw up.

IM(inexperienced)O it seems to me everytime you move your contents from one vessel to another you're risking making a mistake which could undo the work you've put in. Contamination, spillage, or some other stupid thing.

Right now in my process I'm looking for good results not great results and eventually working into the great catagory. I will be extremely happy to end up with a product that is enjoyable and tasty. If its not potentially award winning I'm fine with that. I want to develop my process as I learn and keep my hobby budget in check as much as possible. I can definitely see playing and experimenting with racking to secondaries in the future, but for the learning process I'm going to go the primary direct to bottle route.

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I think this is a very good analysis.

If you are not comfortable with your sanitation practices, and other techniques, it is probably best to let the beer condition in the primary.

I just find that many people here cast secondaries aside as a useless step and that bothers me a bit because I think many people are turned off the idea without ever hearing how to properly use it and what the benefits are.

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You need a good amount of yeast to consume and process the off flavored chemicals and compounds produced during primary fermentation as well as to completely attenuate the beer. That is why many people have reported underattenuated beer after transferring to secondary or off flavors etc. You need to rack earlier rather than later to ensure you have a good healthy yeast mass in your secondary vessel if you intend to finish the ferment and condition there.

When primary is finished and final gravity is met, most of the yeast drop out. If you transfer at that point, conditioning has not occurred and you are removing the vast majority of yeast before it has had a chance to reabsorb the mess it made earlier. So whether you go primary only or primary/secondary, you need to be aware of what you are doing.

As I always say, when in doubt, you primary only, read more, and try a secondary fermentation schedule on your next beer.

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Revvy, I am force feeding you a Gueze for round 2

Boerderij_Kabouter said:

As I always say, when in doubt, you primary only, read more, and try a secondary fermentation schedule on your next beer.

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Revvy, I am force feeding you a Gueze for round 2

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+1 Million!!!!

It really ultimately comes down to what works for you......Try different ways of doing ANYTHING in this hobby and develop your own brewing process....


Oooohhh a Gueze!!!! Yum!!!!!

New lager brewing by Noonan is my favorite source of info for this kind of thing. It is easy to read and has a wealth of great knowledge.

Palmer is a good reference always, but he glosses over fermentation in my opinion.

Kaiser has posted a lot of good brewing publications that I have found useful. Check braukaiser.com

Boerderij_Kabouter said:

New lager brewing by Noonan is my favorite source of info for this kind of thing. It is easy to read and has a wealth of great knowledge.

Palmer is a good reference always, but he glosses over fermentation in my opinion.

Kaiser has posted a lot of good brewing publications that I have found useful. Check braukaiser.com

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Well Lagers are and should be treated waaay differently then Ales.....Lagers by nature need to be cleaner, any off flavor is way more evident. In fact most of the "bogeymen" of homebrewers is mis reading things like Palmer's writing about Lagers (like autolysis) and assuming he's talking about ALL beers....


Lagers and Ales are really different animals.. Lagers require much specific techniques....like temp control, d-rests if necessary, etc....And have less margin for error.

That's why as much as we pan the Light Lager BMC, it really really takes a lot of skill to consistently turn out a light lager. That's why if someone here decides to tackle a bud light clone, I commend him and wish him luck...that is the Yoda of brewing process...despite anyone's feelings on the taste of those things...

If you are lagering you want minimal yeast contact....you want to be within the ball park of completeness of fermentation (whether it's 2/3rds or 100%- depending on whose interpretation) and then you want to get it off the yeast cake ASAP and into the cold for a few months.....That's the point of lagers...they are meant to be stored and conditioned for awhile...so you want to minimize the potential for any off flavors from yeast contact.

I agree, but New Lager Brewing, despite the name, has a very large amount of the book dedicated to general beer brewing and not only lagers. I found it to be the best book I have read so far (overall).

Boerderij_Kabouter said:

I agree, but New Lager Brewing, despite the name, has a very large amount of the book dedicated to general beer brewing and not only lagers. I found it to be the best book I have read so far (overall).

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I'll have to add it to my library....I saw you reference it somewhere else.

Did the Red Ale come from The Cellar?

They used to have really good instructions. I've made 20 plus batches using their techniques and they've all been great tasting beers.

I've allways left mine in primary for at least a week though.

As stated, your beer will be fine.

Do you have a Hydrometer?

Yes, the beginner kit from the Cellar. I live a mile south of there. The kit included a hydrometer, I listed the SG readings I've taken in the OP. I'm going to drop by there later today and pick up some more ingredients to do more brewing this weekend.

Falcor said:

There should be no fermentation in secondary, the name 'secondary fermentation' is a bit misleading. The use of a secondary is really just to give your beer time to clear up. So don't worry about the fact that there is no visible activity - cause there shouldn't be.

But.... yes you probably did rack too soon. Just because the activity had slowed or even appeared to stop does NOT mean that the primary fermentation was complete. Only a hydrometer can tell you this. You should only move your beer from primary when you have a consistent SG over a few day period. That being said, it should probably take no less than a week before you would ever consider racking from primary: first ~4 days for the fermentation, then a hydro reading, then a hydro reading 3 days later to see if SG is the same. Even if you do it that quickly you'd still be rushing things. After the yeast have eaten up all the fermentables they will then start eating up the byproducts that they released while fermenting. I'm sure someone will be along shortly to tell you that they don't even use a secondary and leave the beer in primary for anywhere from 3 weeks to 3+ months. Lesson here, don't listen to the instructions that come with the kits.

A quick question about your racking method: why ferment in carboy, transfer to bucket, then back to carboy? Its perfectly acceptable to ferment in the bucket and then transfer to carboy and leave it. Fermenting in the bucket will give you extra head space to reduce blow off risk, you did mention that krausen was coming through the airlock. The more times you transfer will also increase your risk of oxidation.

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Racking to a secondary before fermentation is TOTALLY complete is actually a good thing. If you wait until fermentation is TOTALLY complete to transfer you might as well just go ahead and bottle or keg. If you're going to use a secondary you should transfer just before fermentation is complete (when the air lock slows not stops) to AVOID oxidation. Why??... Racking while the beer is still fermenting means that any oxidation that may have occured during the transfer will be eaten up by your little friendly yeast which are still somewhat active. That's why most recipe's tell you to transfer in 5-7 seven days when we all know that it really takes 8-10 for full fermentation of most beers. Not because the recipes assume you're in a hurry but to avoid oxidation. If you're really worried then you can always add a few ounces of DME to the secondary to get your yeast active again which would clear up any O2 in your beer and may add a bit more ABV =) This is actually what I do when I transfer too late. The only disadvantage would be if you transferred WAY too early (like less than 3-5 days) and you ended up with a lot of trub in the bottom of your secondary but your beer would still attenuate just fine. You would just have to be careful not to suck up any vomit while siphoning into your bottling bucket or keg. Happy brewing.

bobbrewster said:

Racking to a secondary before fermentation is TOTALLY complete is actually a good thing. If you wait until fermentation is TOTALLY complete to transfer you might as well just go ahead and bottle or keg. If you're going to use a secondary you should transfer just before fermentation is complete (when the air lock slows not stops) to AVOID oxidation. Why??... Racking while the beer is still fermenting means that any oxidation that may have occured during the transfer will be eaten up by your little friendly yeast which are still somewhat active. That's why most recipe's tell you to transfer in 5-7 seven days when we all know that it really takes 8-10 for full fermentation of most beers. Not because the recipes assume you're in a hurry but to avoid oxidation. If you're really worried then you can always add a few ounces of DME to the secondary to get your yeast active again which would clear up any O2 in your beer and may add a bit more ABV =) This is actually what I do when I transfer too late. The only disadvantage would be if you transferred WAY too early (like less than 3-5 days) and you ended up with a lot of trub in the bottom of your secondary but your beer would still attenuate just fine. You would just have to be careful not to suck up any vomit while siphoning into your bottling bucket or keg. Happy brewing.

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(People still believe this stuff? Vomit?!?!?!?!)

Actually taking it off the yeast too soon prevents some much needed cleanup (and the true secondary fermentation period) from happenning. That's why many of us have opted for LONG primary/No secondary. Instead of rushing the beer off the yeast cake before the job is done. The yeast are very tenacious creatures, and if we actually leave them the heck alone, and not move them too soon, they will actually clean up after themselves, and remove their own waste/by products of fermentation, and actually will lead to cleaner, clearer and fresher tasting beers.

Moving it during fermentation more often than not has led to stuck fermentations.....And off flavors.

That old way of thinking that the yeast is the enemy has gone the way of the dinosaurs. Back when yeast was crappy, and may have come in hot cargo holds of ships, and sat on store shelves for an indeterminant length of time. Now with modern, healthy yeast we put it to work for us..."vomit" or "Autolysis" yeast is pretty much a myth for todays homebrewer.

ANd even if we do secondary, (which is rare) we DO wait for fermentation to finish, and let the yeast do some preliminary clearing while there is a lot of those littel buggers still working.

Here's some reading for you.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/second-ferm-racking-128440/#post1438252

And the discussion here, https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/multiple-questions-about-secondary-fermentation-140978/#post1601829

But more importantly this discusses the fact that many folks including jamil and palmer have backed off from that yeast phobia and are embracing long primaries and prolonged yeast contact.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/secondary-not-john-palmer-jamil-zainasheff-weigh-176837/

And you'll find that more and more recipes these days do not advocate moving after 5-7 days (which if you arbitrarily move your beer without a hydrometer reading may only mean 1-2 days of actual fermentation, not LAG TIME which is pretty common. Counting airlock bubbles is idiotic to say the least.) Now more and more recipes even in BYO advocate a minimum of 2 weeks in primary, but nowadays are even says skip secondary leave in primary for 3-4 weeks then bottle.

They yeast do a little bit more than just ferment your beer...a lot more work is left to be done before they go dormant, a lot more than would we as you say, "might as well just go ahead and bottle or keg."

Revvy said:

(People still believe this stuff? Vomit?!?!?!?!)

(which if you arbitrarily move your beer without a hydrometer reading may only mean 1-2 days of actual fermentation, not LAG TIME which is pretty common. Counting airlock bubbles is idiotic to say the least.)

They yeast do a little bit more than just ferment your beer...a lot more work is left to be done before they go dormant, a lot more than would we as you say, "might as well just go ahead and bottle or keg."

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You obviously missed my point. I didn't say you should always secondary. I said "IF you're going to use a secondary..."

..."Vomit"... I was only using it as a joking visual reference as to what the stuff at the bottom of your fermenter LOOKS like and that you probably don't want to suck it up into your bottles or keg. If you actually read my post and weren't simply being argumentative, you'd see I actually called yeast "friendly" when I was directly referring to them.

...No one said not to use a hydrometer or to "count bubbles" so please leave the "idiotic" insults out of what I thought was a friendly forum. It was assumed that a hydrometer was standard equipment since the original post listed his SPECIFIC GRAVITY in his first post and the airlock comment was obviously a mere GENERAL time line reference. (that's why I put it in parenthesis) "rolleyes"... as you say...

...As for my personal opinion on secodarying... I actually agree with you revvy and only secondary when I need the primary for a new brew or have a brew that specifically benefits from it. I was simply giving some insight on the question asked at the beginning of this post.. "what to do if transferred too early?" So please don't assume that everyone that does't brew exactly like you is wrong...Oh yeah and here's some reading for you on secondaries....http://www.homebrewing.com/articles/secondary-fermentation.php
Cheers...