Questions After Moving to Allgrain and 4 Batches In Last Month

I have some questions that are lingering in the back of my mind ... I've recently moved to allgrain after being out of brewing for a few years ... these aren't all specific to allgrain, but I have been brewing a lot recently so they've been coming up again and again

Normal basement temperature is 58 degrees ... with the ambient heat that occurs during primary fermentation, is this an ok setting? What about after primary fermentation has completed and heat drops? Assume ales being brewed, no lagers

Can never get auto siphon working as well as I want, normally dump from one fermenter into another with a funnel ... is the only issue less clarity if more yeast gets into next fermenter than if had siphoned properly ( assuming good sanitizing practices )

When racking to a keg to act as your 2ndary / aging, is it just a single dose of CO2 to seal the keg, or do you seal it and then reapply more CO2 days later? Or even keep it under pressure the entire time?

When stirring my mash, the temperature reading will often jump, sometimes 10 degrees or more ... seems like a stupid question, but is this the real temperature? After stirring and letting it rest, the temperature will slowly, gradually drop ... but stirring again raises the temperature again ( but usually not as much as 10 degrees ) ... I'm using keggles ... what reading should I be working with when trying to hold a temperature during a rest?

When creating a yeast starter with a used yeast culture ( from a previous batch ), do I use the same approximate measurements had I been using DME + Water? ie. ~a quart of water to a cup of DME ... so a quart of water to a cup of yeast

The more you know the more you realize you don't know ...

Thanks
Pete

1) Temperature seems low but I think I read that temperature during fermentation is about 10 degrees warmer? not sure though. When bottleing, warmer temperatures will help carbonate and condition a bit quicker.

2) Aside from the clarity issue, it is not good to aerate beer at this stage. You want the beer to come in contact with as little oxygen as possible otherwise it could result in off / stale / cardboard? flavors. Why doesn't your autosiphon work? mine take 2 quick pushes and i'm off.

3) I usually throw 12 PSI in the keg just to seal it and purge oxygen with the relief valve, then let it do its thing to carbonate if your using sugar for this. If not I would assume you could leave it as is after sealing it until you use it. If you don't prime with sugar, you will have to force carb before drinking.

4) I batch sparge in a home made cooler w/ pipe manifold so I'm not sure of the question. When initially striking I get a hotter temperature at the top of the mash for a good 10 minutes before it settles in and disperses properly.

5) Cant help with this one. I never use starters. I know I should but everythings been coming out great with a tube or two of fresh White labs depending on OG.

Please note that these are just the things that work for me. Others may have better ideas.

ScottishPete said:

Normal basement temperature is 58 degrees ... with the ambient heat that occurs during primary fermentation, is this an ok setting? What about after primary fermentation has completed and heat drops? Assume ales being brewed, no lagers

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This is lower than you want for ales. Make sure you get the carboys off the cement floor. Wrap them in a blanket or make an insulated box. I would highly recommend buying a temperature controller and fermwrap as soon as possible.

ScottishPete said:

Can never get auto siphon working as well as I want, normally dump from one fermenter into another with a funnel ... is the only issue less clarity if more yeast gets into next fermenter than if had siphoned properly ( assuming good sanitizing practices )

Click to expand...

Practice with some water, learn to use the auto siphon. Ditto on the aeration issues. Siphoning will help clarity immensely.
PS: Doing secondary is 'old school', save yourself the risk of infection and just do a primary ferment (up to a month, if longer or adding fruit, then secondary is a good idea).

ScottishPete said:

When racking to a keg to act as your 2ndary / aging, is it just a single dose of CO2 to seal the keg, or do you seal it and then reapply more CO2 days later? Or even keep it under pressure the entire time?

Click to expand...

Aging = YES. As long as your keg doesn't leak, you can just hit it a couple of times and be done.
Secondary = NO. Putting pressure on the beer will suppress yeast activity and it will take much longer for whatever you are trying to accomplish with a secondary ferment.

ScottishPete said:

When stirring my mash, the temperature reading will often jump, sometimes 10 degrees or more ... seems like a stupid question, but is this the real temperature? After stirring and letting it rest, the temperature will slowly, gradually drop ... but stirring again raises the temperature again ( but usually not as much as 10 degrees ) ... I'm using keggles ... what reading should I be working with when trying to hold a temperature during a rest?

Click to expand...

I suspect your probe is touching the side of the mash tun or something. The temp of the liquid will drop unless you have a heating element. For example my mash tun is a stainless steel box with foam insulation on the outside, I usually drop only 1 degree C over an hour mash. So I think your tun isn't insulated very well and the probe is touching the side.

ScottishPete said:

When creating a yeast starter with a used yeast culture ( from a previous batch ), do I use the same approximate measurements had I been using DME + Water? ie. ~a quart of water to a cup of DME ... so a quart of water to a cup of yeast

Click to expand...

You seem confused. A yeast starter is used to grow up yeast. You need a certain cell count for a specific beer.

http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

Default here is 5.5 gallons of an 1.048 OG beer needs 177 billion cells. You can do this several ways (assuming 100 billion cells per vial/pack):
Pitch 1.8 vials/packs of yeast
Make a 1.5L simple starter with 1 vial/pack of yeast.
Make a 1L stir plate starter with 1 vial/pack of yeast.
Pitch 87 mL of yeast slurry (used yeast from previous ferment)
Pitch 10g of dried yeast.

So unless you don't have 87mL of yeast slurry, you don't need to make a starter. You can make a small 'starter', meaning you can throw a bit of wort in the jar the morning of just to wake the yeast up and get them active, but you don't need a full starter when repitching yeast. Also when making a starter, I weigh my DME, I don't use cups. Also you want the gravity of a starter to be around 1.035, so it really depends on the DME you are using to determine how much to use.

nathani said:

You seem confused. A yeast starter is used to grow up yeast. You need a certain cell count for a specific beer.

http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

Default here is 5.5 gallons of an 1.048 OG beer needs 177 billion cells. You can do this several ways (assuming 100 billion cells per vial/pack):
Pitch 1.8 vials/packs of yeast
Make a 1.5L simple starter with 1 vial/pack of yeast.
Make a 1L stir plate starter with 1 vial/pack of yeast.
Pitch 87 mL of yeast slurry (used yeast from previous ferment)
Pitch 10g of dried yeast.

So unless you don't have 87mL of yeast slurry, you don't need to make a starter. You can make a small 'starter', meaning you can throw a bit of wort in the jar the morning of just to wake the yeast up and get them active, but you don't need a full starter when repitching yeast. Also when making a starter, I weigh my DME, I don't use cups. Also you want the gravity of a starter to be around 1.035, so it really depends on the DME you are using to determine how much to use.

Click to expand...

Ah, interesting ... I thought I was supposed to be doing the DME with the slurry and put it on the stir plate ... ( I've only made one starter so far, and it was with liquid yeast + DME )