Wyeast 1968 London Ale is...

...the most badd a$$ yeast I have ever used! This thing flocculates like nothing I've ever seen. This fermentation is the most violent fermentation I have ever had! I love this yeast!!!

Yep, for a quick beer, this is your yeast. I've gotten several 48 hour fermentations from this yeast.

I am just amazed by it. I have gone out to the fridge about 10 times today just to watch it! The beer will still say in primary for about 4 weeks but it's an awesome one to watch! I'm mesmerized by it.

What kind of beer? 1968 is going to be ready quick - no need for anything even close to 4 weeks.

PseudoChef said:

What kind of beer? 1968 is going to be ready quick - no need for anything even close to 4 weeks.

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Yeah, this yeast is the poster boy for two week or less grain to glass brewing. The longer you let this yeast sit in the primary, the more yeast derived flavors you lose and chances for spoilage go up. English yeasts are not designed to sit on the yeast cake for weeks at a time.

bierhaus15 said:

Yeah, this yeast is the poster boy for two week or less grain to glass brewing. The longer you let this yeast sit in the primary, the more yeast derived flavors you lose and chances for spoilage go up. English yeasts are not designed to sit on the yeast cake for weeks at a time.

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I did now that about this yeast. I have become so accustomed to leaving beers in primary for 4-5 weeks i thought this would be the case too. It is a british bitter, or esb. So you think i should pull it off in 2 weeks?

I personally don't see many reasons to leave any beer for that long - as long as it's a solid recipe and brewed well. Most ale fermentations (regardless of yeast) should be complete within a week, and only around 48 extra hours are necessary to clean up those fermentation byproducts.

Unless I run out of keg space, my beers are kegged wtihin 2 weeks. Depending on starting gravity, I wouldn't hesitate to keg a beer made with 1968 within 10 days.

I have an unpopular opinion (on this forum, at least) that if your beer needs all this extra time to be "right," then it just isn't good beer to start with.

WildGingerBrewing said:

I have become so accustomed to leaving beers in primary for 4-5 weeks i thought this would be the case too. It is a british bitter, or esb. So you think i should pull it off in 2 weeks?

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This whole 'primary for weeks on end before you can bottle/keg' it is a one big load of you-know-what, especially concerning British beers. English yeasts taste best when young and are pretty much ready to drink as soon as they are carbed. I just kegged a batch of special bitter (wy1318) this evening - I brewed it on the 18th and I'll be drinking it by the weekend with my brew club, though it'll be another week or so before the flavor really peaks.

There are a few tricks to getting the most out of your fermentations with English yeasts, wy1968 in particular. Make a good sized starter, oxygenate well, pitch the yeast at a low temp (64F) and ferment no higher than 70F. Ferment the beer for 10 days, give it a D rest if it needs one, and then cold crash it to flocc out any remaining yeast and 'set' the flavor profile. Also, highly flocculating yeasts do not do well sitting on the yeast cake for long amounts of time. The yeast will trap trub and hop debris and off flavors can develop. Good luck with your brew.

This is good info. I will take it into consideration. As far as the long primaries go, I have found that my beers are considerably better when I leave them alone for 4-5 weeks. The last IPA I made, and first one that ever tasted worth a ****e, was in primary for 3 weeks with a 5 week dry hop. Fantastic. My pecan porter, which is probably the best beer I make, stayed in primary for 6 weeks. It is incredible. But never having used british yeast before, maybe I will leave this one for 2 weeks before racking to secondary to dry hop. Does this yeast require a D-rest?

My fermentation is holding steady at about 72F, yesterday it was 70F. I checked it this morning before leaving for work and it still looks like a violent volcano. Man I love this yeast!!

I used 1968 a few months ago for the first time, this stuff is incredible! I was worried when I read some reviews about needing to swirl the beer to keep it going. Didn't experience this, it just worked. The beer looked like it was in a blender!:rockin:

Yes! When I made the starter I told my brewing buddy that there is something about this yeast that I have never seen before. When I showed him my starter he was as blown away as I was. But after pitching it...OMG! If it tastes half as good as the violent fermentation it has going, I may make this my main yeast!

I was reading everyone's comments about not allowing brews to sit on this yeast for a while, and now I'm worried. I did an ESB, which fermented down nicely. Then I used the slurry for an English Barleywine. The BW has been sitting in the primary for 3 weeks as of today. I was planning to let it ferment out completely and then sit another 2 weeks to clean up (I was thinking of racking next week). Now with the comments about not sitting on the yeast and imparting yeasty flavors, I'm wondering if I should rack it to secondary today to age a while. I haven't taken a gravity reading recently (will do tonight), but it's most certainly done fermenting. Thoughts?

Letting the beer sit on the yeast cake for a few weeks wont ruin the beer by any means, though it can affect the yeast flavor profile. If it has been in there for three weeks as of now, it should be 100% done fermenting. If not, you might have something else going on...

A good rule of thumb for most English yeasts (and highly flocculating yeasts in general) is to go no more than 3 weeks in primary and two weeks if your looking to retain those complex ester profiles. Racking to a secondary to bulk age would be fine at this point, same with kegging.

I currently have a Slow Elk clone going that uses this yeast and I was already planning on bottling at 3 weeks so this was some good info to discover. I had done the AHS 20th Anniversary ESB with this yeast a couple months ago and left it in the fermenter for about 4 weeks. It turned out excellent as far as I'm concerned but now I'm curious about brewing it again with a shorter primary.


One praise I have for this yeast is that it flocks like nobody's business. It's so good at it that it's almost pain to rinse bottle because it glues itself to the bottom of them...

Thanks for the feedback. I typically primary for about 2-3 weeks, then secondary for another 1-2 weeks, and then bottle. With the barleywine, I thought it should primary for 2 weeks after fermentation was 100% complete, then bulk age for a while. Not sure how long, but probably 2 months, and then bottle age for another 4 months+.

So I am currently using this yeast in my freshly fermenting ESB. I am thinking about harvesting the yeast for (my first time) and immediately re-pitching this into the Stone Ruination clone from AHS (it is one of the yeasts they suggest/double pitched). I have heard from others that they consider the AHS suggested yeasts (for this brew) poor choices. What do you think?

I have a starter of 1968 and a starter of 3068 going on at the same time.... Just made a quick video this morning. I think the difference is quite amazing.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?gl=US&hl=en_US&client=mv-rim&v=WvrUkqWAwYs

(let me know if the link doesn't work)

M_C

Here's an update on my brew with the 1968...I racked to secondary to dry hop last night. Just over 2 weeks in primary. The sample had no off flavors and the beer seems like it is going to be farily crisp. The taste was good. My apparent attenuation was 74%, OG: 1.060, FG: 1.016. I'm pretty happy with that. I plan to bottle it this weekend and I will post an update on how it tastes after it's carbed. I'm thinking that 2 weeks on the yeast cake is not going to be an issue. And since I usually leave the beer in primary for 4-6 weeks, I will get to drink this one sooner. Another reason to love thisyeast!

I just brewed a pumpkin spiced ale with this yeast, hoping the less attenuation would leave some complimentary sweetness. I agree, I've never seen a yeast munch wort so quickly. We pitched Tuesday night with a 1L starter, and now Thursday night it's already tapering down. And, yep, the most clumpy, swirling yeast used to date. Damn! I'll let y'all know how it does with pumpkin flavours. Might just have to use it on a vanilla porter.