Last week, I brewed my second batch (a Sweetwater Festive Ale clone) after a fairly successful first batch from a Brewer's Best English Pale Ale kit.
Brewing day went quite well, and my beer is happily fermenting away in the bathtub. My OG reading was 1.073, which seems about right since the finished product is supposed to be 8.5% ABV. So, a few questions:
1) How do people generally measure gravity during fermentation? Do you just drop the hydrometer in your primary fermenter, or do you siphon off a bit and measure that? If the former, doesn't the krausen interfere with a good reading? If the latter, what do you typically siphon off beer into, and how do you keep the hydrometer from getting stuck to the wall of whatever container you're using?
2) I've been reading a lot of the debate about whether or not to use a secondary fermenter, and to me, the decision comes down to if it's worth risking contamination to achieve a greater level of clarity. This is a dark beer (I'm told it should be around 30 SRM), so I don't know that a little cloudiness would even be perceptible, but at the same time, I want to produce the best beer I can, and am fine with the extra work (and additional risk) to achieve that. Also, the fact that I have two engineering degrees (one of which in chemical engineering), and spent quite a bit of time in labs to get those degrees means I'm pretty comfortable with my ability to keep things sanitized/clean so I'm not as worried about contamination if I rack to a secondary fermenter.
Okay, that's a whole lot of preface before I get to a question, so my question is this: assuming I'm going to rack to a secondary, when should I do so?Everything I've read about racking to secondary says that you want to wait until fermentation has slowed, but not stopped, before you rack to a secondary fermenter. Well, my fermentation has definitely slowed (yes, I'm looking at a bubbling airlock, but I'm fairly certain I have a pretty tight seal based on how well it's been bubbling), but it's still going about twice a minute. I could do a gravity reading, but since I'm still a bit uncertain about how best to do that while it's fermenting (and I want to minimize how many times I open my bucket), I'm using a non-invasive method, at least for now.
As a corrolary to this, do the two methods (just primary vs. primary and secondary) differ in total fermentation time? I read about the 1-2-3 "rule," but then also read about some people fermenting in a primary for months, particularly for higher gravity beers. I can see arguments for either method fermenting faster (the primary only method will have more yeast, but the secondary provides for some additional aeration in a case where oxygen may be the limiting ingredient). The only reason I'm concerned about this is because I'm hoping to bottle 3 weeks after my brewing day, and if one method gives me a better chance that I can do so, that's probably the one I'll choose.
3) A brewing friend of mine recently had a batch explode, and given the high gravity in this batch, I was concerned about a potential explosion since the yeast would have so much sugar to snack on. Thankfully, this hasn't been a problem on this batch (at least so far, but things are slowing down so I'm hopeful). I've read about people using a blow-off tube to prevent explosions, but haven't really seen a good description of what this is or how to make one. Also, what are some other methods to prevent explosions, if any?
Okay...so that was a little long-winded, and if you made it this far, thanks for reading. Also, thanks-in-advance for any responses.
Brewing day went quite well, and my beer is happily fermenting away in the bathtub. My OG reading was 1.073, which seems about right since the finished product is supposed to be 8.5% ABV. So, a few questions:
1) How do people generally measure gravity during fermentation? Do you just drop the hydrometer in your primary fermenter, or do you siphon off a bit and measure that? If the former, doesn't the krausen interfere with a good reading? If the latter, what do you typically siphon off beer into, and how do you keep the hydrometer from getting stuck to the wall of whatever container you're using?
2) I've been reading a lot of the debate about whether or not to use a secondary fermenter, and to me, the decision comes down to if it's worth risking contamination to achieve a greater level of clarity. This is a dark beer (I'm told it should be around 30 SRM), so I don't know that a little cloudiness would even be perceptible, but at the same time, I want to produce the best beer I can, and am fine with the extra work (and additional risk) to achieve that. Also, the fact that I have two engineering degrees (one of which in chemical engineering), and spent quite a bit of time in labs to get those degrees means I'm pretty comfortable with my ability to keep things sanitized/clean so I'm not as worried about contamination if I rack to a secondary fermenter.
Okay, that's a whole lot of preface before I get to a question, so my question is this: assuming I'm going to rack to a secondary, when should I do so?Everything I've read about racking to secondary says that you want to wait until fermentation has slowed, but not stopped, before you rack to a secondary fermenter. Well, my fermentation has definitely slowed (yes, I'm looking at a bubbling airlock, but I'm fairly certain I have a pretty tight seal based on how well it's been bubbling), but it's still going about twice a minute. I could do a gravity reading, but since I'm still a bit uncertain about how best to do that while it's fermenting (and I want to minimize how many times I open my bucket), I'm using a non-invasive method, at least for now.
As a corrolary to this, do the two methods (just primary vs. primary and secondary) differ in total fermentation time? I read about the 1-2-3 "rule," but then also read about some people fermenting in a primary for months, particularly for higher gravity beers. I can see arguments for either method fermenting faster (the primary only method will have more yeast, but the secondary provides for some additional aeration in a case where oxygen may be the limiting ingredient). The only reason I'm concerned about this is because I'm hoping to bottle 3 weeks after my brewing day, and if one method gives me a better chance that I can do so, that's probably the one I'll choose.
3) A brewing friend of mine recently had a batch explode, and given the high gravity in this batch, I was concerned about a potential explosion since the yeast would have so much sugar to snack on. Thankfully, this hasn't been a problem on this batch (at least so far, but things are slowing down so I'm hopeful). I've read about people using a blow-off tube to prevent explosions, but haven't really seen a good description of what this is or how to make one. Also, what are some other methods to prevent explosions, if any?
Okay...so that was a little long-winded, and if you made it this far, thanks for reading. Also, thanks-in-advance for any responses.