Chilling in Secondary to Clear without Additives

I read that you can chill the beer in secondary so that the free proteins and excess yeast fall to the bottom, reducing chill haze. Will this affect carbonation? Any other thoughts on this practice?

Its called crashing and I try to practice it often. But since I've never crashed for more than 3 weeks, so I've never had a problem with carbonation.

Wild

Cool! I was just going to do it for one week, so I guess there wouldn't be a problem.

Someone told me that if you cold condition, you need to do a diacetyl rest for bottling... which means to just allow the beer to come up to room temperature for one to three days, right? Can one of the more experienced people comment on this?

Jack said:

Someone told me that if you cold condition, you need to do a diacetyl rest for bottling... which means to just allow the beer to come up to room temperature for one to three days, right? Can one of the more experienced people comment on this?

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I'd like to read more on this also. I've heard of the diacetyl rest, but never knew what it was or took the time to search. Come on you old pros...

A diacetyl rest is a short warm fermentation done with lagers to allow the yeast to clean up the 2,3 butanedione.

http://byo.com/mrwizard/871.html

Thanks for the link.

If it's mosty for lagers, would it be necessary for ales as well?

No, just lagers.

Wild

Hey, just say this forum and it got me interested. I was just wondering a couple of things though:

1)When durring the secondary fermentation do you do this?
2)How cold do you chill the beer at?
3) I have a wheat beer and a Magic Hat clone in the process, should I even bother?
4) If i do decide to "crash" my beer then how long should I leave it out of the fridge to let it warm up before bottling?

Thanks for the help.

1. At the end. A friend of mine and I do one week, but I've heard everything from one to three weeks on these forums.
2. As cold as possible without freezing it. I put my carboy in a tub and fill it with ice. I'd use a lagering fridge if I had one.
3. No. Wheat beers are supposed to be cloudy.
4. You just need to get it to room temperature. Otherwise you could have problems with pressure.

You can start cold conditioning as soon as you move to secondary as long as your primary fermentation is definitely done. I like to wait and see if the transfer will rouse some yeast and kickoff a little more fermentation. If not, it's safe to move to a lower temperature.

I've cold conditioned a Hefeweizen for nearly 30 days at 45F and didn't manage to clear it, but it's definitely not mandatory. Most German commercial Hefeweizen brewers do some form of cold conditioning, however.

Warming up the beer before bottling? Not necessary...you can add priming sugar and bottle no problem. You will have to warm the bottles up to achieve carbonation, however.

Thanks for the help guys! It's too late for my Hefe, since I'm bottling on weds. No great loss since I prolly wouldn't have done it with the Hefe anyways, but maybe I'll try it with my Magic Hat.

Baron von BeeGee said:

Warming up the beer before bottling? Not necessary...you can add priming sugar and bottle no problem. You will have to warm the bottles up to achieve carbonation, however.

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That's good to know. A friend of mine intoned that you need to let it warm to room temperature to equalize pressure, increase solubility of priming sugar, and remove any possible diacetyl (I'm skeptical about this one).

But the way I see it experience trumps theory any day!

Jack said:

That's good to know. A friend of mine intoned that you need to let it warm to room temperature to equalize pressure, increase solubility of priming sugar, and remove any possible diacetyl (I'm skeptical about this one).

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If it fermented at ale temps, you basically did a diacetyl rest already. It's only lagers where this should possibly be necessary.

So, could you just leave your beer in the primary fermenter for 2 weeks and chill it week 3 and not have to deal with a secondary??

Thanks,
Doug

You could but then there is the debate as to whether a beer should be racked of the trub ASAP. I'd say better to just rack to secondary unless you have a good reason for not doing so.

My first batch I ever made was a Belgian wit with tripel yeast. I had an extremely vigorous primary and had no idea what was happening. I thought I had overfilled the carboy so I drained some of it into two small bottles and tossed them in the fridge. Over the next two months I vented them daily and they continued to ferment/carbonate.
I drank them 2 weeks ago and they were super clear even though it was a wit. They were also delicious!

Does anyone know if this is a normal way of clearing beer? Would it have still been alcoholic? And was the sugar in the wort enough to carbonate the bottles?

mew said:

I read that you can chill the beer in secondary so that the free proteins and excess yeast fall to the bottom, reducing chill haze. Will this affect carbonation? Any other thoughts on this practice?

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Now it won't affect carbonation. But why not do it in the primary??? That's what I do when I "COLD CRASH".

oops...sorry didn't read the date of the OP. Years and years ago.