Recommendations on bulk aging time in 2ndary

Hi everyone,
so this weekend I got around to transferring both my triple and my barley wine to secondaries.

The belgian from 1.082 to 1.011 and has been stable there for about a week and a half. It sat in the primary for a little over 3 weeks. I was surprised how quickly it fermented out the later addition of the candi sugar. 3 days into the active fermentation, I added 2 lbs of sugar back in and just a few days (5 maybe), I was down really close to where it stopped.

The second was a barley wine, similar to Jamils recipe that went on a Pacman yeast cake. I got it down from 1.127 to 1.032.

Anyways, both of these beers will be bottled at some point in the future, but I've got them sitting in carboys right now, covered with a towel. I'm not really sure how long to age either of them though. Initially, I was thinking maybe a month, but from the taste, both were good (barley wine was better though).

Any suggestions on how long to sit on these?

I aged my tripel for 3 months in secondary, and a month in the bottle. Fantastic. A barleywine I'd let go even longer, but I haven't made a barleywine, so you might ask someone else. If you have glass carboys, I'd leave it there longer than in plastic ones (oxygen permeability).

climateboy said:

I aged my tripel for 3 months in secondary, and a month in the bottle. Fantastic. A barleywine I'd let go even longer, but I haven't made a barleywine, so you might ask someone else. If you have glass carboys, I'd leave it there longer than in plastic ones (oxygen permeability).

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A month would be a good starting point. My barleywine of similar gravity was in the secondary for 4 months and is now bottle conditioning. The longer time gives you a chance to oak or dry hop the barleywine.

The O2 permeability of a better bottle is insignificant compared to even the O2 from the stopper and airlock. There is some permeability but for practical purposes it can be treated as impermeable as glass. Better bottles may have some disadvantages but O2 permeability is not one of them.

Craig

Well, they're all currently in 5G glass carboys. The barley wine has a nice little hop bite and good aroma so I don't think I'll dry hop it, and I just got done putting a big RIS that was on Oak into bottles to continue to age, so I think i've got enough oaked beer for awhile.

I've been working on big beer projects lately so I'll be ready for next winter. (A RIS, the tripple, a barley wine, a scotch ale and a IIPA)

Usually, I've been shooting for around 3-4 weeks before bottleing to give it time to clean up and it seems to be working, but I haven't done something quite as big as the barley wine (though the RIS got close with a SG of 1.100)