8 gallon primary?

[Rick_R]

I brewed my first big beer, 1.086 OG. I was smart enough to use a blow-off tube but was surprised at the amount of beer lost. It's a six gallon primary and you can see in the first photo below where it started. The second looks to have lost at least a gallon! Do you guys use larger than 6/6.5 primaries on big beers? Is the loss just an accepted part of doing big beers? Should I not have pitched on the yeast cake? Just curious.

Oh, and it appears from my previous posts that the pictures sometimes don't show up but refreshing the page tends to bring 'em up. Thanks for any thoughts.

 

[malkore]

if you pitch on a whole yeast cake, you've overpitched, and that's the biggest reason why it blew off so much. That degree of overpitching isn't a big deal taste wise, but the yeast just get a little 'too active'.

I've had 1 beer blow several pints out of my airlock, in a 7gallon bucket, and that was the batch I poured fresh wort on to an existing yeast cake.

You could probably have scooped out half the slurry and washed it (or thrown away) to prevent such a massive blow off.

 

[Blender]

I lost a gallon too when I used a yeast cake. I haven't done it since because my primaries are 6 gallon.

 

[Rick_R]

Thanks, guys. The last time (the one other time) I reused yeast I did a yeast wash; guess I should have this time. Since it was a big beer I thought it might be better to pitch on the cake as it always seems the suggestion on big beers is a huge starter.

Live and learn.

Rick