Hop Pellets Explosion

[shattstar03]

Hi guys and gals,

My red ale has been sitting in my secondary fermentor for about two weeks, last week I decided to throw some centennial hop pellets in my secondary. The first week, there was hardly any activity, the hops actually settled at the bottom of the fermentor.

Last night (a week later) I checked my fermentor and I saw literally all the hops pushed up to the nose of the carboy, fluid was already entering my airlock (it looked like a volcano getting ready to explode). So I removed the airlock and replaced it with the blow-off tube. It's been about a day and there has been no sign of this thing calming down, there has been a lot of activity, this thing is actually trying to push itself into my pan for the longest time. One possible culprit to my problem is that I have very little headroom in my secondary, I figured the main part of the fermentation was over.

This brew has been fermenting for 4 weeks already, I'm extremely surprised that there is this much activity going on this late in the process. I was going to begin bottling later this week but I'm unsure on what to do at this point.

So my questions are:

Should I be concerned with this kind of activity? What course of action should I take? Should I let the brew settle itself out, then bottle? Should I remove some of the hops?

Thanks a lot!

 

[Beerens]

My question is what is the gravity of the wort? Check to see where it is at and let us know.

 

[chezhed]

uh...some more specific information might help us help you How much is "some" hops?
How big a batch in what size fermenter?
Check the gravity at any point? What type yeast?...what's the temp you have this batch at?

I've never had this happen so I'm real curious what caused it myself....sorry I can't help but I sure wouldn't take any hops out...only risking some sort of contamination IMO.

 

[shattstar03]

Ah my bad,

Here is what I used: 1oz of hops with White Labs English Ale yeast,

I was using a 5 gallon carboy as my secondary fermentor, I had very very little head room in it.

 

[chezhed]

with that little headroom and not knowing your gravity reading or temp, I'm betting your fermentation is still going and it's just gas pushing swollen pellets....but like Beerens asked, what's your gravity...actual to targets?

 

[CourtHouseBrewing]

I use a Brix scale refractometer so I only need small sterile samples to check my gravity. I have read the only way to know for sure if fermentation is done is to see a steady reading over four or more days. When I dry hop I put the hops in the bottom of the secondary then move from the primary on top of the hops being careful not to introduce air by aeration of the liquid. In my limited experience I have never seen yeast act on anything other than sugar. Would like to hear more of what was happening when you added the hops. Just the lack of head space should not cause this to happen if you are dry hoping at the end or near end of fermentation.

 

[malevolent]

Not all the CO2 comes out of the beer during fermentation. It is unlikely there was THAT much CO2 left in the beer which came out when you put in the dry hops. Strange.

 

[BradleyBrew]

I dry hopped a barleywine about a month ago. A day after there are foaming and bubblies streaming from the yeast cake, and airlock activity. I believe that the hops allow the beer to release more co2 causing this placebo like fermentation. I checked the hydrometer and it did change from pre to post dry hopping.

 

[Jayhem]

I dry hopped my Pale Ale with 1oz of pellets but I had almost 3/4 gal headspace in my carboy, still I got about 1" of frothy hops on the top of the beer for 5 days!

 

[joelrapp]

Not all the CO2 comes out of the beer during fermentation. It is unlikely there was THAT much CO2 left in the beer which came out when you put in the dry hops. Strange.

That it my thought as well. I've seen the very same thing. Taken measurements, all the same transfer and watch as the gas is released and comes blasting out. My guess is that is what you are seeing.

 

[akervin]

Any pics? I'd like to see what your talking about.

 

[HopHeadGrady]

Maybe the pellets fell to the bottom, stirred up some yeast and then kicked off some fermentation?

 

[moose7710]

My guess is that the hop pellets created nucleation points for the CO2 to come out of solution. Kinda like the Mentos in a coke bottle trick.

 

[unionrdr]

Or he transefered to secondary after 1week or so.That's been done a lot since January. Rack to secondary too soon,& it stalls. Add something to secondary & it can kick off again. That's why the krausen is getting ready to blow. Kicked up co2 only lasts an hour or two for me.