How long?
- Thread starter Riles8148
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Depends on the beer and temps. Months for sure.
A beer only ferments as long as it needs to and that's usually a week or so. Are you REALLY asking how long you can leave your beer in primary AFTER a beer is done fermenting?
If that's your answer, people have left their beers in primary for a year or more without any issue.
Many of us don't secondary and leave our beer in primary for a minimum of a month before we bottle. It makes for clear, crisp tasting beer.There's at least one thread a day discussing long primaries, just look around and you'll find all the info on it you will need.
I've left a beer for 5.5 months, and the beer was delicious.
A beer just won't go "bad" unless it's been infected, and that could happen just as easily in a day as it could leaving a beer for months....
If that's your answer, people have left their beers in primary for a year or more without any issue.
Many of us don't secondary and leave our beer in primary for a minimum of a month before we bottle. It makes for clear, crisp tasting beer.There's at least one thread a day discussing long primaries, just look around and you'll find all the info on it you will need.
I've left a beer for 5.5 months, and the beer was delicious.
A beer just won't go "bad" unless it's been infected, and that could happen just as easily in a day as it could leaving a beer for months....
>>A beer only ferments as long as it needs to and that's usually a week or so.
Revvy, I find that in buckets I can gently press down on the lid and a little more CO2 comes out of the air lock (the bucket lid was slightly bulging up). Dosn't that imply that a little bit of fermentation is still going on? Or is that trapped CO2 thats being released from the wort that has been there for 2 weeks?
Revvy, I find that in buckets I can gently press down on the lid and a little more CO2 comes out of the air lock (the bucket lid was slightly bulging up). Dosn't that imply that a little bit of fermentation is still going on? Or is that trapped CO2 thats being released from the wort that has been there for 2 weeks?
airlock activity isn't a sign of fermentation, especially when you're causing it. taking gravity readings are the only surefire way to know.
No...It only implies that co2 is coming out of your bucket, not why....
Airlocks can start or stop or start and stop again, for a ton of reasons, like temp changes, getting nudged by the cat or the vacuum cleaner, changes in barometric pressure, but your beer could still be fermenting fine.
Pushing down on a bucket lid and getting bubbling only means that you are pushing out an co2 that is in there, NOT that the co2 is being currently produced, or has simply sat in stasis filling the headspace since the day you pitched yeast.
Airlocks tell you the WHAT is happening, that co2 is or isn't getting out of the fermenter....but they aren't telling you the WHY. If it's fermenting or not, or off gassing or not. If it's done or not....
That's why we tell you to ignore what your airlock is doing, it's not a magic fermentation gauge, all it is and is meant to be seen as is a vent, a valve to release any excess co2 or purge oxygen out of it when co2 is intially produced. It's to keep from gas from building up so much that you end up with beer on the ceiling.
But to read any more into it, especially what the yeast are actually doing is idiotic.
