Sour Wort Rye with Brett Trois Question

[jujitsudave]

Hello everyone. I recently started the process of designing a sour coconut pineapple rye ale (inspired by The Bruery's Sour in the Rye with Pineapple and coconut). Here are the details and the notes (I copied The Mad Fermentationists format because it makes a lot of sense to me):

Recipe Specifics
Batch Size (Gal): 5
Anticipated OG: 1.044
Anticipated SRM: 11
Anticipated IBU: 14

Grain/Sugar
6.6 lbs. Rye Extract (70% Pilsen, 20% Rye, 10% Caramel 40L)
75% Fermentable

Hops
1 oz. Fuggles (Pellet, 5.2% AA) Hop Tea @15 min

Extras
1 Whirfloc @15 min
2 lbs shredded unsweatened coconut (roasted) @15 min boil
2 lbs pineapple (secondary fermentation)

Yeast/Bacteria
OYL-605 Omega Labs Lacto Blend (sour wort 5 gallons)
1 pack rehydrated US-05 (2.5 gallons)
WLP644 Brett Trois (other 2.5 gallons)

Notes
- Lacto Starter (1.040 24 hrs)
- Brett Starter (1.040, 48 h, stir plate, twice)
- Lightly boiled 5 gallons of unhopped wort 15 min, then chilled to 80F
- Pitched lacto starter, incubate 3 days at 85F with fermwrap. (Final pH = 3.40)
- added hop tea,whirfloc and wort chiller. Boiled 15 min and chilled to 70F. (pH = 3.51, adjusted back to 3.4 with lactic acid.)(OG = 1.048)
- split batch into 2 carboys and oxygenated each with pure O2 60 sec.
- Pitched US-05 into one, and Brett starter into the other. (US-05 has airlock, Brett has carboy hood with blow off tube)(both fermentors are in water baths).
- 12 hr, US-05 is actively fermenting. Brett has what looks like pellicle or thick krausen.

So my question is about the activity of the Brett batch (ignoring if its truly sacch). It initially developed a thick krausen or pellicle after 12 hrs but no activity in the blow off tube. Wednesday morning (~48 hr) still no activity in the blow off tube (US-05 is still chugging away) so I took it out of the water bath to raise the temp a little bit (80F here in Santa Barbara CA). Wednesday night no activity still. It took about 24 hours to get activity in my starters with a stirplate, and that was with constant stirring. But does this long of a lag time seem normal? This is my first batch of all Brett beer and I'm hoping it goes well. When would be a good time to expect to see some activity? Or, how long should I wait to start worrying? Or will I simply not see any activity, even though the beer is fermenting? I'm wondering if I should have given more time to build the starters as well.

Thank you for the feedback.

 

[stpug]

It sounds as though you've thought through your process very well and planned for a successful fermentation. The fact that the trois fermenter developed a thick krausen should be indication enough that something is happening, and those don't generally develop without some form of off-gassing. My gut instinct is that there is a leak in your blowoff system for the trois that is allowing the gas to escape instead of bubbling through your blowoff jar/vessel; is that possible?

 

[jujitsudave]

That's a good point, hadnt thought about how secure my connections are. I'm using a carboy hood but it doesnt feel loose. I went ahead and taped it up with electrical tape just in case. Did that this afternoon, we'll see if that helps. Thanks for the idea.

 

[jujitsudave]

still no activity this morning. I think I'm jut being over paranoid, but does anyone have any other thoughts?

 

[mbbransc]

Have you tasted any samples yet?

 

[jujitsudave]

Yup. About a week and a half ago I tried both. The Trois beer was down to 1.022 and the US-05 was down to 1.020. Both taste fantastic so far.

US-05: Clean, nice sour tartness, coconut is flavor is there but less than I was hoping for.

Trois: Clean, nice sour tartness, but with a good amount of coconut and some pineapple/mango to it.


After I sampled the beers, I juiced 3 pineapples and split it between the two batches in a secondary. I plan to just ignore them for now and maybe consider bottling in about a week and a half or so. Figured about 3-4 weeks in secondary should be good for both.

Ill post more results soon.