PeterCottonAle
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- Jul 18, 2013
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Hi all,
This isn't really a 'help me' thread, just wanted to share some observations that may be helpful to other new to lager brewing, and maybe if others have had similar experiences I'd be interested in hearing them.
After ~2 years of brewing, I finally gave lagers a try about 6 months ago (and got instantly addicted to lager brewing). My first 4 lagers were all OG ~1.050, 2 viennas, a dortmunder, and a helles. All fermentations were very similar: ~12-18hr lag time, then slow and steady airlock activity (1-2 bubbles sec) for 3 days. Day 4 usually showed noticable slowing of airlock activity, then day 5 airlock activity was basically done. Then I'd ramp temp slowly up until hitting diacetyl rest temperature, hold there for a few days, then cold crash for a few days before kegging. Except for the first lager done with dry yeast, all others were pitched with either with a yeast harvest or a new liquid yeast built up on a stir-plate starter (~2L each time).
For my doppelbock, i had ~5.5 gal at an OG of 1.073 and pitched a ~3L starter aerated w/stir plate. I used roughly 200ml of harvested yeast slurry in the starter (3rd generation). My lag time was roughly equivalent to every other lager I've done, with visible activity ~12hr after pitching. I pitched at ~46f and allowed it to warm to ~48-50f. The 2nd day seemed to progress as normal, with accellerating airlock activity, but never quite reached the activity level of my previous lagers, with the 3rd day bubbling every 10-20 sec. It is now the 4th day after pitching and I'm seeing maybe 1 bubble every 30 sec or so.
I was expecting this fermentation to be much like my previous lager attempts, except maybe drawn out an extra couple days for the higher OG, but this appears to not be the case. Now, I know not to immediately assume airlock activity = fermentation activity, but I did find this a little curious. I'm thinking this could be due to two things;
1) the higher gravity/higher alcohol environment is suppressing the yeast activity a bit and is just going to mean an even slower and longer fermentation than i thought
2) I did notice my starter took off and finished more quickly than normally, maybe this carried over into the beer and I simply missed the most vigorous portion of fermentation.
I'll keep posting updates as the beer comes along. I plan on checking the gravity in a few days to see how my lil doppelbock is doing.
This isn't really a 'help me' thread, just wanted to share some observations that may be helpful to other new to lager brewing, and maybe if others have had similar experiences I'd be interested in hearing them.
After ~2 years of brewing, I finally gave lagers a try about 6 months ago (and got instantly addicted to lager brewing). My first 4 lagers were all OG ~1.050, 2 viennas, a dortmunder, and a helles. All fermentations were very similar: ~12-18hr lag time, then slow and steady airlock activity (1-2 bubbles sec) for 3 days. Day 4 usually showed noticable slowing of airlock activity, then day 5 airlock activity was basically done. Then I'd ramp temp slowly up until hitting diacetyl rest temperature, hold there for a few days, then cold crash for a few days before kegging. Except for the first lager done with dry yeast, all others were pitched with either with a yeast harvest or a new liquid yeast built up on a stir-plate starter (~2L each time).
For my doppelbock, i had ~5.5 gal at an OG of 1.073 and pitched a ~3L starter aerated w/stir plate. I used roughly 200ml of harvested yeast slurry in the starter (3rd generation). My lag time was roughly equivalent to every other lager I've done, with visible activity ~12hr after pitching. I pitched at ~46f and allowed it to warm to ~48-50f. The 2nd day seemed to progress as normal, with accellerating airlock activity, but never quite reached the activity level of my previous lagers, with the 3rd day bubbling every 10-20 sec. It is now the 4th day after pitching and I'm seeing maybe 1 bubble every 30 sec or so.
I was expecting this fermentation to be much like my previous lager attempts, except maybe drawn out an extra couple days for the higher OG, but this appears to not be the case. Now, I know not to immediately assume airlock activity = fermentation activity, but I did find this a little curious. I'm thinking this could be due to two things;
1) the higher gravity/higher alcohol environment is suppressing the yeast activity a bit and is just going to mean an even slower and longer fermentation than i thought
2) I did notice my starter took off and finished more quickly than normally, maybe this carried over into the beer and I simply missed the most vigorous portion of fermentation.
I'll keep posting updates as the beer comes along. I plan on checking the gravity in a few days to see how my lil doppelbock is doing.
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