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bernardsmith

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I am making my first braggot. Pitched the yeast last Wednesday night. OG was close to 1.090. I've made lots of wine and some mead but have no beer making experience under my belt. I know the brew (3 lbs of DME and 2 lbs of specialty grains) won't ferment dry and I see this morning that the krausen is beginning to disappear. When do you know that the first phase has ended?

Some context:
Using Nottingham for the beer. I fermented the honey separately and it has been aging since October. The mead is 3 gallons (clover honey) and this batch of beer is about 2 gallons with trub. The beer , however, is fermenting in a 3 gallon carboy and my plan was to rack the beer into a 5 gallon carboy and fill the remaining space with the mead.
Since beer does not ferment "dry" and since there seems to be a general aversion to taking gravity readings (with wine you would take readings and when close to about 1.003 you could rack into a secondary) how do you decide when it is ready to rack off the trub and into a carboy with no headroom and so no exposure to oxygen?
Thanks
 
If you're thinking of racking to secondary, then wait until it's done fermenting (i.e. reaches FG). Some will tell you not to bother - that the risk of oxidization and infection is not worth any debatable gains made. Personally, if I'm not feeling lazy then I would secondary because I find that there's less chance that hop debris will get into my bottling bucket and clog my wand.
 
If you're thinking of racking to secondary, then wait until it's done fermenting (i.e. reaches FG). Some will tell you not to bother - that the risk of oxidization and infection is not worth any debatable gains made. Personally, if I'm not feeling lazy then I would secondary because I find that there's less chance that hop debris will get into my bottling bucket and clog my wand.

But how do you know when it has reached final gravity? Is there some definitive gravity that is "final" or do you simply use the calendar? One week after pitching the yeast it'll be done?
With wine and IMO, with mead, final gravity is reached when there are no residual fermentable sugars left to ferment and so the gravity is below 1.000, routinely, .998 or .996... and anyway you age for 9 months or longer. What is the "final gravity" when you are using malt and grains? And how do you measure this is if taking a reading exposes the beer to bacterial and yeast infections that are considered a greater cost than any benefit the measurement would offer? I guess my thinking is that there is a great danger to allow the beer to sit exposed to air in the carboy if it is not producing a blanket of CO2 and the only way to know if it is still producing CO2 is to measure the change in gravity but do beer makers simply watch the airlock and count the frequency of the bubbles? And if that is the technique at what point do you say that there are no fermentables left... when the frequency drops below 1 burp a minute? One in five minutes?
 
But how do you know when it has reached final gravity? Is there some definitive gravity that is "final" or do you simply use the calendar? One week after pitching the yeast it'll be done?
With wine and IMO, with mead, final gravity is reached when there are no residual fermentable sugars left to ferment and so the gravity is below 1.000, routinely, .998 or .996... and anyway you age for 9 months or longer. What is the "final gravity" when you are using malt and grains? And how do you measure this is if taking a reading exposes the beer to bacterial and yeast infections that are considered a greater cost than any benefit the measurement would offer? I guess my thinking is that there is a great danger to allow the beer to sit exposed to air in the carboy if it is not producing a blanket of CO2 and the only way to know if it is still producing CO2 is to measure the change in gravity but do beer makers simply watch the airlock and count the frequency of the bubbles? And if that is the technique at what point do you say that there are no fermentables left... when the frequency drops below 1 burp a minute? One in five minutes?

You check the SG and then three days later check it again. If it's the same, it's at the final gravity and can be racked or bottled. Generally, you don't bottle until clear of course.
 
But how do you know when it has reached final gravity?

When you have two successive, identical gravity readings, 3 days apart.

Is there some definitive gravity that is "final" or do you simply use the calendar?

Neither. You use a refractometer or a hydrometer.

One week after pitching the yeast it'll be done?

Fermentation may be finished (depending on yeast strain, pitch rate, temperature, wort composition, and other factors), but you almost certainly do not want to rush it. Even if there are no fermentable sugars left, the yeast will still be "cleaning up" for several days, not to mention giving your beer time for sediment to settle out and clarify. I normally don't even look at my beers until 3 weeks after pitching the yeast.

What is the "final gravity" when you are using malt and grains?

It depends on the recipe and yeast.

And how do you measure this is if taking a reading exposes the beer to bacterial and yeast infections that are considered a greater cost than any benefit the measurement would offer?

By carefully sanitizing your sampling equipment, and discarding the sample (rather than returning it to the fermenter).

I guess my thinking is that there is a great danger to allow the beer to sit exposed to air in the carboy if it is not producing a blanket of CO2 and the only way to know if it is still producing CO2 is to measure the change in gravity

The beer does not need to be still producing CO2. CO2 it's already produced will still be in there, protecting it.

To be honest with you, I never actually do the "2 gravity samples 3 days apart" test. I just leave it completely undisturbed for 3 weeks, then cold crash it and fine with gelatin, then rack it to a keg. After kegging, I take a sample to measure the final gravity and calculate ABV, but I never worry whether or not it's done fermenting. If it's not done fermenting after 3 weeks, then it's likely infected, which would be visually obvious. If it doesn't look infected after 3 weeks, it's done.

do beer makers simply watch the airlock and count the frequency of the bubbles?

The airlock is a poor indicator of fermentation activity. The presence of bubbles doesn't mean the yeast are still working, nor does the absence of bubbles mean they're done. The airlock is simply a device for keeping foreign contaminants from getting into your beer. It is not an indicator of fermentation activity.

at what point do you say that there are no fermentables left... when the frequency drops below 1 burp a minute? One in five minutes?

Again, ignore the airlock. Bubbles could just mean the air temperature or pressure is changing, causing CO2 dissolved in the beer to come out of solution. A lack of bubbles could mean you have a tiny leak somewhere. Use your hydrometer or refractometer to be certain.
 
Thanks, This is very helpful.
So I guess there really is very little difference between what wine makers think and do and what beer makers do and think... Perhaps the only difference is that wine makers are less cautious about returning a sample back to the primary that they have removed to measure gravity (although we wouldn't test pH and then return that sample) and we tend to use K-meta as our sanitizer of choice
 
Just a wild guess, but it may be that the higher alcohol percentage of wine would make it less likely to introduce an infection?
 
To be honest with you, I never actually do the "2 gravity samples 3 days apart" test. I just leave it completely undisturbed for 3 weeks, then cold crash it and fine with gelatin, then rack it to a keg. After kegging, I take a sample to measure the final gravity and calculate ABV, but I never worry whether or not it's done fermenting. If it's not done fermenting after 3 weeks, then it's likely infected, which would be visually obvious. If it doesn't look infected after 3 weeks, it's done.

If I want to use a carboy for conditioning, is this process good enough:

Wait a week, visually make sure the krausen has come and gone. If not, wait another week.

If so, rack to a carboy to get the beer off the yeast cake and since you know headspace is no longer needed.

Wait 2 more weeks. Visually inspect for cloudiness. If happy, bottle and don't open for at least 3 weeks.

6 weeks minimum start to finish.

Worst case a little more trub / yeast cake will form in the carboy the way I see it. I have noticed the quality of my beer seems to improve until at least 10 weeks after brew day, so I try to keep it in bottles for 6 weeks or so before I indulge, but that can be a really long 6 weeks.
 
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