Curious fermentation

[Tony B]

This is my third batch ever and still constantly changing equipment and procedures as this journey progresses.
First batch was 5gal, all LME, IPA kit that came with a “ once used” bucket kit that I bought on OfferUp. Second batch, using the same equipment was a 5gal DME, Kölsch recipe with steeping grains from the Ballast Point website.

Now, for my third batch I have switched to BIAB. I found a great deal on a used 8gal kettle, a sous vide stick and bought a plastic Speidel 20L FV on Amazon. Sous vide stick worked great at keeping my mash within about 1 degree of my mash temp of 151* F. Since the, to the brim capacity of the FV is about 5.75gal and I’m heating on a stovetop, I decided to start with a 3gal batch of the same Kölsch recipe, but the all grain version and I scaled it down to 3gal.

At the same time, I decided to start building a yeast bank. Bought a couple flasks, a pack of WLP029, DME and some yeast nutrient. Overbuilt a starter of 1.5L. Crashed and decanted. Swirled yeast into suspension and filled 10 vials with 6ml each of the slurry and cryopreservative for freezing.
What remained was about 200ml of slurry that I poured into a sterilized 250ml flask. I put that in the fridge until brew day, a few days later. When I pulled it out, the yeast had settled to just under the 50ml line and the rest was liquid. I let it come to room temp before pitching on what turned out to be about 3.3 gal of 1.048 wort. Estimated OG was 1.052, so I figured my efficiency was not great, but fine.
This recipe says to ferment for 10 days, then add optional dry hop and ferment another 6 days.
I was really surprised on brew day that I started seeing some bubbles after 3 hours and it was going to town after 4 hours.
That was Saturday night. I hadn’t seen much activity in a day or two, so last night decided to take a gravity reading. 1.006. . I did the dry hop addition and will probably bottle on Monday or Tuesday night. About 1/2 the expected time.
Recipe says 1.012 FG, which is closer to what I got the first time around with pitching a full pack of WLP029.
I’m thinking I either over pitched or maybe had better than normal conversion in my mash? Any thoughts?

 

[lumpher]

Have you verified your mash temp is accurate? It's possible that it read 151, but was really lower. Wlp029 is a beast, and will do some damage quick, especially if it was mashed low. That result is not 1 I'd expect from overpitching.

 

[Tony B]

Have you verified your mash temp is accurate? It's possible that it read 151, but was really lower. Wlp029 is a beast, and will do some damage quick, especially if it was mashed low. That result is not 1 I'd expect from overpitching.

I used the temp on the sous vide stick and 2 other thermometers. They all varied slightly, but I would say plus or minus 2 degrees

 

[hotbeer]

This recipe says to ferment for 10 days, then add optional dry hop and ferment another 6 days.

When recipes give you a set number of day to keep in in the fermenter, they don't mean that it is going to ferment for all of those days. It's just that we call it a fermenter because that is it's main and initial purpose.

Fermentation is only the conversion of sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide. It's not the only thing yeast do. Many times fermentation only takes a day or two once things get going good as evidenced by the krausen.

So in less than 3 days from pitch for many beers are at their FG. Some occasionally take a little longer to deal with that last little bit of more complicated sugars.

The additional time your recipe is calling for is to let the yeast clean up the off flavor and aroma they may have created and to let the beer start to drop all the crud and most of the excess yeast itself that is no longer desired in the beer.

I and some others will wait even longer for the beer to clear than the stated time of the recipe. Rushing a beer out of the FV tends to have more unsatisfactory results for me. So I and others don't get in a hurry.

so last night decided to take a gravity reading. 1.006. . I did the dry hop addition and will probably bottle on Monday or Tuesday night. About 1/2 the

So did you wait the ten days before dry hopping? There are all sorts of thoughts on when to dry hop. Some will wait longer even if FG is reached and other will do it sooner. Your recipe can't tell you every possible way to do your beer. It'd be confusing.

Sort of like when you read through the threads here and everyone is doing something different. You get even further confused as to what to do when. Some processes work better for others. You have to figure out what works well for you.

Keep notes about everything you do and the results. They'll eventually be useful to look back on to base other decisions.

Lastly, what did you use to take that SG reading of 1.006?.

 

[Tony B]

When recipes give you a set number of day to keep in in the fermenter, they don't mean that it is going to ferment for all of those days. It's just that we call it a fermenter because that is it's main and initial purpose.

Fermentation is only the conversion of sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide. It's not the only thing yeast do. Many times fermentation only takes a day or two once things get going good as evidenced by the krausen.

So in less than 3 days from pitch for many beers are at their FG. Some occasionally take a little longer to deal with that last little bit of more complicated sugars.

The additional time your recipe is calling for is to let the yeast clean up the off flavor and aroma they may have created and to let the beer start to drop all the crud and most of the excess yeast itself that is no longer desired in the beer.

I and some others will wait even longer for the beer to clear than the stated time of the recipe. Rushing a beer out of the FV tends to have more unsatisfactory results for me. So I and others don't get in a hurry.


So did you wait the ten days before dry hopping? There are all sorts of thoughts on when to dry hop. Some will wait longer even if FG is reached and other will do it sooner. Your recipe can't tell you every possible way to do your beer. It'd be confusing.

Sort of like when you read through the threads here and everyone is doing something different. You get even further confused as to what to do when. Some processes work better for others. You have to figure out what works well for you.

Keep notes about everything you do and the results. They'll eventually be useful to look back on to base other decisions.

Lastly, what did you use to take that SG reading of 1.006?.

I dry hopped it on Friday night. I am keeping detailed notes. I used a hydrometer for the SG readings. At room temp, about 68*. I did test the hydrometer in water and it read 1.000

 

[Tony B]

I decided to let it ride for a bit longer and plan to bottle tonight. I took a hydrometer reading last night and SG is down to 1.004. My girlfriend and I tasted it and we both liked it.

 

[hotbeer]

Most of us wouldn't bottle a beer until the SG is stable and two reading about 3 maybe 4 days apart are the same. We use to say two days apart was fine.

You might have a infection that might take it lower still. Even below 1.000 SG. And that extra bit of fermentation of the sugar types that you probably didn't want fermented along with the fermentation of your priming sugar might produce enough CO2 to over pressurize your bottles and explode them or give you seething volcanoes when opened.

I have had the seething volcanoes. Haven't ever exploded one yet. Though others have.

If you were going to keg it, it wouldn't matter as much as you can control the keg pressure and they are built to stand the higher pressures than are your bottles.

 

[Tony B]

Most of us wouldn't bottle a beer until the SG is stable and two reading about 3 maybe 4 days apart are the same. We use to say two days apart was fine.

You might have a infection that might take it lower still. Even below 1.000 SG. And that extra bit of fermentation of the sugar types that you probably didn't want fermented along with the fermentation of your priming sugar might produce enough CO2 to over pressurize your bottles and explode them or give you seething volcanoes when opened.

I have had the seething volcanoes. Haven't ever exploded one yet. Though others have.

If you were going to keg it, it wouldn't matter as much as you can control the keg pressure and they are built to stand the higher pressures than are your bottles.

I am planning to take a reading later today. Being this is only my third batch, there certainly is a chance of contamination, but I am diligent in my cleaning and sterilization. If the gravity seems stable, I am going to bottle and hope for the best.

 

[Jag75]

Aside from good cleaning and fermentation temp control , having patience is dang near as important imo. I personally would leave beer in the fv for 3 weeks when bottling. You want the yeast to have time doing its clean up , and you will have way less sediment in the bottles . Even when I keg I leave the beer sit for 3 weeks in the fv.

 

[Tony B]

Aside from good cleaning and fermentation temp control , having patience is dang near as important imo. I personally would leave beer in the fv for 3 weeks when bottling. You want the yeast to have time doing its clean up , and you will have way less sediment in the bottles . Even when I keg I leave the beer sit for 3 weeks in the fv.

Makes sense. I’m still pretty anxious to make it through to drinking my beer. Hopefully in the future, when I have some batches under my belt, more than one FV and a kegging system, I will find the patience to let them ride the storm out. For now, I’m going about 2 weeks. This one will be 12 days, assuming the SG is stable tonight.

 

[hotbeer]

Usually you'll find that FG is reached by 3 to 4 days after pitch. But still, many of us wait a full 2 weeks or more to let the beer clear up on it's own. If you put clean beer in your bottles, there'll be less sediment to mess up the clear and clean beer you want to pour into the glass.

I've waited 6 weeks for some to clear. Those still are among the beers I liked the best for taste. For beers I've rushed, it seems to be 50/50 whether I really think well of them.

 

[redrocker652002]

Having finally done a repitch of yeast I harvested from a previous batch, I experienced much the same as you did. It took off within 6 hours and was ripping thru the wort and then seemed to stop after about 2 or 3 days. I kept it in the fermenting bucket for another week and a half I think. Added my dry hops and bottled after 3 or 4 days. Left the bottles in a closet for a week, took out one bottle and fridge it. Tasted good, but had a bit of a strong bitter ending. I left the rest of the bottles in the closet, and took two or three out about a week later. Tasted much better. As someone said, patience is almost as important as the rest of the process. And believe me, patience is not one of my fortunes. LOL. I wait at least a week and a half to two weeks before I dry hop and time it to have my bottling day 3 to 4 days after dry hop. So far, so good and it has worked out ok for me. Good luck and enjoy the process.

 

[Tony B]

I took a gravity reading and it was stable at 1.004. So I went ahead and bottled. I stuck with my procedure of adding a measured amount of table sugar to each bottle and bottling straight from the FV. I only got 12-12oz bottles and 7-22oz bottles for a total of about 2.3 gallons before I started to see small bits of the yeast running through the bottling wand. The yeast cake was probably 1.5” thick.
We tasted it again from the hydrometer jar and my GF said this is her favorite batch yet.

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[hotbeer]

I took a gravity reading and it was stable at 1.004. So I went ahead and bottled. I stuck with my procedure of adding a measured amount of table sugar to each bottle and bottling straight from the FV. I only got 12-12oz bottles and 7-22oz bottles for a total of about 2.3 gallons before I started to see small bits of the yeast running through the bottling wand. The yeast cake was probably 1.5” thick.
We tasted it again from the hydrometer jar and my GF said this is her favorite batch yet.

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I thought my dementia had finally fully manifested itself because of the déjà vu this post was giving me.

Then I realized you posted this in another thread yesterday, Priming question

 

[Tony B]

I thought my dementia had finally fully manifested itself because of the déjà vu this post was giving me.

Then I realized you posted this in another thread yesterday, Priming question

Haha. Yes.
I realized I had posted in the wrong thread after a long day and a few SNPA’s.

 

[redrocker652002]

I would have kept bottling depending on how much you had left. The yeast will settle to the bottom of the bottle and as long as you pour slowly you will be ok. I have had sediment in most every bottle I have done, but the beer is still good. Glad it worked out for you.