D-rest for dunkel (w/WY 2308)

[Nugent]

Hi all,

Have been fermenting a dunkel at 10c for five days and the gravity samples are indicating that the fermentation is slowing down. Time for a d-rest.

What temperature would you bring in up to? How fast would you do it?

Thanks.

 

[bottlenose]

I've usually used 55F (13C).

 

[osagedr]

I typically just take the fermenter out of my ferm chamber and set it on a counter--so room temperature.

Sometimes I will leave it in the ferm chamber and raise the temp to sixty-something.

Everything I've read says to go over 60. I can't see any harm in room temperature for the last few gravity points.

 

[bottlenose]

It all depends on how close you're trying to hit the traditional process.

I usually take to room temperature and then crash cool; as long as you're almost to FG before raising temperature, and have hit FG before crash cool, it should work. The problem is keeping the yeast active in a traditional lager fermentation, in which the yeast are expected to continue some fermentation while lagering. To get this to work, the diacetyl rest shouldn't be too high, and you also want a gradual cooling to lager temps.