Did I transfer to early?

[pegcitybrewer]

I brewed a cream ale on the 30th using us-05 at 62 degrees. It had an og 1.048 and was still bubbling away every 15 seconds or so. I checked the gravity and it was at 1.008 which surprised me so I transfered it for cold conditioning. Should I have left it longer? How much lower could it go? 1.008 seems pretty dry.

 

[joshesmusica]

If you got the same reading a couple of days apart, it was probably finished.

 

[flars]

FG depends upon the recipe. Still bubbling after eight days, I would have left it in the primary for another week or two to see what developed. Either it wasn't done fermenting or an infection took over.

 

[christyle]

Why did you feel the need to transfer in the first place?

 

[joshesmusica]

Why did you feel the need to transfer in the first place?

That's actually a pretty good reason to use a secondary, long-term lagering. Now if he's only planning on a couple of weeks of cold conditioning, then I'd tend to agree with you. But if he's doing a few weeks or more at lager temps, it's advised to use a secondary.

 

[ss4ivan]

Airlock activity has nothing to do with the whether the beer is finished or not. Even after fermentation has finished, the beer will still off gas CO2 that is still in the solution. If you reached final gravity you were good to transfer/bottle/keg...whatever your preference may be.

 

[christyle]

That's actually a pretty good reason to use a secondary, long-term lagering. Now if he's only planning on a couple of weeks of cold conditioning, then I'd tend to agree with you. But if he's doing a few weeks or more at lager temps, it's advised to use a secondary.

us-05 isn't a lager yeast though. I only use secondary when I plan to store something for more than 2-3 months, or if I'm separating for fruit/additives. Just asking if there was another reason, because most of the time, it just isn't necessary. Either way, it should still keep fermenting away, the yeast that had floccd were tired out anyway. Good yeast is still in suspension.

 

[joshesmusica]

us-05 isn't a lager yeast though. I only use secondary when I plan to store something for more than 2-3 months, or if I'm separating for fruit/additives. Just asking if there was another reason, because most of the time, it just isn't necessary. Either way, it should still keep fermenting away, the yeast that had floccd were tired out anyway. Good yeast is still in suspension.

You do know that you can "lager" any beer right? The term simply means storage, though with beer, it's typically some type of cold-conditioning. Many people who are attempting to make hybrid lagers, aka lager-style beer made with ale yeast, will still lager their beer. A cream ale is basically that, an american light lager fermented with ale yeast.

If it's finished fermenting, it's not going to keep fermenting away. But if OP didn't quite reach FG, then I agree it will likely still reach it while in secondary.

 

[christyle]

You do know that you can "lager" any beer right? The term simply means storage, though with beer, it's typically some type of cold-conditioning. Many people who are attempting to make hybrid lagers, aka lager-style beer made with ale yeast, will still lager their beer. A cream ale is basically that, an american light lager fermented with ale yeast.

If it's finished fermenting, it's not going to keep fermenting away. But if OP didn't quite reach FG, then I agree it will likely still reach it while in secondary.

Understood, but what I was getting at, and MANY people agree, is transferring for secondary is more often than not, unnecessary for home brewers. If FG had indeed not be reached, he should still be fine though, so whatever worries he had about transferring too early are somewhat moot.

 

[pegcitybrewer]

wow thanks for all the responses. I normally don't really get any haha. to answer why I transferred in the first place I actually needed my primary for another batch and I thought it might help clean it up a bit, I'm not quite lagering, just letting it sit at 48 for 2 or 3 weeks. I don't usually use a secondary for any of my beers unless I need to free up my pail for another brew like right now. Thanks again. hopefully its not an infection, and if it wasn't finished at 1.008 I'm not concerned, how much lower could it have gone? a point or two maybe?