Few questions from a noob

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jining

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Hello! So my friend and I just started brewing not too long ago. We bought a homebrewing kit from a local homebrewery store, and we just happened to get another kit from a friend who didnt use his.. so we can make 2 or even 3 batches at a time basically.

Anyways, we have a light wheat ale in the secondary and tonight we just made up a clone of Rogue Deadguy Ale. I have a couple questions if you guys wouldnt mind helping us out :)

1) The recipe for the rogue clone says keep in primary @ 60F for 3-5 days then transfer to secondary until fermentation is complete. Im not sure what exactly that means, do I do as I did my previous batch and wait until no bubbles come out of the airlock before I transfer to secondary?

2) Then the recipe says to rack off trub and store secondary @40-50F. How does one do this? Is trub the bits of hops from using hop pellets or what exactly is it? I used whole hops in a hop bag so there arent hop bits floating around.

3) Last question and maybe the most important... we had a boil over (looked away for 1 second!!) and after dumping the wort in the primary I noticed the malt extract/rock sugar had burned a bit on the bottom... could this have ruined my beer by making it taste burnt? :(

Thank you for your advice!!
 
1: Your airlock is not an indication of fermentation. Buy a hydrometer, and learn how to use it properly.

2: Trub is that layer of gunk at the bottom of your fermentation vessel. You siphon the beer off of that into a second fermenter.

3: Ruined? No. Taste burnt? Very probably. Next time be sure to remove your kettle from the heat before adding extract, and stir thoroughly. Boil over wouldn't have caused this, but there are several easy things you can do to prevent further boil overs. You can have a fan blowing on the surface of your wort. You can keep a spray bottle filled with water handy, and spray it on the surface when it looks like a boil over might be coming. You can buy additives and add them to the wort that will help prevent boil overs.
 
1. Just wait till its done fermenting then transfer to your secondary.

2. Yes the trub is usually hop bits and and hot break you picked up from your syphon..

3. As long as you didnt scrape it off the bottom and add it into your primary then you will most likely be ok. Dead Guy is a stonger taste and will cover and burnt flavors if any that you picked up in your post boil wort.
 
Thanks for the replies, I do have a hydrometer and know how to use it. I should have mentioned that.

About the part where it says rack the trub, the reason why it is confusing is because the way the recipe reads, it seems to say to transfer to secondary until finished fermenting, and then rack off trub and store secondary for 2 weeks+ at 40-50f... meaning after fermentation is complete in the secondary I would have to rack my brew from my secondary into primary bucket, scrape off all the trub in the secondary and put it back in there to store for 2 weeks?? Lol... must be a mistake eh?

Should I just wait till fermentation completes in the primary (by verifying final gravity has stabilized), then rack to secondary and store at 40-50f for 2 weeks+?

Thanks again!
 
when racking to secondary you want to leave the crap(most of it anyway) thats in the bottom of the primary fermenter, the crap is called a trub. when to do the racking is the key, you want to have most of the fermentation complete but not all. your trying to get the beer of all the dead yeast cells and protiens that have already dropped out of solution but you dont want to wait so long as there is no fermentation going on. you need some residual fermentation to finish cleaning up your beer and to force oxygen out of the secondary vessel's headspace. i personally go for a 10-14 day primary before racking in winter and a 7-10 day in summer, temperature plays a big role in how fast a beer will ferment.
 
Thanks for the reply. I understand racking from the primary to the secondary to leave behind the trub. Its just that the recipe for the rogue says to rack to secondary after 3-5 days and leave it in there until fermentation completes, and then it says to rack the trub... Weird. Maybe its a mistake.

Ill just do what ive been doing. Primary for a week or so give or take, then rack to secondary for 2 weeks or so.

Thanks!
 
Thanks for the reply. I understand racking from the primary to the secondary to leave behind the trub. Its just that the recipe for the rogue says to rack to secondary after 3-5 days and leave it in there until fermentation completes, and then it says to rack the trub... Weird. Maybe its a mistake.

Ill just do what ive been doing. Primary for a week or so give or take, then rack to secondary for 2 weeks or so.

Thanks!

That sounds about right. No reason to rack to secondary and then rack it again.
 
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