First Batch

[SilentBrewer]

Me and my buddy have done quite a few batches of wine for the holidays and now have been working on our first batch of beer. It is a Winter Spice Amber Ale. Starting gravity was 1.042. My recipe says to rack it out of the primary at 1.020. We took 10 days in the primary to reach that (we are fermenting at a temperature of 18 'c so we know it will be a slower process which we are fine with. We racked it out at 1.019. The next day we check on it and it is extremely active in the carboy. I knew I would see activity in it but I was shocked to see this much activity.

Is this a little too much activity in the carboy? I cant wait till this batch is ready. I am gonna start another batch this weekend.

 

[Revelator]

I wouldnt worry about it - Chances are you infused some oxygen into the beer when you racked it and got things rolling again...which is a good thing

 

[mvcorliss]

18C is about 64F which is a good pitching temp for most ale yeast. Remember the fermentation is going to produce heat so you will be actually fermenting 2 or 3 degrees warmer. I would be a little concerned about it taking 10 days to only drop 20 gravity points. Was the wort cooled down enough and the temp of the yeast close to the wort temp when you pitched so it wasn't "shocked" and could get a good quick start? Did you aerate the wort really well before / after pitching the yeast? Did you pitch enough good healthy yeast? I think Revelator might be right about introducing more O2 and getting things going again.
BUT ... as long as it's going and still fermenting ya got nothing to worry about. Just somethings to think about and learn for the next batch. What's that one going to be?

 

[SilentBrewer]

Sorry for the slow response. We did chill it plenty. We let the wort sit for a whole before pitching to ensure proper cooling but now that you mention it, we didn't aerate right before pitching as we were headed out the door for a super bowl party. I was told not to aerate after pitching so I didn't. Just an update, a couple days after this video, it slowed right down and now there is no bubbles on top of my beer and it now seems to be beginning to clear.

Also another not, I am in Canada so it may drop in temp a degree or two over night and we have much longer nights. So it may be lower that 18 the majority of the time.