First BIAB brews

[Walleyeman]

Hello gents, I have extract brewed for a while and never really had any issues. I recently stepped up to all grain brewing, BIAB method. I just brewed my first 2 BIAB brews. I used the formulas and hit pretty close to the 5.5 gal mark target. After finishing and the yeast has been pitched temp ranges around 68 to 72 I noticed that very quickly the fermentation began and fairly vigorous at the first 2 to 3 day mark and by the 4th day the fermentation seems to be very slow with the airlock hardly showing any activity. I know when the extract batches were fermenting it seems to be more active. Am I missing something or is this the trend with all grain brewing? Any help is appreciated. Thanks!!

 

[tntpilsner]

Welcome to the wonderful world of BIAB
I jumped onto BIAB after my first batch of extract, I couldn't help myself. I've done maybe 10 (?) or so batches and I think you'll find that it depends largely on the yeast and fermentation temp as much as anything.
Others will have more technical knowledge than I do at this point, but sometimes it seems my airlock dies down in one or two days, and sometimes it's still bubbling after 5 or more days - all with BIAB, just different styles and yeast (and sometimes different ferm temps).
And of course, as everyone says, to know when fermentation has ended you need to go by the SG reading more than the airlock activity. Good luck! And welcome again to BIAB - it's fun!

 

[Walleyeman]

Welcome to the wonderful world of BIAB
I jumped onto BIAB after my first batch of extract, I couldn't help myself. I've done maybe 10 (?) or so batches and I think you'll find that it depends largely on the yeast and fermentation temp as much as anything.
Others will have more technical knowledge than I do at this point, but sometimes it seems my airlock dies down in one or two days, and sometimes it's still bubbling after 5 or more days - all with BIAB, just different styles and yeast (and sometimes different ferm temps).
And of course, as everyone says, to know when fermentation has ended you need to go by the SG reading more than the airlock activity. Good luck! And welcome again to BIAB - it's fun!

Thanks, and I am not too concerned but just thought I would throw it out there. I was going to give it 10 to 14 days before checking the SG. I understand that fermentation can go on and look kind of like paint drying. Figured being only the first few days taking SG readings at this point would be a little anal! Thanks for the guidance!

 

[Soyben]

Sounds perfectly normal, most fermentation is done in the first 3 to 4 days.

 

[balrog]

What you describe is normal all the way.
I BIAB, and datalog my ferm temps and see the major activity exotherm day 2-3. I often ramp temp after that to encourage yeast to not drop out too fast, esp English yeasts. Then I leave another week for all the cleanup yeast will do.

 

[deadwolfbones]

Yeah, with most brews the bulk of fermentation is done by day 4 for me.

 

[Walleyeman]

Thanks gents, I will probably rack to secondary at 10 to 14 days to get it off the dead yeast but to let it clean up as well. Then set a couple weeks there and bottle after that.

 

[RM-MN]

The yeast isn't dead, just dormant and you are likely to do more harm than good to your beer by moving the beer. I sometimes bottle at day 10 but leaving the beer sit in primary longer lets a bit more yeast settle out. Carefully transferring the beer to the bottling bucket will leave most of the trub behind. Letting it sit in the bottling bucket for half an hour seems to let any trub you sucked up in racking to settle out again. I sometimes get more trub while trying to get that last half bottle out of the bottling bucket but it never seems to leave me with much trub when I'm ready to pour the beer.