Help needed with accelerated schedule

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spiny_norman

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Hi gang,

My bad for poor planning, but I need to go from grain to glass in 4 weeks. I brewed last Saturday and it needs to be ready by Christmas day. Does this look sane?

- Ferment at 64 / 65 for 14 days
- Diacetyl rest at 68 for additional 2 days
- Cold crash to 32, add gelatin, leave for 5 days

After 3 weeks I have 1 week to force carb:

- transfer to keg and set at 34 degrees / 25 PSI for 3 days, then purge and set to serving pressure and temp (38 degrees / 10 PSI) for an additional 4 days = 4 weeks exactly. (This part I'm not too confident)

This is a fairly simple IPA with WLP001 and no dry hop. I usually do 3 weeks primary, then cold crash for a week and then keg and force carb using the set-and-forget method (which takes 10 days minimum before it's carbed enough to drink). So I'm trying to shave 2 weeks off my usual schedule without carbonic acid or over carbing (I'll be building a bleed valve to mitigate against the latter, hopefully).
 
I would ferment at 68-70 and cold crash 2-3 days after Ive reach FG which should take less than 14 days. At 70 F you should be done fermenting in less than 10 days if you use a starter and have an OG around 1.050.

I dont see any reason to ferment at 65, you wont get lot of ester at 70 with wlp001.

You could cut time on cold crashing too...
 
Looks fine to me. I'd probably go with Safale -04 just because it flocks so well and finishes really fast.
 
Did you use a starter? How the fermentation is going? You should raise the temp if possible. Don't worry it'll stay clean even at 72, especially if the fermentation already started.
 
Did you use a starter? How the fermentation is going? You should raise the temp if possible. Don't worry it'll stay clean even at 72, especially if the fermentation already started.

I recently stopped using the liquid least and starters for stock IPAs (so that I didn't have to plan my brew day days in advance). For this batch I pitched 1 x 11.5g packet of Safale US-05 (I didn't even hydrate) directly onto the wort once I got it down to 68. I under-pitched by about 10% according to Jamil's pitching rate calculator but it should still attenuate to about 80% from past experience.

Ambient temp of the ferm chamber is 65, and the stick-on temp gage on the carboy is showing 68 so I would guess that the wort is probably at around 70. (I have a thermowell, but I'm reluctant to go sticking things directly into the wort at this stage of fermentation).

I pitched Saturday evening and the lag time was about 16 hours.
 
I think you should be alright. The important thing is to let it finish fermentation, don't rush. If it takes more than 14 days you can always cut on cold crash time or force carb. Maybe the beer will be a little young but for an ipa it will be less noticeable. If you worry about the green taste, maybe you should think about dry hopping while cold crashing (secondary or primary) or even right in the keg if you plan to drink it all during xmas to cover it up a little. It's up to you
 
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