Kegerator & Fermentation

[john_nz]

So I'm just getting into home brewing and have just ordered a 2 tap kegerator and 3x corney kegs.

Ive seen a few videos and read a few sites about the secondary fermentation process which is really aimed at experienced home brewers.

So my questions are
after the primary fermentation process has finished what is the next step?

is a 2nd fermentation process required?
does it have to be hooked to co2 continuously or just purged?

 

[Sadu]

Welcome. You gonna love this hobby. Once primary fermentation is done most people leave the beer a few days to clean up a bit. Generally 2 weeks in primary fermentor is good. Then you want to siphon from primary into the keg. Read up on how to purge the keg of oxygen first.
Then you want to carbonate the beer. Read up on force carbonation, pretty easy once the beer is in the keg.

Looks like you are in New Zealand, me too, send me a PM if you want to give me a call and I can run you through any questions. Cheers.

 

[NSMikeD]

If you want to prime your beer and naturally carbonate, then yes, purge the air leaving a blanket of CO2 in the headspace and let mother nature to do her thing.

With two taps, you'll be able to use that second airline to force carbonate over a week or two under serving pressure (about 12psi give or take, depending on the style). Purge the O2 and then leave it on serving pressure and over the course a number of days, the beer will achieve equilibrium.

If you can't wait, there are a number of techniques where you initially use higher pressure, say 20-30 psi, to accelerate the carbonation and then dial down when the carbonation achieves serving pressure. This is common but it risks over-carbonation.

Your third keg will require a little more thought if it can't be stored in the kegerator and hooked up to CO2.

Secondary fermentation is really about conditioning the beer. After the yeast converts the sugars to alcohol, it the starts "cleaning up" the beer. Very simply, the yeast works on off-flavor chemicals in produced initially and removes them improving the flavor. Since beer transferred into a keg is separated from the trub, time is on your side since you don't risk any off flavors from extended exposure to the trub. This is fortunate for high ABV and lager beers which benefit from extended conditioning (aging).

Just as in the primary phase of fermentation, temperature control is important during the aging process in a keg

 

[seabrew8]

So I'm just getting into home brewing and have just ordered a 2 tap kegerator and 3x corney kegs.

Ive seen a few videos and read a few sites about the secondary fermentation process which is really aimed at experienced home brewers.

So my questions are
after the primary fermentation process has finished what is the next step?

is a 2nd fermentation process required?
does it have to be hooked to co2 continuously or just purged?

How big is you Co2 tank? I really don't understand your secondary fermentation frankly. Are you referring to putting the beer in another container?

 

[TheHopfather]

Secondary fermentation is a term that gets tossed into beer kit instructions and stuck in newbie's heads, but it is really not something that you need to worry about. If you really want to do a secondary you should think in terms of vessels, not fermentations.

Brew your beer, put it in a fermentor with yeast. The yeast will do its thing and ferment the beer, this is the primary fermentation (and 99% of the time, the only fermentation). You can also think of this fermentor as the "primary fermentor/vessel". Common instructions from kits and forums would have you rack the beer into a "secondary fermentor/vessel" once the beer is done fermenting. The idea was to get the beer off of the yeast cake to help prevent off flavors, and that the beer would clear up quicker in the "secondary". Keep in mind that fermentation is done, there is no secondary fermentation happening here, just aging in another vessel.

Nowadays more and more people are starting to skip the secondary altogether. Let the beer ferment and age in the primary, don't touch it until it is going into kegs or bottles. This is the way that I, and many others do it.

It sounds like you have kegs. So what I would recommend is this;

1. Brew the beer
2. Ferment the beer (should take 4 to 7 days most likely)
3. Let the beer age in the primary fermentor (give it another week)
4. When done, rack the beer into a keg
5. Seal the keg, purge the head space with CO2
6. Put in fridge hooked up to CO2 at serving pressure (10 to 12 psi)

Your beer will age and carbonate at the same time. If you set the CO2 to serving pressure you'll have carbonated, drinkable beer in about 2 weeks. You can speed that up, but that is another question.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

Ferment and clean up/condition in the primary unless you plan to do an extended aging (like a big stout or something).

My fermentations are pretty much complete in about 4 days, I raise the temp and give it another 5 days (this is where I dry hop if not going for a NEIPA haze). Then cold crash, transfer to the keg where you can carb and serve.

As noted above, purge the keg of O2. Lots of great info on the process. Also, I use a CO2 forced transfer from ferm to keg with my big mouth fermentor. For NEIPA's it pretty much eliminates any exposure to O2.

 

[john_nz]

Thanks for all the replies

So it would make sense to have a 2nd fridge in the garage to carbonated the kegs, then move to the kegerator when ready?
Rotate around kegs around.

 

[NSMikeD]

Thanks for all the replies

So it would make sense to have a 2nd fridge in the garage to carbonated the kegs, then move to the kegerator when ready?
Rotate around kegs around.

In a nutshell. yes. Let's just focus on ales for now (lagers require colder fermentations). Temperature control can get pretty complicated so let's stick to a basic assumption that most ales should ferment and condition at slightly below room temperature (mid to low 60'sF) to maximize the yeast producing desired flavors.

Since you have three kegs and your kegerator can only hold two (at serving temperature) a second fridge with another CO2 tank and regulator would be great. You can also put your fermentor in this fridge since the fermentor and the keg most often will require holding at the same temperature. You may need an inexpensive temperature controller if the fridge is too cold. This fridge is your fermentation chamber in homebrew talk.