Need advice- lack of activity in secondary

[gkeusch]

I usually don't use a secondary stage, but wanted to dry-hop a batch, so I left it in primary for 2 weeks (all activity had ceased) then put in secondary with some leaf hops. I use buckets, and there was several inches of head space above the beer. I guess I though there would be enough residual activity to push out the oxygen, but after two days the airlock "hat" hasn't even been pushed up. So now I'm sweating whether the beer is getting ruined because of it's exposure to the oxygen I trapped in with it?

Please advise...

 

[JohnnyO]

As long as you transferred gently, you shouldn't have introduced too much oxygen into your beer. You'll be fine.

 

[ApothecaryBrewing]

Like JohnnyO said, If you did a gentle transfer from one fermenter to the next, you should be fine. That would be something like siphoning to the bottom of the secondary fermenter so as to minimize all splashing and foaming of the beer.

If you just opened it up and poured it, your beer will taste like butt. You won't see any activity in secondary either. Fermentation is typically 90% done or 100% done at that point and you are only using it to get it off the trub to avoid off-flavors, help clear it out a bit more and add spices/hops.

I have never worried about oxidation in my beer and never have had a problem with it. That said, being careful goes a long way, but it would take more than siphoning your beer from one fermenter to the other to ruin it.

 

[Yooper]

I don't like the idea of using a bucket for a clearing vessel, but for the very short term it should be fine. I dryhop typically for 5-7 days, and then package. I think it should be ok for the amount of time for dryhopping. But next time, I'd either use a carboy, or dryhop in the primary, just to avoid the wide headspace of a bucket.

 

[gkeusch]

I don't like the idea of using a bucket for a clearing vessel, but for the very short term it should be fine. I dryhop typically for 5-7 days, and then package. I think it should be ok for the amount of time for dryhopping. But next time, I'd either use a carboy, or dryhop in the primary, just to avoid the wide headspace of a bucket.

Thanks for the response - if I dry hop in the primary, do I wait until fermentation has slowed to add the hops or just put them in from the start?

 

[HeadyKilowatt]

If you dry-hop in primary, just toss your hops in 5-7 days before you plan to bottle.