NEIPA secondary fermentor issue

[Craftsman76]

Anyone see this before? I have brewed a few juicy style NEIPA all were good and held their color even after 8 weeks in the keg. I only made some minor tweaks to recipe but this one turned on me, a day after transferring to secondary. I had a beautiful hazy yellow/orange color in primary and day 1 of secondary, but on day 2 it completely lost the yellow/orange and changed to amber almost light brown. I know oxidation can be an issue for this style, so I followed my typical oxygen precautions, a pressurized CO2 transfer from carboy to carboy. So I really don't think this this is oxidation. It turned in 24 hours so, any ideas on what happened. I haven't tasted it. Another bit of information, the hydrometer sample i took when transferring is still bright yellow/orange.

 

[thehaze]

Why do you still do secondary? I am asking, as I never used it in the last 60 batches and never felt like it would've helped anything. IPAs and especially NEIPAs will oxidize fast and will take damage, from too many transfers and O2 exposure.

Are you sure the beer didn't just drop a bit clearer? Hazy beers will always look brighter in colour than somewhat clearer ones. But if you do not think it's oxidation, then it's not. But I don't think it could be anything else, especially when it sounds like you know what you are doing and took precautions.

 

[Craftsman76]

I have read a lot lately, secondary is likely a waste of time for the typical home brewer. Just stuck in my old ways I guess and haven't pulled the trigger on dry hopping in primary.

The only possible way I can see oxidation is if I had contamination in my CO2 supply. It's a brand new tank. I purged the carboy, lines, etc and pressure transferred.

Hoping it is just clearing, thanks ...fingers crossed.

 

[deepbluegroove]

Next time skip the secondary. Then do you normal transfer process to the bottle or keg with as much oxygen avoidance.

 

[Iseneye]

Secondaries suck. Don't do it - particularly with NEIPA.

 

[Rodent]

how did you purge the carboy prior to transferring into it?

 

[Craftsman76]

Using a couple of racking wands thru the carboy cap (2 port plastic cappers). Harder to describe without pics, than actually do. Its a simple daisy chain setup. I run a slow stream of CO2 to the top of the primary in one side of the plastic capper. On the other side of the primary cap I have a racking cane that is inserted, but above the beer level. This is connected to the secondary fermenter thru one side of a plastic capper to a second racking wand inserted to bottom of the secondary carboy. The other side of the secondary fermenter cap just has a bubbler. Then after a slow purge of a few minutes, I just insert the racking wand in the primary below the beer the level......then pressure and gravity does the rest. In theory there should be zero oxygen contact.

 

[wepeeler]

It's absolutely oxidation, sorry. Primary everything that doesn't need to age ie stouts. I only use carboys for my winter stout that I brew in June/July.

That being said, and I'm hoping to not jinx myself here, but I don't do closed transfers, and I've never had an extreme case of darkening with my NEIPAs. I used to secondary as well (no longer), with an auto siphon - no darkening. I also transfer from my primary bucket to keg with an auto siphon and had beer in the keg for upwards of 6 weeks - no darkening. Are you using a lot of flaked oats? I've cut back considerably on my oat additions. Seems like others who use a lot of oats have had darkening issues.

 

[Craftsman76]

Haven't heard that.....not sure I would call it a lot of flaked oats. One of the tweaks I made to the recipe was to increase base malt, so flaked oats addition actually went down from 8%, to about 7%.

 

[Jag75]

What did you do different with this one ? Maybe a stupid question but maybe its your lighting in that area. I would think oxidation but your system looks solid. You will hear all kinds of different ways about 2ndary or not. Imo I rack after 7 days . Now I have a conical so it's a simple close valve and dump the ball. But people open their fermenter to dry hop , add oak chips , fruit ect... essentially its exposing your beer to the elements. Theres just ways to safe guard it better. I especially rack if I'm using a carboy or bucket because I dont want my beer sitting on the yeast and trub after too long. I dont want any odd flavors .

 

[beervoid]

Maybe you transferred later this time and there was no residual fermentation anymore to scrub any oxygen.
Also would be hard purge a carboy properly.
It takes alot of purge cycles for a pressurized (30psi) keg te be free of oxygen

 

[isomerization]

Did you use a different strain of yeast this time?

 

[Harry482]

I second the others to dropping the secondary. A secondary goes against all that a neipa is (fresh hop character and suspended stuff that would be lost moving to secondary).

 

[Craftsman76]

I am definitely ditching the secondary...thanks to everyones consistent feedback! I also have to admit i over reacted on the color change. Looked fine at transfer to keg....tapped the keg yesterday and it turned out fine.

 

[Bobby_M]

The only way to absolutely purge an empty vessel is to fill it with starsan and then push it out with CO2. There's just too much gas mixing when you start with air.

 

[Jag75]

The only way to absolutely purge an empty vessel is to fill it with starsan and then push it out with CO2. There's just too much gas mixing when you start with air.

How many 5 gallon kegs on avg will a 5# co2 tank last?

 

[Bobby_M]

How many 5 gallon kegs on avg will a 5# co2 tank last?

I have no idea. Running a homebrew shop with access to a rack of tanks doesnt lend itself to accurate data. I tend to use a 20lb tank for carbing and serving and a 5lb for utility purging.