Newbie Brewing Questions

[Longtrain4]

I am fairly new to brewing, but, have a lot of wine making experience. I recently made back to back recipes of a Midwest Hop Cult and Flat Tire IPA's. Primaries sent well and both are at about 1.012 for a number of days. Primary was done in buckets with lids under airlocks. They were racked to secondary 5 gallon Better Bottle type carboys with airlocks. There is several inches of headspace in each carboy and am concerned that w/o any further fermentation, I could have issues as they age.

The Hop Cult needs to be dry hopped for one week after a 3 week aging period, the Flat Tire may be bottled as soon as it clears. Any issues with headspace and aging? The beer should clear prior to bottling, right?

Thanks for any direction, its appreciated.

Tony

 

[unionrdr]

I don't secondary to dry hop anymore. And an IPA shouldn't be aged. Just get it to finish fermenting & drop clear or slightly misty before dry hopping for a week. IPA's should be as fresh as possible after dry hop,carb & conditioning.

 

[DuckiesRevenge]

So a couple of things that I'm seeing. First, you will probably want to let primary go longer next time (this is off of an assumption that you racked probably a week after pitching, which i could be wrong about). You will want to give the yeast more time to so their thing. I recommend 3 weeks*. Which it's highly dependent on the beer but that's what i do.

When I rack to secondary I get a good amount of headspace often. If I'm only leaving it in there for less than a month I will let it be. Shake it up to get co2 in there but that's it. Otherwise if I let it age longer than a month I will try to keep the headspace to a minimum or keg it and let it age in that.

 

[Longtrain4]

Thanks, I shook them a bit and got some action in the airlock. I'll let them clear a bit and then rack to a bottling bucket, prime and bottle. I'll dry hop the Hop Cult about a week before I bottle.

 

[3PegBrew]

Shaking your secondary and getting air bubbles isn't "action." all you are doing is releasing gas trapped in the liquid. Once you go to another container and remove the beer off of the yeast cake, your beer is done like dinner. The purpose of the secondary, if you use a secondary, is to allow clarification prior to bottling or kegging. The thing is, you can accomplish all of the above by keeping it in the primary container. Just remember, after you dry hop, the longer you wait and age, the more your hops touch fades away.

 

[Yooper]

Thanks, I shook them a bit and got some action in the airlock. I'll let them clear a bit and then rack to a bottling bucket, prime and bottle. I'll dry hop the Hop Cult about a week before I bottle.

It's too late now, but for heaven's sake, don't do that anymore!

You just took the air in the carboy and mixed it up in your beer, so if you were worried about the headspace before you don't have to worry now as it's in the beer instead of protected by any c02 in the beer or in the headspace.

Anyway, bottle them sooner rather than later. The beer will go downhill from here.

 

[3PegBrew]

It's too late now, but for heaven's sake, don't do that anymore!

I think this can also translate into, "Beer brewing angels will cry."

 

[Roadie]

You did the right thing by making sure gravity was same over several days so fermentation was done. Try dry hopping in primary next time and once fermentation is done never shake the carboys.