Rack to secondary too early?

[franklinswheat]

My batch of agave wheat took abou 4 days before noticeable fermentation began.. after about 3 days it had stopped.. i let it hang out for another 5 days or so and racked into my secondary. After a few days in the secondary the airlock is raised and tilted and if i apply even a small amount of pressure to the top of my bucket the air-lock bubbles.. did i rack into the secondary too soon? my plan is to give it a few more days then check the gravity. Does it sound like i went to secondary too soon?

 

[Teromous]

No, it's not too soon. You could have waited another week to get more clarity but it won't hurt the beer at all. The good thing about a wheat beer is it's normally cloudy anyway. On a side note, adding pressure to the top of an air-tight bucket will cause bubbles in an airlock even if there is no activity

 

[pericles]

It sounds like the yeast in your primary settled before they had completely consumed all the fermantable sugars. That's not a big deal, but it does mean you'll have a slightly cloudier beer. Not a problem if you're doing a wheat - I wouldn't have put that in secondary at all!

Give it a little extra time, and shake the carboy once or twice - CAREFULLY so as not to let in oxygen - to make sure the yeast is REALLY done before you bottle or keg.

 

[Revvy]

Yes you raacked too soon, hence renewed fermentation activity/co2 pressure in there.

Where fermentation is concerned, If you arbitrarily move your beer, like to follow the silly 1-2-3 rule, you will often interrupt fermentation. Because sometimes the yeast won't even begin to ferment your beer until 72 hours after yeast pitch, so if you rush the beer off the yeast on day 7 then you are only allowing the yeast a few days to work.

This often leads to stuck fermentation because you have removed the beer from the very stuff you need to ferment your beer. The yeast....It can often lead to the same off flavors one gets if they undrpitch their yeast.

Besides, fermenting the beer is just a part of what the yeast do. If you leave the beer alone, they will go back and clean up the byproducts of fermentation that often lead to off flavors. That's why many brewers skip secondary and leave our beers alone in primary for a month. It leaves plenty of time for the yeast to ferment, clean up after themselves and then fall out, leveing our beers crystal clear, with a tight yeast cake.

That is why more and more folks are skipping a secondary and leaving the beer in primary for a month, or if we do opt to use a secondary, then to leave the beer alone til fermentation is complete, and even a few days longer (I usually wait til day 14 if I am secondarying).

If you wait 14 days, or confirm fermetnation is complete with you hydrometer, because fermentation should be complete before you rack it to secondary. No fermentation should be happening at that time.

Fermentation time for any beer is not set in stone, a beer is finished when the GRAVITY is stable for 3 consequtive days. An airlock is a valve, a vent to release excess Co2 and keep beer off the ceiling. It is not a magic fermentation gauge. It only bubbles when it needs to release co2, but that doesn't mean that if it isn't bubbling fermentation is finished, the yeast are still often working, but not producing a ton of EXCESS co2. Or that if it's bubbling fermentation is still going on, there could simply be a temp shift or a change int atmosphereic pressure causing it to bubble.

The most important tool you can use is a hydrometer. It's the only way you will truly know when your beer is ready...airlock bubbles and other things are faulty.

The only way to truly know what is going on in your fermenter is with your hydrometer. Like I said here in my blog, which I encourage you to read, Think evaluation before action you sure as HELL wouldn't want a doctor to start cutting on you unless he used the proper diagnostic instuments like x-rays first, right? You wouldn't want him to just take a look in your eyes briefly and say "I'm cutting into your chest first thing in the morning." You would want them to use the right diagnostic tools before the slice and dice, right? You'd cry malpractice, I would hope, if they didn't say they were sending you for an MRI and other things before going in....

Thinking about "doing anything" without taking a hydrometer reading is tantamount to the doctor deciding to cut you open without running any diagnostic tests....Taking one look at you and saying, "Yeah I'm going in." You would really want the doctor to use all means to properly diagnose what's going on?

even if we do secondary, (which is rare) we DO wait for fermentation to finish, and let the yeast do some preliminary clearing while there is a lot of those littel buggers still working.

Here's some reading for you.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/second-ferm-racking-128440/#post1438252

And the discussion here, https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/multiple-questions-about-secondary-fermentation-140978/#post1601829

But more importantly this discusses the fact that many folks including jamil and palmer have backed off from that yeast phobia and are embracing long primaries and prolonged yeast contact.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/secondary-not-john-palmer-jamil-zainasheff-weigh-176837/

And you'll find that more and more recipes these days do not advocate moving after 5-7 days (which if you arbitrarily move your beer without a hydrometer reading may only mean 1-2 days of actual fermentation, not LAG TIME which is pretty common. Counting airlock bubbles is idiotic to say the least.) Now more and more recipes even in BYO advocate a minimum of 2 weeks in primary, but nowadays are even says skip secondary leave in primary for 3-4 weeks then bottle.

So slow down, this isn't a race...and you're not in charge, the yeast are. Let them tell you when to move them.

 

[franklinswheat]

thanks... what should i do now?

 

[Yooper]

thanks... what should i do now?

Check the SG. If it's in a good FG range, it's fine. Check it again in three days, and if it's the same you can bottle if you want.

I don't think you racked to early- it was in the primary, what? 12 days? Of course, I'm a big believer in taking SG readings. If you took an SG reading before transferring, you'd know for sure if it was too early or not.

 

[Revvy]

Step away from the beer and let the yeast do what they need to do. Give it a couple weeks and you'll be fine.

Just learn for next time...read the stuff linked.

 

[OzarkPA]

Revvy - that blog link was busted! Do you use a sterilized beaker to take your readings off of and then discard?

 

[Revvy]

Fixed the link https://www.homebrewtalk.com/blogs/revvy/144-think-evaluation-before-action.html

from a kitchen ware store and it is awesome. But the plastic one from any grocery store works fine.

And

Here's what I do....

1) With a spray bottle filled with starsan I spray the lid of my bucket, or the mouth of the carboy, including the bung. Then I spray my turkey baster inside and out with sanitize (or dunking it in a container of sanitizer).

2) Open fermenter.

3) Draw Sample

4) fill sample jar (usualy 2-3 turky baster draws

5)Spray bung or lid with sanitizer again

6) Close lid or bung

6) take reading

It is less than 30 seconds from the time the lid is removed until it is closed again.

 

[OzarkPA]

Thanks Revvy - Do you spray the lid every time you take a reading? After taking the reading do you toss the sample or add it back to the bucket? It sounds like the starsan will last a while after it's mixed and doesn't expire like the idophor, correct?