Sediment 1 hour after brewing?

[edecambra]

hello all, this is my first post, and I am a green newbie.

I just finished brewing my second brew. It is a Hefeweizen. It has been about 1 hour after I put it in the fermenter and I see a thick layer of sediment at the bottom, about 1.5 to 2 inches thick. Here is my recipe:

6 lbs wheat DME
1 lb of malted barley
1 oz of hallertau hops
Weihenstephan Wyeast 3068

I steeped the grains for about 30 min. This was more for me to get a feel for partial grain brewing than anything else. After that I boiled all ingredients in 2 gallons of water for 60 min.

Should I be concerned? Is this from the dry malt extract?

Just curious, and Thanks everyone

 

[marubozo]

That's normal. As it cools more 'stuff' will settle to the bottom. Everything from hop particles, proteins, yeast, you name it. Nothing to be worried about. As the beer continues for the next week or so that layer of sediment should compact a bit, but you'll always have an inch or so of sediment at the bottom so no need to worry.

 

[statseeker]

It probably is from the extract. I had sediment at the bottom of my all grain brew too, just give it another day or 2 and the activity of the yeast will throw all that sediment up into the beer as it ferments. Then it will all settle back out.

 

[edecambra]

Wow, guys.

I have been reading this forum for about a week now, and I can safely say that The help provided by members of this forum surpass any other online forum I have ever been a member of.

Thanks guys, I had figured there wasn't much to worry about. I just didn't remember this from my first batch. So much to learn, and I can't wait to learn it all.

 

[marubozo]

That's what we're here for. It's not often you find a hobby where people are so passionate about it they stay up way past their bedtime just to help others who had similar questions as they did when they started.

 

[BeerJorge]

No need to be concerned...

 

[Revvy]

It's all good. Relax!

 

[edecambra]

Yeah, people helping me near midnight.... very awesome.

And of course the beer is fine. This morning I checked and no sediment. Actually I think all the sediment evacuated the fermenter and ended up all over the damn floor! I need to use a much large blow-off reservoir next time because this is a big slimy mess. But it is going better than my first batch, mess and all.

 

[dsteele1234]

im also on my first batch...its a red ale from a kit and my next beer is going to be a hefe so let me know how yours turns out

 

[edecambra]

Well so far, a bit under 24 hours, I have already put the air lock on, removing the blow off tube. The fermentation has slowed significantly. I live in south florida and cooling is a problem. Our house temp is set around 78-80 most of the day. From what I have read, that tends to speed up fermentation so I might be bottling pretty soon.

I will let you know how it comes out.

 

[marubozo]

Well so far, a bit under 24 hours, I have already put the air lock on, removing the blow off tube. The fermentation has slowed significantly. I live in south florida and cooling is a problem. Our house temp is set around 78-80 most of the day. From what I have read, that tends to speed up fermentation so I might be bottling pretty soon.

I will let you know how it comes out.

Be careful you don't confuse rapid fermentation with an overall quicker turnaround on the final product. In fact, just the opposite is true. At high temperatures the yest will produce a lot more esters and off-flavors and the best way to combat that is to let the beer sit in the fermenter longer than normal. More time means the yeast have more time to clean up after themselves and eliminate some of the unwanted flavors.

 

[edecambra]

Thanks for the advice. How long after there is a steady gravity reading for me before I bottle.

 

[ReverseApacheMaster]

Three days of steady readings is the norm, however you may choose to let the beer condition in the fermenter for additional weeks before bottling. For a wheat beer you may not want to wait that long.

 

[marubozo]

Thanks for the advice. How long after there is a steady gravity reading for me before I bottle.

Basically, the steady hydrometer reading test is just to make sure it's safe to bottle without risking bottle bombs. It really has little to do with whether or not the beer is ready to go into bottles.

The beer may be done fermenting and hit final gravity in 48 hours, but IMO the absolute minimum time the beer should spend in the fermenter is 10-14 days, and that's for lower gravity beers fermented at the proper temps. Wheat beers tend to be one of the few styles that can get by on the lower end of the time spectrum because they are best enjoyed young, but when you throw high fermentation temps into the mix even they could use an extra week.

I personally leave almost all of my beers in the bucket for about a month before even checking the gravity. It leaves very clean tasting and clear beer every time.

 

[Revvy]

Basically, the steady hydrometer reading test is just to make sure it's safe to bottle without risking bottle bombs. It really has little to do with whether or not the beer is ready to go into bottles.

The beer may be done fermenting and hit final gravity in 48 hours, but IMO the absolute minimum time the beer should spend in the fermenter is 10-14 days, and that's for lower gravity beers fermented at the proper temps. Wheat beers tend to be one of the few styles that can get by on the lower end of the time spectrum because they are best enjoyed young, but when you throw high fermentation temps into the mix even they could use an extra week.

I personally leave almost all of my beers in the bucket for about a month before even checking the gravity. It leaves very clean tasting and clear beer every time.

Same with me, a month minimum in primary for all my beers.

 

[edecambra]

Hey guys, I just posted this in another thread, but I figured I'd ask here too:

At risk of seeming way too fresh, I am going to quote Charlie Papazian:

"The purpose of two-stage fermentation should be to isolate the beer from prolonged contact with an inordinate amount of inactive yeast cells. For the homebrewer, this is a matter of concern only if you plan to ferment your beer over 2 or 3 weeks, because after this period of time the spent yeast will begin to break down and may impart a degree of off flavors to your beer. But remember: there is really no advantage in keeping your beer sitting around for over 3 weeks unless you are brewing at cold temperatures and with quality lager yeast."-Charlie Papazian-

sorry for the long quote. I am new at this and I have a thread where I am getting these suggestions to let it sit in the primary fermenter for 3 weeks to a month. I am not arguing with more experienced brewers, but I am getting mixed signals.

 

[Revvy]

Hey guys, I just posted this in another thread, but I figured I'd ask here too:

At risk of seeming way too fresh, I am going to quote Charlie Papazian:

"The purpose of two-stage fermentation should be to isolate the beer from prolonged contact with an inordinate amount of inactive yeast cells. For the homebrewer, this is a matter of concern only if you plan to ferment your beer over 2 or 3 weeks, because after this period of time the spent yeast will begin to break down and may impart a degree of off flavors to your beer. But remember: there is really no advantage in keeping your beer sitting around for over 3 weeks unless you are brewing at cold temperatures and with quality lager yeast."-Charlie Papazian-

sorry for the long quote. I am new at this and I have a thread where I am getting these suggestions to let it sit in the primary fermenter for 3 weeks to a month. I am not arguing with more experienced brewers, but I am getting mixed signals.

That book, as good as the basic info is, is 30 years old don't forget. There has been a lot of change in the homebrewing community, especially over the last few years.

There's been a big shift in brewing consciousness in the last few years where many of us believe that yeast is a good thing, and besides just fermenting the beer, that they are fastidious creatures who go back and clean up any by products created by themselves during fermentation, which may lead to off flavors.

Rather than the yeast being the cause of off flavors, it is now looked at by many of us, that they will if left alone actually remove those off flavors, and make for clearer and cleaner tasting beers.

You'll fine that a great many folks, maybe even the majority on here these days, leave their beers in primart for 3-4 weeks, skipping secondary.

Even John Palmer talks about this in How To Bew;

Leaving an ale beer in the primary fermentor for a total of 2-3 weeks (instead of just the one week most canned kits recommend), will provide time for the conditioning reactions and improve the beer. This extra time will also let more sediment settle out before bottling, resulting in a clearer beer and easier pouring. And, three weeks in the primary fermentor is usually not enough time for off-flavors to occur.

John Palmer

As a final note on this subject, I should mention that by brewing with healthy yeast in a well-prepared wort, many experienced brewers, myself included, have been able to leave a beer in the primary fermenter for several months without any evidence of autolysis.

People have left it as much as six months. Autolysis is a myth for homebrewers.

Even when Palmer is talking about it, he's talking about it in terms of LAGERS not ales. Most people get so freaked out about in reading Palmer, that they don't notice it is in the Lager chapter, nor do they notice the caveat at the end of the section that I posted above.

I still believe that POSSIBLY autolysis WAS a concern to homebrewers 20-30 years ago, when the yeast came in dry cakes, of dubious heritage and came across from where homebrewing was legalized in the hot cargo holds of ships and may have sat for months in terrible conditioned...In other words was unhealthy to begin with.

And therefore may have crapped out and made for nastiness, (and also was prone to stick fermentation as well.) and tales of it just continued to perpetuate over time, even though yeasts are much more healthy and fresh, and more is understood about them nowaday....people gravitate to the negative and fear and still perpetuate those worries...over and over and over....

But you have to realize that modern yeast is fresher and healthier than the old cakes that traveled halfway around the globe.

And I still maintain that as much as I like Palmer, he contributed to the hysteria.....I mean noone but me seems to notice that that section on the scary autolysis appears in the chapter on lagering. He is not talking about it with ales...or beers in general..just lagers..because flaws are more perceptable in lagers...since in essence most commercial lagers are tasteless...anything would stand out..

and I think most new brewers have crapped themselves at the mere thought long before the notice the closer to the section I mentioned earlier.

This is where the most up to date brewing wisdom and ideas can be found...In fact a lot of stuff has been started on here, and made it into byo or zymurgy or podcasts...in fact BYO DID a piece on no secondary/long primary, along with the BASIC BREWING PODCAST and even they said that there were no issues/harm with doing it and in some beers it did actually improve the flavor and clarity. And I believe that really WAS influenced by the discussion we have had for the last couple years on here.

Now many of us leave our beer in primary for a month. Been doing it for years. The rest of the HB community is starting to catch up. And that's why it appears that we're starting to see it in magazines now.

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

 

[monty3777]

I think the confusion lies in whether it's harmful to leave the beer in a primary for a month or a benefit. What Papazian said is that there is no advantage to leaving beer on the yeast for more than 3 weeks. What some folks on this forum seem to advocate is that your beer will be better if you leave it in a primary for a month "minimum." As far as I have found in my research it is an overstatement to suggest that your beer will be better if it is left in the primary on top of the yeast for over a month. It won't hurt anything - but there is no discernible advantage.

 

[Revvy]

It won't hurt anything - but there is no discernible advantage.

You can believe that if you want, while the rest of us who do it and believe it actually IMPROVES the quality of our beer, continue to medal in contests. Which to me is a pretty good judge that it has merit. Many of us have been doing it for 3 years or more, and are done debating whether or not it is a good thing. I was just steering the newb to more up to date info, not to beat what really is now a dead horse. We've heard that tired argument before, and as the Jamil thread goes to show, people like Palmer and Jamil are starting to agree with us.

*shrug*

 

[monty3777]

You can believe that if you want, while the rest of us who do it and believe it actually IMPROVES the quality of our beer, continue to medal in contests. Which to me is a pretty good judge that it has merit. Many of us have been doing it for 3 years or more, and are done debating whether or not it is a good thing. I was just steering the newb to more up to date info, not to beat what really is now a dead horse. We've heard that tired argument before, and as the Jamil thread goes to show, people like Palmer and Jamil are starting to agree with us.

*shrug*

This isn't a matter of faith. The fact is that after primary fermentation the yeast does reabsorb and reprocess diacetyl and acetaldehyde for a period of maybe 2 days to a week. After that is done the yeast becomes inactive. This is assuming proper fermentation temps (and I'm talking ales not lagers, though the same principles apply, but with different time factors). Thus, there is no benefit to leaving the beer on the yeast except that it gives the brewer more flexibility.

 

[edecambra]

I appreciate your help, and your post in both threads Revvy. Do you guys have anything to do during the day other than help new homebrewers, and debate with the veterans?

What I am trying to say is the help and advice is amazing.