Shaking of carboy and increase of co2!

[tdavisii]

My belgian which started out at around 1.078 or so that i brewed 8 days ago is still going like crazy. co2 every 2 seconds. A couple days ago i raised the temp from 65+/- to room temp. This increased the c02. Then yesterday it was starting to slow, but just a little c02 every 4-5 sec. or so. So.....i shook the carboy. This morning its back to C02 every 2 seconds again and the krausen is back up to the top. The question is. Is all this normal and should i have shaken the carboy????

 

[IrregularPulse]

From my understanding you do not want to shake the carboy after it's started fermenting and for surely not after it's done.
It looks as though you've resuspended the yeast and they are just going back to work with what they have left. Don't know what kind of effect you would have from shaking. I don't see how it could introduce oxygen unless you removed the airlock when shaking.

 

[Funkenjaeger]

Depends on what you're trying to achieve. Swirling the carboy to rouse flocculated yeast is a pretty normal procedure, but you generally do it when you have a slow/stuck fermentation, not just randomly. But, since you seem to be seeing increased fermentation activity again, I'd say it helped in this case.

 

[tdavisii]

I never tooked the airlock off cause i knew i didnt want any oxygen/infectious substances to get in. Also i dont think it was ever stuck really. Since it was still bubbling at the slowest every 5 seconds. Im still concerned that this damn thing has taken this long and is still going like friggin crazy.

 

[jds]

From what I've read (and my experiences with at least one belgian strain), they tend to take a while to ferment out. I wouldn't worry about it? Which yeast are you using? WLP400 is famously "slow" to finish.
Example 1
Example 2
I wouldn't be surprised to see other Belgian strains also take a while, especially with a gravity as high as your OG.

Also, there's no problems in rousing the yeast. It's one of the first steps in trying to fix a stuck ferment (which it does NOT sound like you have), common practice with really big beers, and not detrimental.

 

[tdavisii]

I am using wyeast 3922 belgian wit

 

[Bobby_M]

I did a wit that took 3 weeks to reach FG using WLP400.

 

[jds]

I am using wyeast 3922 belgian wit

Interesting. I'm not seeing that on Wyeast's site. Did you mean 3942, maybe?

If so, it's not the same strain (WLP400 is the Hoegaarden/celis strain), but may behave in the same way. Jamil Z has a nice cross reference for yeast strains on his site. Either way, it sounds like all is well with your yeasties.

 

[tdavisii]

my bad 3944. I was on my way to work and in a hurry when i wrote 3922