Tertiary?

[danmdevries]

I've got a pretty big ipa, og 1.086. In primary I had a lot of trub fall out so I racked to secondary before it started to clear. Now at 3 weeks (26 days) in secondary with a steady fg 1.018 at 68deg.

But I've got a solid two inch cake in my carboy. The beer is fairly clear but I keep seeing bubbles come up from the cake, trailing yeast up into solution, keeping it slightly cloudier than I'd like. Also, I dry hopped twice and the second I tossed whole hops without a bag so they're floating in solution for about a week.

I'll be kegging this one so I'd rather not transfer yeast or hops particles and I don't have filtration abilities. So I was considering racking to tertiary and cold crashing to get the hops and a majority of the yeast out.

Should I do that or just cold crash the current vessel?

 

[samc]

Cold Crash. I would have just left it i primary and cold crashed from that vessel, but from the secondary its fine.

 

[GySgtLynn]

Had to look up Tertiary... Because I'm retarded

 

[day_trippr]

Had to look up Tertiary... Because I'm retarded

 

[danmdevries]

Cold Crash. I would have just left it i primary and cold crashed from that vessel, but from the secondary its fine.

I had two batches with strange flavors after leaving them on the trub in primary for the full course. YMMV

Almost all of mine get secondaried except for the really dark porters/stouts where I don't care about clarity and they're quite forgiving on flavors. Usually I wait until there's a thick trub/yeast cake 2" then rack and end with only a trace 1/2" ring at the low spot in the carboy.

This particular beer used a TON of hops. IIRC (don't have notes handy) 5.5oz whole hops. I boiled without a bag, scooped what I could from the boilpot during cooling and ended up with a TON of crap at the bottom in primary so I pulled the beer off a little earlier than normal due to two batches with a "old dusty flavor" that I (maybe incorrectly?) attributed to full fermentation in primary. I haven't had any issues since I started racking all to secondary for clarification. I rack off the trub/yeast when the top 6" or so is clearing and let it sit for 2-4 weeks then keg/bottle.

I've never crash cooled before so maybe that's a more appropriate question. Will the crash cooling stop the yeast coated air bubbles? Or should I let it sit a while longer until they stop? I'm still seeing some yeasty cloudiness in solution.

 

[samc]

If it is CO2 coming out of solution, then adding cold will stop that process. As long as you reached FG, then chill away.

 

[solbes]

I'm assuming you would just cold crash now, or in a week or so. I wouldn't bother too much with a tertiary. That's a lot of racking.

 

[eastoak]

I'm assuming you would just cold crash now, or in a week or so. I wouldn't bother too much with a tertiary. That's a lot of racking.

exactly. secondaries and beyond do nothing that a long primary does not do but if it gives peace of mind then it's worth it.