White labs English cider WL775 fermentation temp

[globell]

New to brewing but of all the ciders I have going m, I tend to favour about 62-66F for temp of cider during fermentation.

This yeast states 68-75 as optimal.

Anyone used lower temps and have any off flavours or negative/positive experiences.

Using fresh pressed juice want to get this right.

At 62 it stopped fermenting or slowed down to almost nothing and at 64 it's started again but slowing once again.

*edit* It's fermented down from 1.05 to 1.015 in 5 days!! Guess that's why it's slowed down.

Thanks

 

[madscientist451]

I've used it the last few years, makes a nice dry cider. You can re-pitch many times. I run it 55-60 and it finishes in a month or so.

 

[globell]

Ok. Great. Thanks. I feel 5 days is pretty fast!

Thinking id like to keep it at 1.01. Have you done this in the past? I normally let it dry out.

 

[Scrumpy!]

I used this yeast last year on several batches and liked the results. I kicked each batch off at about 65 deg then immediately moved it to a cellar at 45 deg to slow it down. About 3 months later it had worked its way down to 1.015 from 1.060. Very satisfying result with full flavor.

 

[globell]

Awesome. Thanks for that! I racked it last night and it is now at 1.004.
Now to make a choice on what to do

 

[Scrumpy!]

It will go all the way to 1.000 or even a little lower so you are on track to have a dry cider. At this point, you could prime it, add enough sulfite to protect it and bottle it. In general, the addition of 4.2 g/l corn sugar will give you 1 vol of CO2 plus whatever you already have in solution and the additional CO2 you can expect from continued fermentation of the final 4 points. Anything more than 2.5 vol requires bottles that are stronger than beer bottles so be careful.

If you want it to be a little sweeter, there are other things you could do but they are a little tricky. This forum and others have many posts on various strategies to solve this problem when you have reached a FG this low. I have had good results using modest amounts of Splenda. If you get too carried away with it, you can pick up an after taste so if you try this, do some tests before you bottle to determine how much you can use and still not detect an after taste. There are other non-fermentable sweeteners like xylitol that might work better but I haven't tried them. Regardless of the artificial sweetener you use, pay close attention to your priming sugar so you don't make any bottle bombs.

Best of luck

 

[globell]

It will go all the way to 1.000 or even a little lower so you are on track to have a dry cider. At this point, you could prime it, add enough sulfite to protect it and bottle it. In general, the addition of 4.2 g/l corn sugar will give you 1 vol of CO2 plus whatever you already have in solution and the additional CO2 you can expect from continued fermentation of the final 4 points. Anything more than 2.5 vol requires bottles that are stronger than beer bottles so be careful.


Thanks. I think that this is what I'm going to do. is that 4.2g per litre?

 

[Scrumpy!]

You are at a critical point in your process. Good measurements are really important. You should be using a good hydrometer or at least one you have checked against distilled water and take all your measurements at the temperature your hydrometer is rated for (should be printed on hyrdrometer).

You should let your cider finish by going all the way to 1.000 or even lower if you started above 13 or 14 BRIX. You will need to add priming sugar to get it carbonated in the bottle. Eight grams per liter will take you to 2.5 atmospheres. Here is a graph that shows how long it takes to reach full carbonation if you start at SG=1.000 and add sulfite. This one flat lined at just over two atmospheres after 45 days at a temperature of 70 deg F. It will take more or less time at lower or higher temperature respectively.