Danstar BRY-97?

[tavas]

Should have followed Carnie's advice... pitched another pack of Saf Ale 05 on my batch on Friday to see if I could get it down from 1020 - hasn't budged an inch.

Followed this schedule with my Braumeister for it's first use:

5 mins @ 52c
60 mins @ 67c
10 mins @ 78

Going to have to test the temps of the BM next time I use it. I have 2 more brews cubed hope they don't suffer the same fate in not being fermentable.. will be using Saf Ale for these to see.

Just make sure you didn't end up with 52*c for 60 mins and 67*C for 10mins. I got mine around the wrong way (BM puts time first then temp) and ended up with a stout at 1.020.

 

[paulmclaren11]

Yeah I need to check a few variables next time (eg, owner programming error :huh:, BM temps are accurate).

Cheers.

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

Those who've seen long lag times, did you see airlock/blowoff activity during the lag? Ever take a hydro reading?

I've used this yeast four or five times and never seen more than a 24 hour lag. At about 45 hours now and still no visible sign. No blowoff activity either. It may have dropped a point, but it could be an off reading either on brew day or now.

Not too worried after reading this thread, but it's certainly a different experienced this time. The only difference to my normal procedure was a warmer rehydration - close to 35.

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

Just to give further wait to what was already a pretty established suggestion in this thread....this one can be slow.

12...24....40 hours. Nothing, no drop in grav or activity despite oxygenation and rehydration.
48 hours. No visible activity but a very healthy blow off tube.
52 hours. The lid looks like an nightclub toiletbowl at 3am on a Sunday morning.

While this matches up with other expereinces here, it doesn't match up with my previous experiences using this yeast. As much as one can at home, these brewed under similar conditions. The two variables to my mind are either the way it reacts to wort composition or factory variation in the yeast itself. This slow beer was a very turbid lambic base, whereas the fast starters were standard 'gateway' pales.

 

[MichaelM]

Mine started fermenting around 36 hrs after pitching and took a week to complete fermentation. OG was 1.045. Safale definitely gets the job done faster in my experience.

 

[billygoat]

Pitched one packet into 22L of 1.053 wort. Temperature set to 18C. This is a recipe I have made on 3 other occasions using US05.
After 24 hours there were bubbles forming on the top of the wort. After 36 hours there was a krausen of about 25mm thick.
After 48 hours the krausen was 75mm thick.
After 72 hours the krausen was around 125mm thick which seemed to be its peak.
After 5 days the gravity was 1.018.
Didn't pay much attention until day 9 and the gravity was 1.009. Set temperature to 1C for a week and kegged yesterday. Very clear going into the keg.
Compared to US05 - the BRY-97 starts slower, the krausen is much thicker than I have experienced with US05. With US05 I usually lift the temperature from 18C to 20C for the last 2 days of fermentation which usually knocks off a couple of gravity points, didn't need to do this with BRY-97.
When I have done this particular recipe with US05, it has attenuated to the same degree as it has this time, except all visible signs showed it started slower but got to FG a bit quicker with BRY-97.
Won't know what the taste is like for a week or so, will report back then.

 

[Spiesy]

Pitched one packet into 22L of 1.053 wort. Temperature set to 18C. This is a recipe I have made on 3 other occasions using US05.
Compared to US05 - the BRY-97 starts slower, the krausen is much thicker than I have experienced with US05. With US05 I usually lift the temperature from 18C to 20C for the last 2 days of fermentation which usually knocks off a couple of gravity points, didn't need to do this with BRY-97.

To be fair you should have hydrated and pitched 2 x packs of BRY-97 for that brew, as per the manufacturers recommendations.

 

[billygoat]

To be fair you should have hydrated and pitched 2 x packs of BRY-97 for that brew, as per the manufacturers recommendations.

Thats right, and I also should do the same with the US05. With the recipe that I used, I have only pitched 1 packet of rehydrated US05 previously and the results have been good. There were two reasons I only used one pack of BRY-97. One reason was to do a comparison with US05 and the other reason was I only had one pack of BRY-97.

 

[Bribie G]

I'm currently fermenting with BRY-97 for the first time, it's a double brew so I used two packs rehydrated.
It kicked off within 24 hours but after a week at 17 degrees there was still a huge frothy krausen. I raised the temp to 20 for the last few days, krausen still there on day 10.

I've found that before with Chico yeasts, they often seem to behave as a true old school top cropper and rise to the top during fermentation. I note that when I swirl the current brew by rocking the FV, you can see "yeast soup" vortexing down from the top of the liquid and re-mixing with the body of the brew.

When the brew has finally attenuated I find that with these yeasts a good strategy is to CC at -1 degrees for three or four days, and the head finally vanishes.

 

[Ross]

Should have followed Carnie's advice... pitched another pack of Saf Ale 05 on my batch on Friday to see if I could get it down from 1020 - hasn't budged an inch.

Followed this schedule with my Braumeister for it's first use:

5 mins @ 52c
60 mins @ 67c
10 mins @ 78

Going to have to test the temps of the BM next time I use it. I have 2 more brews cubed hope they don't suffer the same fate in not being fermentable.. will be using Saf Ale for these to see.

67C is not going to give you that fermentable a wort - try dropping to 65c.


Cheers Ross

 

[paulmclaren11]

Thanks Ross.

I have brewed most of my pales at 66-67c and never had an issue with attenuation (this is when I was BIABing).

As I said this was the first time using my Braumeister and perhaps my candy thermo isn't as accurate as I once thought when I was BIABing so I will drop the mash temp for sure as you suggest.

I have a couple more packets of this yeast so will pitch 1g/ltr as suggested and give it another shot.

The beer is kegged and carbing as we speak - it has actually turned out to be a nice hoppy full bodied mid strength APA so no real complaints about the yeast (more brewers error!).

 

[Bribie G]

I just pitched two sachets into a double batch of American Cream Ale, and of course I rehydrated in tepid water (as posted by Warra48, pitching dry into wort will waste around half of your purchase due to cell wall rupture when rehydrated in a sugary solution).

Sitting on 17.

And fifteen days later:



No finings, only about 4 days cc. Third day in keg.

This is definitely one of the best Cream Ale / Blonde ales I've ever done, clean, low IBUs but the hops just stay with you during the finish. This is almost as good as my best lagers, if they had euro hops. (I used a wee touch of Chinook).

And..... it's a partial

I'm definitely sold on this yeast, it reminds me very much of those fast clean Wyeasts like San Diego Superyeast or Pacman.

 

[carniebrew]

I'm finding similar with BRY-97, an APA and IPA I did with this yeast, neither which I crash chilled, are both tasting a little yeasty, like I haven't left the last 10ml or so in the bottom of the bottle...and this is after a good couple of months in the bottle too. I've never had this with US-05. If I use BRY-97 again (I think I have 1 left) I'll crash chill to see if it helps.

Sorry to quote myself, but I wanted to follow up on this. I bottled my IPA done with BRY-97 on Nov 3 (no crash chill), and was saying in late Dec that it was still a bit yeasty. Well I drank the last dozen or so of this batch while on holidays the last couple of weeks (with some help), and noticed the yeasty taste was completely gone. So it may have just taken a good few months for it to fully drop out in the bottle. Or perhaps it just took a while for my IPA to come good....or both?

As I said though I'll crash chill from now on with this yeast, hopefully that'll help it come good more quickly.

 

[jyo]

To update on mine-

The first keg cube (fermented at 19-20') is still tasting yeasty and generally very disappointing.
The second cube (fermented at 17') is tasting great. I haven't really noticed any difference in flocculation when comparing this to US05.
I will give it another run at 16-17' and see how I go as this temp seems to be a sweet spot.

 

[Bribie G]

CB, I've found that crash chill is handy with a lot of these "chico" yeasts. That's tied in with why I stopped using US-05 in frustration and tried a full gamut of family members such as Wyeast 1056 and so on, but (like the BRY-97) at the end of primary they all seem to have this characteristic of hanging around like a bad smell, particularly US-05, with a scummy little head that won't go away.

The BRY kept throwing up a big spongy head after daily swirling (after about the fifth day). In some ways it acts not unlike an old fashioned Yorkshire yeast, floating up to the surface as a mat after attenuation. When the BRY had subsided to the scummy little head I unleashed the mini-lagering on it -1°C for 4 days and as usual it waved the white flag and flocced beautifully to a surprisingly clear and clean beer.

Current brightness - no finings uses - is more like what I would expect from a beer after two weeks in the keg, never mind two days.

 

[malt_shovel]

Man I am envious of the results other are getting with this yeast. For some reason I am struggling to get it to floc out and attenuate fully. I put it down to my particular sachets were poorly handled before I got them but others in WA seem to be getting good results. I think I will wave the white flag and go back to US-05 for now. I am building up some dark lager and RIS stocks for winter time anyways so will revisit when done with those.

 

[paulmclaren11]

I got mine in WA too from a reputable retailer - got them via post though.

When mine stalled at 1020 (only pitched 1 packet) I questioned my mash temp which was 67c and whether my Braumeister was accurate. I have a Bright Ale clone mashed at 66c in the BM fermenting now with Saf 05 and it's down to 1010 no worries in 7 days.

Perhaps there are some suss packets floating around in Perth... next time I will pitch 2 packets (as I have some left) but I have never had a brew stall so high mashing at 67c (and I have verified the temps are correct).

 

[carniebrew]

But Paul, didn't you say previously that you pitched a packet of us-05 onto the BRY-97 beer that stalled at 1.020, and it didn't drop any further? If that's the case then it wasn't the BRY causing your high final gravity issue.

On the subject, I'm not sure a dodgy packet of dry yeast would necessarily cause stalling at a high gravity....even a significantly under-pitched beer should still ferment out, it might just take a while, and possibly produce some off flavours from the stress the yeast is under?

 

[verysupple]

But Paul, didn't you say previously that you pitched a packet of us-05 onto the BRY-97 beer that stalled at 1.020, and it didn't drop any further? If that's the case then it wasn't the BRY causing your high final gravity issue.

On the subject, I'm not sure a dodgy packet of dry yeast would necessarily cause stalling at a high gravity....even a significantly under-pitched beer should still ferment out, it might just take a while, and possibly produce some off flavours from the stress the yeast is under?

It depends how he pitched the US-05. Apparently the yeast needs to be metabolically active when pitching into something that already has an appreciable amount of alcohol in it. Inactive yeast apparently just say, "Nope, we aint touchin' that." if pitched into alcoholic solutions. But if they're already active they say, "Yeah, alright. We may as well finish this job while we're at it.". So sprinkling or even rehydrating won't cut it. You need to get them munching on some sugar first.

Of course, this still doesn't mean the BRY-97 failed. It may be that 1.020 really is the limit of attenuation. Who knows?

 

[paulmclaren11]

It depends how he pitched the US-05. Apparently the yeast needs to be metabolically active when pitching into something that already has an appreciable amount of alcohol in it. Inactive yeast apparently just say, "Nope, we aint touchin' that." if pitched into alcoholic solutions. But if they're already active they say, "Yeah, alright. We may as well finish this job while we're at it.". So sprinkling or even rehydrating won't cut it. You need to get them munching on some sugar first.

Of course, this still doesn't mean the BRY-97 failed. It may be that 1.020 really is the limit of attenuation. Who knows?

Yeah I dumped a packet of Saf Ale straight onto the wort sitting @ 1020 - no rehydrating.

 

[manticle]

As very supple says - try making an active starter first. Not normally necessary with dry yeast but for stalled ferments it is a good thing.

 

[carniebrew]

I wouldn't waste my yeast without doing a forced ferment test first though. You want to know there's still some fermentables left into the wort before throwing more yeast at it.

 

[verysupple]

Another thread got me thinking about BRY-97 again, and how it seems to behave a bit differently to other clean American style ale yeasts. I have a new theory about why there are so many reported cases of extended lag times. Is it possible that it actually starts fermenting well before it forms a krausen? I came up with this idea because once it does form a krausen it seems to reach FG very quickly. So maybe half the work is done before the krausen? I never take gravity readings until I think it's about done, and my FV lid doesn't seal properly any more so the airlock doesn't bubble unless a batch is in full swing. So I can't tell if it's producing CO2 before the krausen forms.

Have people who use glad wrap or who have good seals and bubbling airlocks noticed if CO2 is produced (and therefore fermenation has started) before the krausen forms or other visual signs of fermentation?

 

[jkhlt1210]

Big fan here! Definitely slow starter but hammered after two days of nothing!

 

[Gavo]

Is it possible that it actually starts fermenting well before it forms a krausen?

I reckon it could do this. I have a fermenter with BRY97 ATM, it seemed like a slow start however I could see that the break material was sitting at the top of the fermenter which I find is the result of the yeast working and creating enough CO2 to float the break material and atached yeast.

Know what you mean by the fluffy top BribyG mine is just the same ATM and reckon I will have to crash chill just to get it to drop.

 

[Milk-lizard84]

Hey guys just a quick question in regards to this yeast. I made a partial rye pale ale and it finished quite high. Og was 1.048 but finished at 1.018. I used the 1g per litre recommended for this yeast. I tried to ferment it in the house while my fermentation fridge was being used so it sat at about 16 to 17 degress most of the time.
I did rehydrate my yeast and seemed to start quite well but seemed to fizzle out. Tried agitation to the wort and more heat when my fridge was free but it won't seem to budge past 1.018. Will this be safe to bottle?
Haven't had anything finish this high before

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

What temp did you mash partial grains at?

 

[Milk-lizard84]

It was about 65 from memory

 

[manticle]

What else was in the recipe? Are you measuring gravity with a hydrometer or refractometer? What temp, how consistently and how long for fermentation? I know you said mostly 16-17 but how long and did it swing much?
Don't bottle anything till you know it's done.
How long stalled at 1018?

 

[Milk-lizard84]

Yeah I was measuring with a hydrometer. I guess the temp did fluctuate abit due not being controlled and its been in fermenting for about 2 weeks. It just had a kilo of grain, 1 can of coopers pale ale and I kilo.of ldm. Hope that helps.