One Week Fermenting

[dickTed]

This is a 3kg can of ESB Nut Brown Ale. It has an additional 1kg LLME, and I pitched a Safale 04 without proofing.

Made it up last Friday. OG 1.052. I put 40g Cascade pellets into the pot that I dissolved the extract in, brought to boil, then tipped it in.

Temp was 24C when I pitched, and it stayed on 22C for the next 2 days, and has been about 20C since then, and still is.

It went "bloop bloop" rather normally for a couple of days, and on Monday it was down to about once every 40 seconds. This morning it was still going. Bubbling about every 2 mins.

I was hoping to bottle it today. SG is 1.022. The test tube had about half an inch of yeast and hop particles in it, so I tipped that out and poured another, which was pretty much the same. It still tastes sweet.

The plan was to just bulk prime and bottle when it's ready. I don't want it to start on the yeast cake, so perhaps I should run it into my other fermenter. Maybe I should do that tonight.

 

[cubbie]

gravity sounds high, but I have never done an esb nut brown ale. maybe worth rousing the yeast incase you have a stuck fermentation. It won't hurt at the least.

 

[Ross]

dickted,

Rack to secondary for 1 to 2 weeks, or leave on primary for another week - either way, you won't have any problems...

 

[Tony M]

DicTed
I'ts a few years since I used a kit but going thru old notes I reckon you should drop at least 40 points. If you bottle now, look out for flying glass in about three weeks. You could try and get some air into it with a vigorous stir and make sure the temp does not drop too much at night. If patience does not see the ferment kick along perhaps you should get another yeast started and throw that in

 

[Gulf Brewery]

Gents

Do not get air into the wort at this stage!. It will oxidise the beer and give you off flavours. You can gently swirl the fermenter to get the yeast back into action. With this sort of beer, it still has a way to go before you bottle - use your hydrometer and check that the SG doesn't drop for 3 days before bottling.

Cheers
Pedro

 

[Batz]

Gents

Do not get air into the wort at this stage!. It will oxidise the beer and give you off flavours. You can gently swirl the fermenter to get the yeast back into action. With this sort of beer, it still has a way to go before you bottle - use your hydrometer and check that the SG doesn't drop for 3 days before bottling.

Cheers
Pedro

[post="48768"][/post]​

Pedro's spot on

Batz

 

[Steve Lacey]

Pedro's spot on

[post="48771"][/post]​

Batz is spot on. Gently rouse it or just leave it alone. You may want to bottle it, but trust us, it does not want to be bottled yet.

I can tell you, I ferment these ESB 3-kg kits all the time. Working with malt extract can give you slower fermenattions. S-04 compounds this (in my opinion, many people with turbo-powered oxygenators don't agree with me). My standard procedure is to leave the fermenter alone for two weeks before I do anything. And to be honest, that applies to absolutely anything I brew. All-grain or extract-based. That extra week on the primary yeast cake, even if all the attenuation is done in one week, cleans the beer up a lot. Just don't open it and release you CO2 once attenuation is finished because it protects the beer from oxidation. But on the other hand, before attenuation is finished, high CO2 levels can actually inhibit yeast activity. So opening and gently stirring at your 1022 point does two things: it re-suspends some yeast, and it releases some CO2 and removes one source of yeast suppression. As I said, not worth doing if full attenuation has been reached. Expect a final gravity of 1014.

Steve
h34r:

 

[dickTed]

Thanks gang. I took Ross' advice, and went into the other fermenter. I feel a lot better now.

Getting used to the taste of White King and sweat.

When I emptied the primary, I tipped it upside down, but found the Safale yeast cake still stuck firmly to the bottom.

 

[dickTed]

OK so now it's been bottled one week, and last night I put a stubby in the fridge, and this evening I opened it. Just before the Bris - St K match started on TV.

You'd get just as many bubbles in a glass of water. All the little bubbles just bursted and went away. Nice flavour though. Just flat.

I know a week isn't long, but I've sampled all my other brews after a week and they've been carbonated, whether they've kept their head or not.

If it isn't carbonated in another 2 weeks, the only drink I'll have is the one I made on Tuesday. This can be a cruel sport.

BTW this had a week in primary, and five days in secondary, and bulk primed back into the other fermenter for bottling.

Boiled 180g of white sugar and let it cool, then poured it gently into the fermenter. I used a 2 meter hose which coils around the bottom of the (bottling bucket) fermenter.

Do you think it will carbonate?

? ?

Oh BTW again, there was a weak little hiss at least when I opened.

Having a Gippsland gold now - my favourite normal strength aussie beer, to compensate for having to drink flat piss. Must admit, I finished it though.

 

[dickTed]

One more thing. FG=1.018
Any opinions on whether I can expect it to carbonate??

 

[Jovial_Monk]

180g sugar? It will carbonate!

Maybe shake the bottles to get the yeast back up into the beer and keep the bottles at about 20C

Jovial Monk

 

[dickTed]

Thanks man. I feel better already. I can be patient for exactly two more weeks.

 

[NRB]

dickTed, did you add the priming liquid to the beer, or the beer to the priming liquid?

Did you mix it around to get a homogeneous mix?

 

[fergi]

dickted as jovial said give bottles a bit of a gently shake upside down and put them somwhere around 20 deg mark even slightly warmer i have found.final of 1018 will be ok i bottled a morgans royal oak with xtra lme/corn syrup/dextrose which finnished at 1018 so when i bottled i put a little less priming sugar in because i thought it might be too high a final and didnt want to over carbonate it..for the first week it had nothing in carbonation then i tried oneafter 2 weeks and it had started to have a slight carbonation although it would dissapear after about a minute so i left it alone for about a month and when i tried next bottle it had a really good head and was nicely gassed,so in short it will be ok
cheers
fergi

 

[dickTed]

Opened another one today after two weeks bottled. Still flat, but the bubbles are finer than last week. I'll just leave it in the darkroom for a few more weeks. There's a fermenter in there with a fan and wet towel, trying too keep it bekow 24C. The empty one beside it is waiting for priming/bottling. Think I need just one more fermenter.

Thanks for the advice you guys.

 

[bouncingcastle]

Think I need just one more fermenter.

It's that kind of thinking that ends you up with 20 kegs, 15 fermenters, and a wife/girlfriend who just doesn't understand.

I love it.

 

[dickTed]

Live on my own now, so I've got 3 spare rooms and no aggravation.
Women didn't understand me before I started brewing, so what hope would I have now. I'm 59. Don't even talk to them any more.

20 kegs & 15 fermenters sounds like good company. We could have a ball.