Racking To Secondary Halfway Through Ferment?

[quantocks]

I'm sure this has been asked before but I can't find much info on what I am after:

what are the side effects of racking to a secondary vessel say 5 days into a ferment? will it just continue to ferment at a slower rate in secondary? will it stop fermentation?

or is pitching another yeast better when racking to a secondary fermenter?

 

[Bizier]

AFAIK most of the active yeast will still be suspended and travel into the next vessel if you do this. But the question remains as to WHY you are doing it?

 

[quantocks]

instead of using my hydro, I racked to secondary to dry hop and then checked my brew log and realised I had only put it down on the 17 of January. It was very very cloudy, lots of yeast still suspended. Should of checked logs before hand :<

should still be okay I hope.

 

[buttersd70]

It will continue to ferment. Hence the term "secondary fermentation". It's a relatively common practice to rack to secondary fermentation when the beer is close, but not quite, finished....hence my dislike of the term "secondary" being used, particularly in reference to racking once fermentation has fully finished. You are either racking to secondary fermentation, or racking to a secondary vessel for conditioning...different animals.

Racking to secondary fermentation is often done to kick start a stalled ferment. It removes the green beer from the spent yeast, and knocks some of the disolved co2 out of solution, which gives a better envoronment for the live yeast in suspension to finish fermentation off.

 

[matti]

Racking to second fermenter as Butter sugested is normal and recommended way of brewing for many as it allowing the yeast to finnish the job.

I rack all my lager 2/3 through fermentation and allow it to finnish in the second vessel.
minimum head space if I can.

If I am dry hopping an ale I tend to allow the the green beer to ferment out as mush as possible.
Then I rack it with hops.
This way the hops oils wont dissipate with the CO2 during fermentation

The only trouble with racking is if you rack way too early.
One generally does not rack until the yeast growth is maximised and the yeast has stored all the nice goodies to survive.


I cant remeber what the stage is called but post krasuen sound familiar.
lag phase-early krasuen-high krausen- late krausen-post krausen or something like that.

 

[rude]

What sort of trouble would you get if you racked off youre trub say 2 days into fermentation for an ale?
As this is what my local HB man does & his beers are very nice.

 

[rude]

Just read youre post properly matti max yeast growth say no more, only rack at or after high krausen

 

[Jase71]

Interesting... Ive taken to racking to secondary after a week or more, but the truth is, I dont know WHY I do this.

 

[razE]

Interesting... Ive taken to racking to secondary after a week or more, but the truth is, I dont know WHY I do this.

I use my secondary at the end of fermentation to let the majority of the left over yeast settle out to improve clarity.

 

[seemax]

i did a comparison some time ago
23L batch (ale) in primary for 8 days and reached FG
racked half into a secondary vessel with gelatine finings, remainder in primary on the cake
8 days later bottled

to my palate there was no taste difference, however the secondary bottles were crystal clear

 

[malbur]

I racked an Ale into secondary after 5 days, because we where going away for a couple of weeks, and i throught it would be better off being off the yeast cake for that time, but it never finished was left sitting at 1.020 when i got back.
I think the silly thing i did was filter between primary and secondary.
maybe i will use gelatine finings next time of nothing at all.

 

[buttersd70]

Secondary fermentation does tend to become a bit redundant if you strip the yeast out of suspension first. :lol:

 

[crundle]

What sort of trouble would you get if you racked off youre trub say 2 days into fermentation for an ale?
As this is what my local HB man does & his beers are very nice.

I guess it depends on how well the yeast had taken off in the first day or so. I would expect that if you have simply poured the wort onto an existing yeast cake in a fermenter, and it starts going off like a bomb, that you may not have any issues, but if the yeast has hardly had a chance to start multiplying, then it will be likely that you will retard the fermentation of your wort.

The question begs though, why go to secondary so soon? I do mine a minimum of 5-7 days in the primary, then go to secondary fermentation. I would see little benefit of going to secondary fermentation after only 2 days, as it is unlikely to assist in clearing the wort much unless the yeast was well established and had been going like the clappers.

Crundle

 

[jonocarroll]

My most recent brew has a lot of trub in the fermenter that I couldn't separate in the no-chill cube (this one's just trying to mess with my head I swear) so I was planning to rack to secondary (just gotta get another fermenter... Bunnings here I come).

My question: How exactly do I do this? Sounds like a stupid question, but I've only ever had the single fermenter. I presume there's some sort of hose that I can use, but I'm not sure.

I plan on racking at 3/4 of ferment, letting the ferment finish in secondary, then crashing the temp down to 2 or 3 to try to settle out as much as possible. It's probably irrelevant what style this is - it's not getting anywhere near 'to-style', but it's my dunkel that I'm doing the equivalent of kneeling over, pounding on it's chest screaming "you're not getting out of this one that easy!"

 

[Bribie G]

Some traditional english breweries used to do a 'double drop' where the beer would be racked or 'dropped' to a second fermenter after only a couple of days in primary, in order to aerate it and take it off the original shyte that had dropped to the bottom of the fermenter. Brakspear (Thames Valley) still do it and you could try it with the WYeast Thames Valley strain. Can't see any advantage in doing that with the beers we HBers make.

I usually wait until the ferment is three quarters of the way through then rack to secondary for a few more days till the fermentation has petered out and the top centimeter or two of the beer is visibly clearing, and then put the secondary fermenter into the live fridge for cold conditioning. I do it to get it off the yeast cake (which I harvest) and to get a clearer beer that I can add stuff to in cold conditioning: gelatine then later polyclar, then bring back up to ambient and bottle.

 

[cubbie]

My most recent brew has a lot of trub in the fermenter that I couldn't separate in the no-chill cube (this one's just trying to mess with my head I swear) so I was planning to rack to secondary (just gotta get another fermenter... Bunnings here I come).

My question: How exactly do I do this? Sounds like a stupid question, but I've only ever had the single fermenter. I presume there's some sort of hose that I can use, but I'm not sure.

I plan on racking at 3/4 of ferment, letting the ferment finish in secondary, then crashing the temp down to 2 or 3 to try to settle out as much as possible. It's probably irrelevant what style this is - it's not getting anywhere near 'to-style', but it's my dunkel that I'm doing the equivalent of kneeling over, pounding on it's chest screaming "you're not getting out of this one that easy!"

Get some vinyl tube and a 23 gerry can from bunnings ( the blue plastic ones). You can run the tube tap to tap or tap to inside the gerry can, point is not to splash around the beer on transfer. Then just run it from the primary to secondary. Get as much beer as you can with out sucking up the yeast cake (be gentile with your primary). You don't need an airlock on your secondary ( i just release the pressure daily, though i rack after 7 days).

Obviously maintain your sanitation standards.

 

[jonocarroll]

You don't need an airlock on your secondary ( i just release the pressure daily, though i rack after 7 days).

This is something I had wondered about - if there is still fermentation, there will be pressure, and I can't guarantee that I'll be able to release it every day. I may fit an airlock.

Good idea about tap-to-tap though. Cheers. :icon_cheers:

 

[JonnyAnchovy]

I've been astonished with how fast and how few racking beer takes. Having come from making meads that take several rackings, and many, many months to clear its a real treat making something crystal clear an a matter of days!

 

[cozmocracker]

im about to rack my lager, im then going to get another lager going using some of the yeast cake, is it as simple as getting a cup full and pitching that straight into the new wort?

thanks for any words of wisdom.

coz

 

[Bribie G]

My most recent brew has a lot of trub in the fermenter that I couldn't separate in the no-chill cube (this one's just trying to mess with my head I swear) so I was planning to rack to secondary (just gotta get another fermenter... Bunnings here I come).

My question: How exactly do I do this? Sounds like a stupid question, but I've only ever had the single fermenter. I presume there's some sort of hose that I can use, but I'm not sure.

I plan on racking at 3/4 of ferment, letting the ferment finish in secondary, then crashing the temp down to 2 or 3 to try to settle out as much as possible. It's probably irrelevant what style this is - it's not getting anywhere near 'to-style', but it's my dunkel that I'm doing the equivalent of kneeling over, pounding on it's chest screaming "you're not getting out of this one that easy!"

If by trub you mean cold break, don't worry about it, it's normal and shouldn't affect the brew. Might even be a good yeast nutrient.

Get a hose (by the metre from LHBS) that fits outside, not inside, the tap for quicker flow

Long enough to loop round the bottom of the receiving vessel so the beer forms a smooth whirlpool with no splashing. Takes about a minute to transfer and bobs yer..
My primary fermenters are 30L and my secondary is 25L, same size as a Bunnings.

Edit: Cosmo, that's what I basically do, but I get it up to speed before pitching by mixing it with sterile water and some boiled LDME in a big glass jar (v8 bottle) and let it rouse up a bit so it hits the ground running.