Secondary Fermentation - Advice On Idea

[Rizzla]

Hi,
Firstly my apologies if this has been answered before, I have looked around the site.
Secondly I'm new to this and have made quite a few "practice beers" (somehow managed to get them down) and some good ones so please forgive if my enquiry is naive.

I currently have 3 fermenters going that end up in 19L kegs after about 2 - 3 weeks of fermentation. These go in the fridge for immediate consumption. I have noticed the beer tastes much better the longer they are in the fridge.

I have 5 kegs, two are always empty and by the time fermentation has finished I am about out in the fridge.

I was wondering if after about 2 weeks or when bubbling slows down

1. I transfered the clear fermenter contents, (leaving the bottom sediment) to 20 L bottled water containers (the type you turn upside down into the dispenser),
2. put in a bit of malt in to get some CO2 happening to keep bugs out,
3. wrapped some sanitised glad wrap over the top secured with an elastic band not tight enough to keep the CO2 in
4. let them sit for another 2 weeks

Whether my beer would improve with longer sitting around with the added bonus of freeing up the fermenters as I could brew every 2 weeks or so and transfer the secondary (plastic water botles) as needed into the kegs.
Cheers

 

[bignath]

The only "real" problem i see with this is adding extra malt to the already "finished" beer.

Not sure why you'd need to.

Racking to secondary is as simple as getting another "vessel" and carefully (to avoid splashing) transferring from primary to secondary to either:

1. get beer off yeast cake.
2. free up another primary vessel to ferment in
3. cold condition/lager your finished beer

there could be others - the more technical can chime in....

Apart from adding the extra malt, you've described racking to secondary vessel, so on that basis, yes it will work, but you shouldn't need the extra malt. Unless sanitation is not up to scratch.

Most people would probably do the secondary thing to remove the beer from the yeast cake, therefore trying to create a cleaner, clearer, resulting beer. This is a point of contention as to whether it's necessary.
Me personally, i don't do it. I have a big ass fridge for conditioning so i put primary fermenter in that to condition for a week and i get pretty bloody clear beer regardless of serving vessel (bottles/kegs).
Adding extra malt may result in extra sediment being produced due to fermentation possibly kicking off again. If you get the extra CO2 layer, it's a sign of fermentation and sediment will result. This is often what people who use secondary are trying to avoid in the first place.

I've been drinking (and rambling) but short answer is "yes" it will work, but it's a bit unnecessary at the same time. By all means use those bottle if you want, but just make sure your sanitation regime is all good and things should be fine.

 

[stux]

Or just use your kegs to lager in

 

[Rizzla]

Thanks Big Fella, the idea of the malt (could be dex) was if there were a few yeast cells hanging around as there should be a tablespoon of so of malt/dex would rev em up a bit to produce some CO2 creating a positive pressure thus keeping the badies out.

Another thought could I just keg them at around 2 weeks and use the keg as a secondary, venting them every now and then. Always got a least two kegs hanging around

edit Thaks Stux we must have been typing at the same time

 

[stux]

Thanks Big Fella, the idea of the malt (could be dex) was if there were a few yeast cells hanging around as there should be a tablespoon of so of malt/dex would rev em up a bit to produce some CO2 creating a positive pressure thus keeping the badies out.

Another thought could I just keg them at around 2 weeks and use the keg as a secondary, venting them every now and then. Always got a least two kegs hanging around

edit Thaks Stux we must have been typing at the same time

With a bit of effort you can time it such that the final part of the fermentation will actually carbobate your kegs, and thus no need to carbonate or release pressure. Check out this page on krausenning
http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Kraeusening

You can get a keg pressure gauge doobie from craftbrewer that let's you dial a certain pressure and it will vent above that

 

[katzke]

Good idea, bad idea.

Except for a few beer styles it is always a good idea to let them set and age before drinking. How long depends on the style. Some beers should be drunk as soon as they are done fermenting. Others can benefit from aging a year or longer. Most if not all new brewers drink beer way before it is ready, even to the point of fermentation not quite being done.

The only bad part of your idea is the vessel choice. Everything I have heard about the plastic water jugs is they are not suitable for brewing.

Suggestion is to look for used brewing equipment and use your extra kegs for now. You already have CO2 and should be purging the kegs before filling them so having a layer of gas on your brew is not a problem. I bet you can get little bungs to fit the hole the gas relief screw into and use an airlock on your aging beer.

Also you should have some CO2 escaping from the brew when you transfer it so adding sugar to get a gas layer is not a big deal.

 

[stux]

Found the name for the German technique of capping off a brew to carbonate

Spunding
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Spunding

Basically ferment in a keg, use a spunding valve and dial it to your carbonation pressure when you have 2 points to go

 

[Nick JD]

Found the name for the German technique of capping off a brew to carbonate

Spunding
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Spunding

Basically ferment in a keg, use a spunding valve and dial it to your carbonation pressure when you have 2 points to go

I've spunded before. I keg beers fermented with S04 when they stabilise (which always is not terminal gravity) and those last couple of gravity points lead to a nice mild carbonation level perfect for the style.

Started by accident when I fridged a few week old keg to cool it, and before taking it out again to force carb, I poured some off to try it - it was nicely carbed! Schweet.

 

[Bribie G]

"I'll be closing the garage door for a while, Dave and I are going to be spunding for the next 20 mins"

"lagering" in the keg is something I do all the time
The one on the right has been there since February. Note that they are fully carbed, I force carb them before lagering.


But the downside is that a keg costs sixty bucks or so and it's a lot of real estate to be carrying. If I'm only going to be lagering / cold crashing for less than a month I either crash the beer down to -1 in primary and just let it clear right out then keg, or (as mentioned earlier) if I need a primary fermenter and they are all taken up, then I'll rack into one of these and give any headspace a squirt of CO2 to purge, and sit it in any available fridge for a couple of weeks then keg.
They are a third of the cost of a keg and of course the beer is flat till kegged. At this stage anyway I don't want to get further fermention and yeast production happening which can also change the finished nature of the beer .



Really you can't get away from the fact that to do lagering / cold conditioning you just have to get as much - and as flexible - fridge space going as you can. I'm fortunate to have accumulated 5 fridges in the brewery and only paid for one of them :lol:
Also as most of them stay shut and two of them are operating at fermentation temperatures I've noticed only about a $20 a quarter increase in power, which can be mitigated by always switching a light off for the lager B)

 

[Rizzla]

Thanks all for your valuable advice. What I will do is rack to the spare kegs after about a week (brewing ales), purge with CO2, get hold of some gas disconnects and run a line from the kegs into a bucket of water with sanitiser and leave for around two weeks at ambiant temperature currently around 18 - 20 oC. Chill to 1 oC for a day then gas and drink. Sound like a plan?

Thanks again