UK Yeasts with a Tendency to Overcarb?

[cpsmusic]

Hi Folks,

I'm still on the quest to make a decent UK-style ale. My last couple of batches (I bottle) have been over-carbed and I think the reason is because I've been using 1968. I could not figure out the reason for the over-carbing but after reading the threads about it here it seems that I'm a victim of this yeast's tendency to keep fermenting in the bottle.

Anyway, from what I've read it seems the problem is confined to 1768, 1968 and 1187. Just wanted to check that this was right? Anyone had any problems with any others?

Cheers,

Chris

 

[Bribie G]

Probably 1469 as well. I only keg nowadays but last Winter I had a keg on 1968 that I kept out of the fridge in a cold garage and served through a Bronco tap. It just about served itself on the generated gas.

edit: to recap, a lot of UK ales are strains that are used in real ales, where they slowly work in the cask at cellar temperatures to maintain a low carb level in the ale.

 

[warra48]

Long thread about this here:

http://aussiehomebrewer.com/topic/69537-uk-liquid-yeast/

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

Consistent with my experience with s04 and 002. Not so with 007, though.

 

[AJ80]

Probably 1469 as well. I only keg nowadays but last Winter I had a keg on 1968 that I kept out of the fridge in a cold garage and served through a Bronco tap. It just about served itself on the generated gas.

edit: to recap, a lot of UK ales are strains that are used in real ales, where they slowly work in the cask at cellar temperatures to maintain a low carb level in the ale.

I've definitely had this with 1469. Delightful yeast though.

 

[verysupple]

My experience with 1968 has been the same: always keeps fermenting in the bottle even if I rouse the yeast multiple times before bottling. This thread details my experience and I found that cold crashing the beer before bottling helped. I assume because there is less yeast in suspension it takes longer to become over-carbed and also stays in a reasonable carb range for longer. On the down side, it also takes longer to properly condition.

On a side note...

I'm planning to start kegging soon. Do people who keg beers made with these yeasts find they have to burp the kegs to keep the carbonation nice and low? If not, I wonder why we have such problems in the bottle.

 

[Bribie G]

As I've posted several times, they are not intended to be bottle yeasts. Having grown up in the UK, bottle conditioned beers were few and far between, basically Worthington White Shield, Guinness in bottles and that was about it.
Nowadays with the growth of "craft beers" and hipsterism, there are no doubt many more, but even now if you go to Dans for a bottle of Spitfire or Timothy Taylor's Landlord or Old Speckled Hen you get a filtered pasteurised beer.
Thus it has been since the turn of the 20th Century.

I think that maybe the old time breweries from which the likes of 1968 came (that one is Fullers I believe) are trying to tell us something.

Another point, on bottling of home brew as MHB I think can confirm, up till recent times most UK home brewers who were looking for a brewery yeast would culture up Guinness, much as we culture Coopers nowadays. It was the overwhelmingly popular yeast for bottling and it was indeed the yeast distributed by Guinness in Dublin to the various bottling contractors around the UK who bottled for Guinness, so obviously not a strain that was going to blow up your bottles.

Did I mention bottles?

 

[Midnight Brew]

On a side note...

I'm planning to start kegging soon. Do people who keg beers made with these yeasts find they have to burp the kegs to keep the carbonation nice and low? If not, I wonder why we have such problems in the bottle.

I've found they are quiet good at serving themselves with the odd top up of CO2 as the keg gets lower. Typical fermentation regime followed by a cold crash for 2-4 days and the beer absorbs some of the co2 back into it. Then I keg and I find this is enough carbonation for a UK style.

 

[warra48]

What Bribie G said.

Although I loved the malt quality of WY1968, I no longer use it, because I got sick and tired of overcarbed bottles.

Try WY1450 Denny's Favorite 50 instead, it will give you excellent malt quality, but won't overcarbonate.