South Dublin Brewers - Next Meet - Thursday, 31st March

[Bubbles]

6. Brewtus - maybe saison and ESB

Back in town from 25 Mar - 3 Apr and looking forward to meeting up again. Well done to all especially Conor in the recent comp.

Great stuff! Looking forward to catching up dude.

[CC]

Yeah I'll be able to bring it along then if you like. I made it a little stronger than the style, to about 1.060. It's a tad warm out of the fermenter so far, so might take a while to condition.

i'm after doing my first big beer (IPA loads of hops 1.064). i used wl0023 burton ale yeast at 19c pitched at 16c.
it cant produce fusels at that temp but when tasted out of the fermentor it seemed to have plenty going on with the yeast flavours- poss a bit 'hot' with phenols??
i bottled at 1.014 after 2 wks.
what is my optimum conditioning time in the bottle??
and have i fecked up by not leaving it 3 wks in the fermentor?? or transferring to a secondary fermentor for a week???

[Bubbles]

It's hard to say. 2 weeks is normally fine for a moderate gravity ale. Though 1.064 is not really "moderate".

A hot alcohol flavour would be caused by fusels, not phenols.

One week per 10 points of gravity is the best rule of thumb for bottle conditioning imo. So personally, I wouldn't look at it for another 6 weeks.

It's hard to tell how good a beer is when tasting it out of the FV. If it was a healthy ferment, then leaving it an extra would not make much of a difference, and racking to secondary no difference whatsoever.

[molc]

Hot is ok, as it's something that can mellow out with conditioning and the yeast in the bottle. Phenols are more solvent or plastic and are much more tricky. I tend to describe fusels as warm when they're something that should balance out and hot when it's just an alcohol bomb

As Bubbles said, 2 weeks should have been fine and now it's just a case of leaving it for a while to condition.

For reference, I'm going to be kegging the amber next Monday after the dry hop and cold crash, which will have been 15 days in the fermenter. If I manage to force some carbonation into it before the meet, I can bring it along and you can try a really young beer (3 weeks grain to glass) which is around the same OG. I wouldn't normally drink a beer that young, but could be a fun discussion point.

[CC]

yeah its defo not fusels as im really well tuned to that flavour after some prev disasters!

i think what i was tasting was just possibly a higher alc content than i'm used to/normally enjoy... and i might be a bit obsessed as i was worried i'd bottled too early so just looking for flaws...
the fermentation was really healthy and i've repitched onto the yeast cake and that fermentation is going great sooo... hopefully its all ok
a friend with decent palate tasted from the fermentor and couldn't detect flaws but just thought conditioning time was needed.

like you i'd been thinking at least 6 weeks in the bottle for something at 6.6%.. 
should be ready for a taste in april at the meeting anyways

[Shanna]

Yeah I'll be able to bring it along then if you like. I made it a little stronger than the style, to about 1.060. It's a tad warm out of the fermenter so far, so might take a while to condition.

i'm after doing my first big beer (IPA loads of hops 1.064). i used wl0023 burton ale yeast at 19c pitched at 16c.
it cant produce fusels at that temp but when tasted out of the fermentor it seemed to have plenty going on with the yeast flavours- poss a bit 'hot' with phenols??
i bottled at 1.014 after 2 wks.
what is my optimum conditioning time in the bottle??
and have i fecked up by not leaving it 3 wks in the fermentor?? or transferring to a secondary fermentor for a week???

Do you have temperature control? If so what type? How do you measure your beer temperature? If you don't have a thermowell or something similar you won't have an accurate temperature reading. I would also confirm that any thermometer your using is accurate. As fermentation is exothermic the temperature during the fermentation inside the fermenter can be several degrees warmer that a temperature taken against the outside of a plastic fermenter. Your alcohol content is a little over 6.5% so you might be getting some warmth from the booze. I would echo what bubbles said about leaving the beer for a minimum of 6-8 weeks if your bottle conditioning. I would also try sample a beer every 2 weeks or so to see if the warmth starts to mellow & eventually disappear.

I did an American Amber ale last year that had yeast pitched @22C but fermented @19C according to an external temperature reading. The beer was close to 7% & I was convinced it was alcohol but others gave no bs feedback that it was fusel alcohol. I made some tweaks to my fermenter to add a thermowell. This gave a temperature reading of 2.5C difference compared to measuring against the side of the fermenter. I also added a 2ND copper chilling coil that allowed me drop the word to below 20C before pitching the yeast. The thermowell also allows the temperature controlled fridge to more accurately keep the desired temperature as the fermentation kicks in. So far I have not had any subsequent problems with fusel alcohols.

Shanna

[molc]

the fermentation was really healthy and i've repitched onto the yeast cake and that fermentation is going great

From the yeast book, they recommend washing the yeast or at the very least measuring out the yeast to use in a clean fermenter when repitching, rather than just dumping the whole yeast cake in there. It will be a big overpitch and will strip some of the yeast derived flavours from the beer.

[CC]

For reference, I'm going to be kegging the amber next Monday after the dry hop and cold crash, which will have been 15 days in the fermenter. If I manage to force some carbonation into it before the meet, I can bring it along and you can try a really young beer (3 weeks grain to glass) which is around the same OG. I wouldn't normally drink a beer that young, but could be a fun discussion point.

yeah that'd be great just to see if what i tasted from the fermentor is similar to what you've got from your amber.....
i suspect that what i tasted was what you're describing as 'hot which can mellow with age'... and i'm just overworrying about what i thought was a too short fermentation time.

[CC]

Do you have temperature control? If so what type? How do you measure your beer temperature? If you don't have a thermowell or something similar you won't have an accurate temperature reading. I would also confirm that any thermometer your using is accurate. As fermentation is exothermic the temperature during the fermentation inside the fermenter can be several degrees warmer that a temperature taken against the outside of a plastic fermenter. Your alcohol content is a little over 6.5% so you might be getting some warmth from the booze. I would echo what bubbles said about leaving the beer for a minimum of 6-8 weeks if your bottle conditioning. I would also try sample a beer every 2 weeks or so to see if the warmth starts to mellow & eventually disappear.

I did an American Amber ale last year that had yeast pitched @22C but fermented @19C according to an external temperature reading. The beer was close to 7% & I was convinced it was alcohol but others gave no bs feedback that it was fusel alcohol. I made some tweaks to my fermenter to add a thermowell. This gave a temperature reading of 2.5C difference compared to measuring against the side of the fermenter. I also added a 2ND copper chilling coil that allowed me drop the word to below 20C before pitching the yeast. The thermowell also allows the temperature controlled fridge to more accurately keep the desired temperature as the fermentation kicks in. So far I have not had any subsequent problems with fusel alcohols.

Shanna

yeah so the temperatures are all spot on.
continuosly monitored with a fuji thermocouple placed in the center of the  fermentation vessel.
this thermocouple is attached to a fuji twin  temperature controller (classic fridge as cooler, brew belt as heater set up) that has smart capabilities...so it learns the thermodynamics of the individual set up and adjusts the rate of cooling/heating to avoid overshoot and help maintain the set temperature consistently.
i had it made up by an english electronics company who kit out a lot of the microbreweries popping up in the uk.

[CC]

From the yeast book, they recommend washing the yeast or at the very least measuring out the yeast to use in a clean fermenter when repitching, rather than just dumping the whole yeast cake in there. It will be a big overpitch and will strip some of the yeast derived flavours from the beer.

yeah i was conscious of the overpitch so i dropped the temperature down to pitch at 15c  and then hit for a steady 16c.
thats slightly below whats recomended for this yeast but i think it slowed the lag phase right down and there was no blow off etc
i might be completely wrong but i guessed that lowering the temp would slow down individual yeast cell activity counteracting the effect of overpitch??

[irish_goat]

Good advice I got from Rossa was that a sanitised ladle full of yeast cake was plenty for a standard circa 5% batch of beer. Has worked fine for me anyway.

[John_C]

1. Bubbles - American Pale/Cream Ale, Brett saison
2. Lurchalicious - beligian pale ale/ thing (viking malt beer)
3. Shanna - Brewferm Diabolo kit brewed with loads of water to hit 4% Pilsner style. Very young American Amber Ale.
4. Molc - English Porter, American Amber (last bottle!)
5. CC- Stout
6. Brewtus - maybe saison and ESB
7. JohnC - Pilsner and Vienna Lager

I'll only be along for an hour or so.

I got marked down in a few competitions last year for off flavours derived from my bottling. I have a new setup now to purge the bottles before filling. I think it's fixed the issue, at least I can't detect any problems. I'd appreciate if yee could look out for any oxidation or stale flavours in the beers. Both lagers were bottled in January so they've had plenty of time for any problems to show up.

[Bubbles]

1. Bubbles - American Pale/Cream Ale, Brett saison
2. Lurchalicious - beligian pale ale/ thing (viking malt beer)
3. Shanna - Brewferm Diabolo kit brewed with loads of water to hit 4% Pilsner style. Very young American Amber Ale.
4. Molc - English Porter, American Amber (last bottle!)
5. CC- Stout
6. Brewtus - maybe saison and ESB
7. JohnC - Pilsner and Vienna Lager

I'll only be along for an hour or so.

I got marked down in a few competitions last year for off flavours derived from my bottling. I have a new setup now to purge the bottles before filling. I think it's fixed the issue, at least I can't detect any problems. I'd appreciate if yee could look out for any oxidation or stale flavours in the beers. Both lagers were bottled in January so they've had plenty of time for any problems to show up.

John, I have a t-shirt for you.. will I bring it along?

[craiclad]

1. Bubbles - American Pale/Cream Ale, Brett saison
2. Lurchalicious - beligian pale ale/ thing (viking malt beer)
3. Shanna - Brewferm Diabolo kit brewed with loads of water to hit 4% Pilsner style. Very young American Amber Ale.
4. Molc - English Porter, American Amber (last bottle!)
5. CC- Stout
6. Brewtus - maybe saison and ESB
7. JohnC - Pilsner and Vienna Lager
8. Craiclad - Munich Helles, Hefeweizen, Galaxy SMaSH

[John_C]

John, I have a t-shirt for you.. will I bring it along?

Yeah, cheers!