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Date: 06 Sep 2006 20:49:36
From: jahammel68
Subject: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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Good day-
I've finally made the jump from partial to all-grain. I wanted to do
something relatively easy (single step) my 1st time. I have the setup
that is 5-gallon cooler for lauter, 7-gallon for mash. Per recipe, I
mashed the grains (7 lbs lager malt, 1 lb carapils, 8 oz. vienna) at
152d for 90 minutes. then sparged with 168d water.
Because this was my 1st time, I kept checking flows from both coolers
- shooting for a 60-minute sparge. I set the mash 'throttle' a little
too high and found that there was not the recommended 1 inch or so of
water sitting on top of the grains, which means water leaving mash tun
faster than it was leaving the lauter tu. This is why I think I
missed my target gravity after boil. I was shooting for 1050, hit
1040. Decided to just go with it and see how the batch turned out.
Used wyeast czech lager yeast and the package never swelled too big
after 24 hours (it was right at 6-months old). I pitched it anyway
and it took right at 24 hours later at room temp (about 75d) before I
saw any action in the airlock. Actually, I went out for a few hours
and came back and found the airlock was full of the foam from the
fermenting and the inside of the carboy was also caked with the
residue of the foam, but the airlock wasn't too active. Could this
mean the yeast went from zero to overflowing the carboy in a matter of
hours? Then back to barely bubbling?
Regardless, I put in fridge at 55d per recipe and still in primary
(recipe calls for 2 weeks in primary). I have seen no action in the
airlock since I put it in the fridge. I took a reading at day 5 and
my gravity dropped from 1040 to 1016 but the wort was still very
cloudy and tasted nasty (didn't smell too bad, though). I aerated
(shook up) the carboy and that got the airlock bubbling again for a
few hours, but nothing since then.
My question - even though the airlock isn't 'bubbling', is there still
fermentation going on? I guess I'll know for sure this wknd when I
rack to secondary and take a measurement. Or, is it a bad thing if I
aerate every day or every other day?
Man - this brewing thing - right when I'm comfortable with doing
partial grain, I do this and it totally throws a monkey wrench in the
spokes. If anyone has any input on any glaring mistakes of my info
above, I'm all ears. I'll take the gravity reading here in a few days
when I rack to secondary and then hopefully the brew will clear up
when in secondary and then conditioning. I'd hate to spend the time
waiting for a 5-gallon batch of yard fertilzer.
thanks to this group with all the info / learning experiences.
Definitely a good source for me. cheers...jeff
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Date: 06 Sep 2006 22:37:37
From: Wayne
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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jahammel68 wrote:
>
> My question - even though the airlock isn't 'bubbling', is there still
> fermentation going on? I guess I'll know for sure this wknd when I
> rack to secondary and take a measurement. Or, is it a bad thing if I
> aerate every day or every other day?
>
>
Yes there is still fermentation going on. It goes very slow at the low
temperatures. Plan of 10 days to 2 weeks before thinking of going to
secondary. Plan on about the same time in secondary before doing your
diactyl rest.
The one thing you need to stop is the aeration. You should not aerate
after the first 24-48 hours of fermentation. By that time, the yeast
will have mostly gone into the anaerobic stage and the additional oxygen
will not get used by the yeast. Instead the extra O2 will go towards
oxidizing your beer. This will lead to a taste like wet cardboard in
your beer. This takes awhile to develop, so if you drink it young you
will probably be okay. Don't age this batch or it may be undrinkable in
6 or 8 weeks.
Congrats on moving to all grain. You just need to learn that there is a
big difference in how ales and lagers ferment. You won't see the huge
amount of activity you are used to when you switch to doing lagers.
Wayne
Bugeater Brewing Company
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Date: 06 Sep 2006 20:30:27
From: neal
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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If your gravity dropped like that, then fermentation activity has
nearly completed. Aeration was a bad thing. What yeast did you use?
Options:
1) Leave it alone and hope for the best
2) Transfer the beer to secondary and 'Krausen' the beer, by adding in
a quart or two of fresh
wort (use extract). This should restart activity and encourge the
yeast to use of the oxygen
you've re-added.
As for the bad taste, you need to lager it (after krausening) and hope
that it goes away. Are you sure the nasty taste isn't the yeast in
suspension? Get a small glass and fill it up, stick it in the fridge
for a couple hours then try it after the yeast has settled out.
Krausening can have postive effects, I've read that it can reduce
lagering time in commerical breweries. In your case a reasonable dose
can get your target acohol content up and potentially lower the final
gravity a bit if you use a highly fermentable extract for krausening.
if you want to keep things VERY simple... just get a kit-can of Coopers
Pils, or Canadian Lager, or similar and use a portion of that can to
krausen. It's hopped so it shouldn't interfere with your target IBU
much.
FYI: In one of my early batches I did the same thing you did.... I
became concerned about oxidation and cardboard flavors.... so I
krausened it and it turned out fine.
Of course you could just leave it alone, wait a bit and reduce to
lagering temps. It may turn out just fine.
Yeast+lagering is a bit like magic. I brewed a Kolsch recently that
was nearly undrinkable when I bottled it. I almost gave up on it, but
I put a portion of the bottles in a fridge for 6 weeks and ignored it.
After 6 weeks it was awesome. Bad flavors gone.. just plain good beer.
jahammel68 wrote:
> Good day-
>
> I've finally made the jump from partial to all-grain. I wanted to do
> something relatively easy (single step) my 1st time. I have the setup
> that is 5-gallon cooler for lauter, 7-gallon for mash. Per recipe, I
> mashed the grains (7 lbs lager malt, 1 lb carapils, 8 oz. vienna) at
> 152d for 90 minutes. then sparged with 168d water.
>
> Because this was my 1st time, I kept checking flows from both coolers
> - shooting for a 60-minute sparge. I set the mash 'throttle' a little
> too high and found that there was not the recommended 1 inch or so of
> water sitting on top of the grains, which means water leaving mash tun
> faster than it was leaving the lauter tu. This is why I think I
> missed my target gravity after boil. I was shooting for 1050, hit
> 1040. Decided to just go with it and see how the batch turned out.
>
> Used wyeast czech lager yeast and the package never swelled too big
> after 24 hours (it was right at 6-months old). I pitched it anyway
> and it took right at 24 hours later at room temp (about 75d) before I
> saw any action in the airlock. Actually, I went out for a few hours
> and came back and found the airlock was full of the foam from the
> fermenting and the inside of the carboy was also caked with the
> residue of the foam, but the airlock wasn't too active. Could this
> mean the yeast went from zero to overflowing the carboy in a matter of
> hours? Then back to barely bubbling?
>
> Regardless, I put in fridge at 55d per recipe and still in primary
> (recipe calls for 2 weeks in primary). I have seen no action in the
> airlock since I put it in the fridge. I took a reading at day 5 and
> my gravity dropped from 1040 to 1016 but the wort was still very
> cloudy and tasted nasty (didn't smell too bad, though). I aerated
> (shook up) the carboy and that got the airlock bubbling again for a
> few hours, but nothing since then.
>
> My question - even though the airlock isn't 'bubbling', is there still
> fermentation going on? I guess I'll know for sure this wknd when I
> rack to secondary and take a measurement. Or, is it a bad thing if I
> aerate every day or every other day?
>
> Man - this brewing thing - right when I'm comfortable with doing
> partial grain, I do this and it totally throws a monkey wrench in the
> spokes. If anyone has any input on any glaring mistakes of my info
> above, I'm all ears. I'll take the gravity reading here in a few days
> when I rack to secondary and then hopefully the brew will clear up
> when in secondary and then conditioning. I'd hate to spend the time
> waiting for a 5-gallon batch of yard fertilzer.
>
> thanks to this group with all the info / learning experiences.
> Definitely a good source for me. cheers...jeff
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Date: 07 Sep 2006 14:26:53
From: John 'Shaggy' Kolesar
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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On Wed, 06 Sep 2006 20:49:36 -0600, <jahammel68@rem0vethis.yahoo.com > wrote:
> Per recipe, I mashed the grains (7 lbs lager malt, 1 lb carapils, 8 oz.
> vienna) at 152d for 90 minutes. then sparged with 168d water.
>
> Because this was my 1st time, I kept checking flows from both coolers
> - shooting for a 60-minute sparge. I set the mash 'throttle' a little
> too high and found that there was not the recommended 1 inch or so of
> water sitting on top of the grains, which means water leaving mash tun
> faster than it was leaving the lauter tu. This is why I think I
> missed my target gravity after boil. I was shooting for 1050, hit
> 1040. Decided to just go with it and see how the batch turned out.
I usually "tweak" the flows until I get a consistent level in the
lauter tun. However, the "1 inch" thing is not that critical. As long as
the level of sparge water in the grain bed didn't get too low, it shouldn't
have had a significant effect on your efficiency. IMO, just try and keep
the level at or slightly above the grain bed, you don't have to have it
exactly 1 inch.
I'm just making estimates, but in order to hit an OG of 1.050 from that
grain bill you'd need to get something like 83% efficiency. IMO, that's
really ambitious for your first sparge attempt. The 1.040 you ended up
with was around 66% efficiency. That's a bit low, but not bad for
your first try. It'll probably go up on your next several batches as
you get more used to the system.
Most brewers would probably get around 1.045 from that recipe.
> Used wyeast czech lager yeast and the package never swelled too big
> after 24 hours (it was right at 6-months old). I pitched it anyway
> and it took right at 24 hours later at room temp (about 75d) before I
> saw any action in the airlock.
IMO, if you are going to use liquid yeast, then it is really a good idea
to be making starters first. If you don't want the trouble of making
a starter, then I'd stick with dry yeast. Starters are especially critical
with lagers, usually benefitting from double the size. I also believe
it's a much better idea to pitch at your fermentation temp. Some sources
say to pitch warm and then cool the wort down after fermentation starts, but
that is really just a compensation for not pitching enough yeast. I think
you'll get better results by increasing your pitching rate and pitching
at 55F instead of 75F. Most of the by products from fermentation are
created very early. By pitching at 75F temps (way too warm for lagers) you're
not going to get nearly as clean of a beer as you would expect for a lager.
Personally, I probably wouldn't recommend a lager as someone's first all
grain attempt. It just adds more complication to a process that is already
going to be new to the brewer.
> Actually, I went out for a few hours
> and came back and found the airlock was full of the foam from the
> fermenting and the inside of the carboy was also caked with the
> residue of the foam, but the airlock wasn't too active. Could this
> mean the yeast went from zero to overflowing the carboy in a matter of
> hours? Then back to barely bubbling?
That sounds strange.
> Regardless, I put in fridge at 55d per recipe and still in primary
> (recipe calls for 2 weeks in primary).
Let the beer set it's own schedule, not what is printed in a recipe.
> I have seen no action in the
> airlock since I put it in the fridge. I took a reading at day 5 and
> my gravity dropped from 1040 to 1016 but the wort was still very
> cloudy and tasted nasty (didn't smell too bad, though). I aerated
> (shook up) the carboy and that got the airlock bubbling again for a
> few hours, but nothing since then.
Might have just been degassing residual CO2 from the fermentation.
> My question - even though the airlock isn't 'bubbling', is there still
> fermentation going on? I guess I'll know for sure this wknd when I
> rack to secondary and take a measurement. Or, is it a bad thing if I
> aerate every day or every other day?
Don't get too worried about the airlock, it doesn't really mean anything.
The gravity readings will tell you much more accurately what is really
going on. I would not aerate the beer anymore. Generally you don't want
to aerate after fermentation has started. "Rousing" the yeast is different
than aeration though. If you're just shaking the fermenter in order to
stir up the yeast which has settled to the bottom, that's fine. Just try
to avoid actually getting any oxygen into the fermenter.
1.040 to 1.016 is 60% attenuation. You're getting close, but I would guess
that it will still drop some before it is completely done. IMO, go ahead
and rack to secondary when it is convenient and let it sit for awhile. Then
check the gravity again and see where it is at. Are you planning on lagering
this beer or bottling/kegging as soon as the fermentation is done?
John.
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Date: 07 Sep 2006 17:39:12
From: jahammel68
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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On 7 Sep 2006 14:26:53 GMT, John 'Shaggy' Kolesar <spam@shagg.net >
wrote:
>Are you planning on lagering
>this beer or bottling/kegging as soon as the fermentation is done?
I was planning on lagering, unless you recommend differently. The
recipe suggests:
ferment at 55 for 2 weeks
secondary at same temp for 2 weeks
then condition at 40 for 6 weeks then prime, bottle, (I'll be doing
forced co2 in keg) and age at 40 for 6 weeks.
I >really< don't think I can wait that long. I might do the two week
secondary, then condition for a couple to 3 weeks then keg and drink.
I'd be interested in your opinion. I've done several extract lagers,
some call for really long (2,3,4 months lagering) but I usually don't
lager for more than a month (sorry - drinking problem) and still end
up with good clean, crisp lagers.
Thanks so much for your posts to this group - I always learn from your
postings. Thanks...jeff
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Date: 08 Sep 2006 01:26:00
From: John 'Shaggy' Kolesar
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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On Thu, 07 Sep 2006 17:39:12 -0600, <jahammel68@rem0vethis.yahoo.com > wrote:
> On 7 Sep 2006 14:26:53 GMT, John 'Shaggy' Kolesar <spam@shagg.net>
> wrote:
>
>>Are you planning on lagering
>>this beer or bottling/kegging as soon as the fermentation is done?
>
> I was planning on lagering, unless you recommend differently. The
> recipe suggests:
>
> ferment at 55 for 2 weeks
> secondary at same temp for 2 weeks
> then condition at 40 for 6 weeks then prime, bottle, (I'll be doing
> forced co2 in keg) and age at 40 for 6 weeks.
>
> I >really< don't think I can wait that long. I might do the two week
> secondary, then condition for a couple to 3 weeks then keg and drink.
> I'd be interested in your opinion. I've done several extract lagers,
> some call for really long (2,3,4 months lagering) but I usually don't
> lager for more than a month (sorry - drinking problem) and still end
> up with good clean, crisp lagers.
>
> Thanks so much for your posts to this group - I always learn from your
> postings. Thanks...jeff
I don't have a lot of experience with lagers. I was mostly just asking
out of curiosity, not necessarily to recommend one or the other. IMO, your
plan sounds fine. I've heard several people say that they have good luck
with shorter lager times. Especially for your first all-grain attempt,
you'll probably be anxious to try it out. ;)
John.
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Date: 10 Sep 2006 10:52:51
From: jahammel68
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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Just a heads up - racked to secondary last night and had gravity of
1.006. Looks like the fermenting continued in the fridge, even though
the 'bubbler' wasn't active. Even smelled good and tasted good and OK
clarity. Can't wait to drink the finished product after 2ndary and
lagering.
Thanks again for your posts. Looks like I might have pulled a rookie
mistake of worrying while in primary. Cheers...jeff
On 8 Sep 2006 01:26:00 GMT, John 'Shaggy' Kolesar <spam@shagg.net >
wrote:
>On Thu, 07 Sep 2006 17:39:12 -0600, <jahammel68@rem0vethis.yahoo.com> wrote:
>> On 7 Sep 2006 14:26:53 GMT, John 'Shaggy' Kolesar <spam@shagg.net>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>Are you planning on lagering
>>>this beer or bottling/kegging as soon as the fermentation is done?
>>
>> I was planning on lagering, unless you recommend differently. The
>> recipe suggests:
>>
>> ferment at 55 for 2 weeks
>> secondary at same temp for 2 weeks
>> then condition at 40 for 6 weeks then prime, bottle, (I'll be doing
>> forced co2 in keg) and age at 40 for 6 weeks.
>>
>> I >really< don't think I can wait that long. I might do the two week
>> secondary, then condition for a couple to 3 weeks then keg and drink.
>> I'd be interested in your opinion. I've done several extract lagers,
>> some call for really long (2,3,4 months lagering) but I usually don't
>> lager for more than a month (sorry - drinking problem) and still end
>> up with good clean, crisp lagers.
>>
>> Thanks so much for your posts to this group - I always learn from your
>> postings. Thanks...jeff
>
>I don't have a lot of experience with lagers. I was mostly just asking
>out of curiosity, not necessarily to recommend one or the other. IMO, your
>plan sounds fine. I've heard several people say that they have good luck
>with shorter lager times. Especially for your first all-grain attempt,
>you'll probably be anxious to try it out. ;)
>
>
>John.
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Date: 07 Sep 2006 04:47:41
From: Jeff
Subject: Re: 1st all-grain (pilsner lager) batch questions/issues
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> My question - even though the airlock isn't 'bubbling', is there still
> fermentation going on? I guess I'll know for sure this wknd when I
> rack to secondary and take a measurement. Or, is it a bad thing if I
> aerate every day or every other day?
Jeff:
As everyone else will say, ignore the airlock and believe your
hydrometer. It sounds to me like it's coming along fine.
Now regarding the "aerating" - my assumption when I read your post was
that you were just agitating the carboy, not actually introducing
air/o2 into it. So you were really just rousing the yeast - is this
correct? Others assumed you meant introducing outside air (with o2)
into the carboy and yes, that can be pretty bad - go with that idea the
other guy gave of adding fresh wort to compensate for it if that's what
happened. However, if you just roused up the yeast and didn't introduce
any new air, I think you should be fine (but quit doing it - it's not
necessary in your situation since everything seems to be coming along
fine).
--Jeff
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