Clearing/Storage of beer

[trueheart]

Hi there

My mate and I have done two kits now but the last kit has been bottled for over three weeks now but still is quite hazy. We did not add any finings as we have read that most people do not bother. We have some heavy sedimentation in the bottle and it has a hazy colour to it. It tastes OK but not amazing. It was fermented for 10 days and then I transfered it to a bottling bucket. Should I have left for a few more days in the bottling bucket?

We have been out and bought a Norfolk Nog kit and don't want to make any mistakes with this one as you can understand they are more expensive. We have a couple of questions to ask any body who can help.

1. What exactly is secondary fermentation, is this when 1 teaspoon of sugar is added to the bottles when bottling?

2. How can i reduce sediment in the bottle and make my beer a little brighter. We keep it at room temperature for 4-5 days after bottling then store the bottles in a fridge to condition, is this right?

Any help on conditioning and storage will be gratefully received as I want to do it right, there is no point spending time and money fermenting it just to ruin it at the end.


Cheers
Phill

[moobli]

my bottles are stored in the warm brew room for 7-10 days then moved to somewhere cooler(garden shed ) in crates for as long as i can bear them to be there, 2 weeks so far they get better with age ,windows are blacked out to stop light strike even tho they are in brown bottles
i bring some in and place in the fridge for 24hrs then either open and drink or stand on the side for an hour then drink

you might be getting chill haze
or just not being patient enough
you get a secondary ferment in the bottle and yes this is when the extra sugar goes in
be more patient with first ferment ref sediment allow it to settle out a bit
then prime and bottle and leave it alone for along while

[daveyk]

You might want to check out....

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=25946

Dave

[kfm]

All my bottled stuff gets 3 months conditioning now, had to build up stocks to be able to do it but the difference in clarity and flavour are huge. good yeast (use S04 a lot) helps too as it will cling good to bottom of the bottle

[Chase24]

Not sure what caused the haze first time round but to be honest I tend to have problems like that when my hygiene hasn't been as good as it ought... there's plenty of bacteria and wild yeasts that can get in and affect the beer without making it undrinkable.

You'll also get less sediment in the bottle if you take care when you're syphoning off from the FV - try to leave as much of the trub at the bottom of the FV as you can.