Fixby Gold : Back for more

[fivetide]

Hello JBK! Long time no see. I'm all out of beer! I'll catch up in the tap room...

For my first brew in a while I'm going to try a Fixby Gold later on and hope the drops in temperature in my house overnight don't adversely affect the fermentation too much. Has anyone else had any problems fermenting while there are still frosts out? I should think it dips from about 19c to 15c until the CH kicks back in.

Anyway, just made a big starter with two sachets of JRB 6G Premium, spraymalt and a dash of Yeast-Vit. I'm going to follow DAB's tried and trusted and keep it pretty straight, but will probably dry-hop with some Styrian or something in secondary for fun.

Nice to be back in the land of the brewing!

[fivetide]

Great, I'm officially brewing again. About bloody time, eh? Some great smells in the kitchen!

I used DaaB's Brupak advice pretty much to the letter. I boiled the teabag for 20 minutes to add some bittering but not too much, remembered the Campden, ended up with a total of 23 litres or therabouts and an OG of 1041 which sounds about right for this kind of beer. Aerated just short of my arms falling off. The starter had been doing its stuff for about 12hrs and went in nice and cool.

Here are some pics for those of you interested:

Ten minutes boiling the extract


Twenty minute boil of teabag


Cooling big pan


Tricky as ever to get OG but eventually settled on 1041


Aeration, aeration, aeration


It'll sit here for up to ten days, then go into secondary

[stevezx7r]

Welcome back Fivetide. I've recently sailed back to the Home Brew shores after a bit of a lay off too.

Nice pics btw.

[Iank]

The starter had been doing its stuff for about 12hrs and went in nice and cool.

That's another lesson for me. My Colne Valley starter only had about 90 mins so must remember to do that earlier next time.

Great pics btw!

[fivetide]

About 20 hours in and there's now decent bubbler action, head formation and some minor lava lamp activity in the bottom of the bucket.

Looking forward to working along to burping beer tomorrow then!

Krausen deep but bubbly rather than creamy at this stage:




Two hours later it all kicked off nicely. Rah.

[daveyk]

wow that is a good head at the aeration stage... is that what I should be aiming for. I thought my recent brews had been aerated but nothing compared to that pic.

Thanks..... need to put a little more 'arm action' in next time.

[fivetide]

Whenever fermentations stick, the first question always seems to be - "Did you aerate enough?" So I just make sure I'm in no doubt and can take that stage at least out of the equation. Some people put their paddles in electric drills, which I've always thought sounded a great idea but have never actually done myself as yet.

I'll stick the hydro in tomorrow night and see how it's going. I bet it's only 1020 though, it always seems to be on first check for some reason!

[GTOrichie]

I have noticed that you can get air pumps and stainless air stones for this job, has anyone tried it at all?

EDIT: sorry I know it's a little off topic

[fivetide]

I haven't, but DaaB discussed this option when I had trouble early on. I think it's cheaper if you make your own 'wort aerater' with aquarium kit though.

My own patented method is to put on some lively music that lasts ten minutes or so and paddle until it finishes! Might give the drill option a go one day though.

[fivetide]

Okay. Tested this tonight after five days in the fermenter and it is now at 1018 from 1041. I anticipated around 1020 as ever, but want to get down closer to 1012 by the end of the week before moving into secondary for the last couple of points and a 4% beer.

As you can see it had slowed down dramatically...


...so I roused the yeasties without delay and have popped the lid back on until Thurday or Friday when I'll transfer to the wine fermenter.

[Aleman]

I have noticed that you can get air pumps and stainless air stones for this job, has anyone tried it at all?

EDIT: sorry I know it's a little off topic

I have, and the problem is the duration that the bubbles are in contact with the wort for its a very short contact time and therefore there is little gas exchange taking place. so You have to run the air pump for an extended duration. What I do with mine is to use pure O2 (Disposable welding cylinders are available) and do the aeration while transferring from the chiller to the FV, the wort movement across the air stone produces a really fine 'bead' and the 10M of tube to the FV allows for an extended contact time. If I was using air to do the same thing I would look at one of the 'nail art' air compressors to do the job as you would need somewhere in the order of 10L per min of air to get the same sort of effect that I get from using 2L per min of O2

[fivetide]

I actually think my front room still gets a bit cold at nights and this hasn't helped the yeast get to work quickly. Since I've been sitting in here today with the CH back on, the bubbler has started picking up again and some sort of head is reforming. Good.

[fivetide]

Meh. 1015


Still a little work to do before secondary transfer at end of the week.

[fivetide]

Stirred up the yeast into suspension and threw in a half tsp of Yeast-Vit for good measure, but the yeast has already formed in quite large clumps so most fell to the bottom again rather quickly.

It's nearly there though, so should be alright in the end after a bit more primary and some secondary shenanigans.

I've forgotten how to be patient, that's my problem and it's just sitting here staring at me as I work. I need my H&G order to arrive so I can start a couple of others off and forget this one for a while.

[fivetide]

After eight days this is at 1014 from 1041.

I think I must have overdone the liquer, don't know how, because my brother has just made up a Fixby Gold and his has an OG of 1045. No matter.

I am moving it into a secondary bucket for a week to try and drop it clear before racking to a Corni. I've had a few qualms about transfering through my fermenter's red tap and tubing in the past, so I've decided to siphon it the old fashioned way with one of those swan-neck jobs, which is slower but appears to create much less bubbling in the secondary bucket.

Here it goes then...



Haven't decided yet whether to dryhop this one or leave it as is. I pretty much dry hop everything, and the Steam Beer I'm making will be highly hopped before bottling. What do you think, a bit of First Gold or something, or leave it alone?