FG reached in 5 days, too early to bottle?

[Brownster]

Hi all,
My TT landlord brew has fermented out well, reaching 1010 after 5 days, I am wondering would it be ok to bottle now?
The yeast is SF04 and reading threads here I don't want it to drop bright as I want some yeast to carry into the bottle for secondary fermentation. My dilema is the FG is right now, I don't want it to ferment more as it'll alter the flavour(it tastes damn good at the moment!) and it's in a FV with a clip on lid with a gap so I don't want it spoiling either.
It's day six now, is this too early to bottle what do you think?

[Buzz]

If the gravity has remained stable for 2 days, get it bottled.

[Brownster]

If the gravity has remained stable for 2 days, get it bottled.

Hi, it'll be 7 days tomorrow (my maths is brilliant ) so I'll check it again and see if it's still 1010.
I'm thinking I don't want it to drop below the recipe's stated FG but, I just realised, that probably represents un-fermentable sugars is that right? In which case it won't drop anymore, I think I'm getting the hang of this now

I figure I'll have drunk a large portion of the Harvey's best and the IPA come the new year, freeing up enough bottles for another brew

[clogwog]

What's the rush?

I never bottle before 2 weeks in primary. I think it gives the yeast a chance to clear up after itself, and remove some unwanted by-products of fermentation. The extra time will improve your beer, and allow it to drop clearer in the fermenter.

[Parva]

I'd agree with clogwog. I don't leave mine quite as long but 10 days is around my average in primary. Additionaly, I don't bottle mine (kegged and force-carbed) so I wouldn't leave it much beyond 10 days as you may then need to add a small amount of yeast to the bottles to get secondary fermentation going as all the yeast may have dropped out of suspension but you should have no problems bottling at 10 days.

[Brownster]

I bottled after 7 days in the end, the FG stayed at 1010 as the recipe. Primarily I was worried that it would become too dry but realised that it shouldn't drop lower because of un-fermentable sugars and I think that was right. I was also aware of people saying that when using safale 04 in particular, it drops clear quite quickly and I didn't want to be in the position where there was insufficient yeast to carry out secondary in the bottle; I'd rather have a bit of sediment than no gas! My Wheeler book says to do a drop after 4 days of fermentation to get rid of the first heavy deposits and also to barrel condition for 2 weeks when bottling but bearing the above in mind I was in two minds about following this last piece of advice.

[hoppingMad]

Hi all,
My TT landlord brew has fermented out well, reaching 1010 after 5 days, I am wondering would it be ok to bottle now?
The yeast is SF04 and reading threads here I don't want it to drop bright as I want some yeast to carry into the bottle for secondary fermentation.

Hi Brownstar, once the beer is at FG you can bottle whenever, according to your own desires, however I believe most homebrewers would advocate sitting it for a few more days to clear a bit. No need to worry about there being enough yeast, you could leave it for months and there's still plenty enough in suspension for bottle cabonation.

I don't want it to ferment more as it'll alter the flavour

whether you leave it in the fermenter or bottle it, its always going to keep on fermenting provided there are fermentables still present. Thats why its always a good idea to wait untill your gravity remains constant for two days, then you know its done. If you are ever in a hurry to bottle a brew and get it ready to drink sooner, do the "Fast Ferment Test" http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?ti ... rment_Test this allows you to know when your beer is done before it gets there, thus you could bottle without waiting for two days for those consecutive same gravity readings. I do this for all my brews now, using the wort from my OG reading. It takes precisely 1 minute to set the FFT going, then 3 days for the result.
Anyway, you're done bottling this batch, so, hope it went well.

Hopp.

[yashicamat]

that's crap!

I wont waste my time trying to explain to you why, again, there is an excellent search facility on the forum.

Not one to mince words eh, Chris? Think you're spot on with this though. JBK has one of the best forum search engines I know of.

[hoppingMad]

You meet the nicest people on these forums.
It isn't crap at all, and when I experience a problem I will fess up. But untill then, all I can do is share experineces and encourage other folks. "Lets encourage... I say"

[hoppingMad]

Brownster, assuming you might be interested, it seems to me you have (at least) a couple of options: you could continue on through your brewing hobby under the assumption that you have a problem and continue to rectify that assumed problem every time by adding yeast at carbonation or, you might try just bottling and see whether there is a problem. Perhaps there might be the two of us who don't have it ?
Why not try bottling half a dozen bottles without adding any yeast and the rest you could try adding yeast to.

As for me, I'm obviously crazy. Here I go again imagining that all my bottles are fizzy when in reality, they're flat, thanks for putting me straight Chris, I'll start adding yeast..... er ....just in case from now on.
By the way SO4 was my mainstay yeast before obtaining S-23 and later on several Wyeast strains. I'm glad all those ... " too many factors ... " you mention, just don't seem to happen to me.

[Parva]

I can think of many reasons I wouldn't want to leave beer sat on the yeast cake for several months and carbonating it would be the least of my worries.

[BarnsleyBrewer]

I'm with you on this Chris, when I use S04 I bottle after 7 days, yes you get a slight yeast deposit in the bottle but where's the problem in that?
Using Windsor yeast would be a bigger problem when bottling, I'll never use it again!

Years ago I let a brew clear to much, the bottles took months to carbonate, and it was only slight.

[Trough Lolly]

Hi all,
My TT landlord brew has fermented out well, reaching 1010 after 5 days, I am wondering would it be ok to bottle now?
The yeast is SF04 and reading threads here I don't want it to drop bright as I want some yeast to carry into the bottle for secondary fermentation. My dilema is the FG is right now, I don't want it to ferment more as it'll alter the flavour(it tastes damn good at the moment!) and it's in a FV with a clip on lid with a gap so I don't want it spoiling either.
It's day six now, is this too early to bottle what do you think?

As Buzz pointed out, if your gravity's stable after a couple of days, you're good to go.

Cheers,
TL