Racking Off

[Barticus]

I think that's what you call it ?

Yesterday I transferred my 7 day old fermented Wherry from the original FV to a secondary FV. Obviously I have heard people mention doing this to get it off the yeast cake and to help clear it up etc etc.

This morning my secondary see through FV now has a further inch of trug on the bottom after just a day. Surely had I just bottled as normal then all of this rubbish would have ended up in the bottles, possibly making the finished product taste worse?

My plan is to give it a week in here and then transfer to the original FV (with tap) to bulk prime and bottle. Obviously I am only on to my third kit and experimenting to find what works for me and try and improve the taste.

Apart from the risk of infection is there a downside to this? IE Will I have left too many yeasties behind to ferment in the bottle?

It just seems strange that everyone doesnt do this given the amount of muck it cuts out

[trucker5774]

Be careful not to splash and oxidise when transferring. An inch in your second FV I would expect about that as a total. I don't believe that racking to a second vessel helps to settle any debris out. Anything that is in suspension in the liquid will settle to the bottom, regardless. It doesn't know it's been transferred! I only transfer if I want to make additions such as dry hops, bulk priming etc, or if I didn't want the beer to sit on the yeast cake for a long period.

[winka]

Personally Id have left it in Primary FV for 14 days, then racked to a secondry for bulk priming then bottling. This works for me and after 7 days there may still have been a bit of primary fermentation going on, also the beer will be fine on the yeast cake for a while so Ive read, certainly for at least up to 3 weeks. Did you add finings after transfering?

Cheers

[Barticus]

An inch in your second FV I would expect about that as a total. I don't believe that racking to a second vessel helps to settle any debris out. Anything that is in suspension in the liquid will settle to the bottom, regardless.

Not sure what you mean by this. I syphoned off from the original being very careful to avoid the trub at the bottom. After a day in the second FV the stuff that must have been in suspension has now sunk to the bottom and looks like this.




When I next transfer to a bottling bucket to bulk prime, I will no doubt leave all this second trub behind.

Surely if I had simply bottled from the first FV then this second trub would have been in the bottles???

Sorry if Im missing something obvious (I usually do)

[Barticus]

Personally Id have left it in Primary FV for 14 days, then racked to a secondry for bulk priming then bottling. This works for me and after 7 days there may still have been a bit of primary fermentation going on, also the beer will be fine on the yeast cake for a while so Ive read, certainly for at least up to 3 weeks. Did you add finings after transfering?

Cheers

No Ive never used finings. Should I be using them?

After having two very yeasty brews I am just trying to get this one as "clean" as possible.

[Matt12398]

+1 to what Winka said.

Just leave it two weeks in the primary. You won't have any issues if you do that. Transferring to secondary for further storage just increases the risk of oxidation and infection. It should be fairly clear after two weeks and leave a faint dusty deposit in the bottles.

Wherry is very tasty. I first tasted mine after about two weeks in the bottle and it tasted good but about 4 weeks on from that it now tastes amazing.

I don't think you need to worry about finings. I've never used them but from what I've read they can decrease the shelf life and strip out some of the body.

[Barticus]

Cheers Matt,

Cant tell you how much Im dying to taste something good that Ive made. Have real high hopes for this wherry.

The waiting is the killer bit in Homebrew. Roll on Rolling Stock

[winka]

I wouldnt bother with finnings either, just wondered if the the sediment was so much because of finning out and making all the stuff drop.

Im about to bulk prime my Coopers APA in the next few minuites, its been in the primary FV 2 weeks and 2 days now, will prime, leave to sit for 20 min then bottle

Cheers

[trucker5774]

An inch in your second FV I would expect about that as a total. I don't believe that racking to a second vessel helps to settle any debris out. Anything that is in suspension in the liquid will settle to the bottom, regardless.

Not sure what you mean by this. I syphoned off from the original being very careful to avoid the trub at the bottom. After a day in the second FV the stuff that must have been in suspension has now sunk to the bottom and looks like this.




When I next transfer to a bottling bucket to bulk prime, I will no doubt leave all this second trub behind.

Surely if I had simply bottled from the first FV then this second trub would have been in the bottles???

Sorry if Im missing something obvious (I usually do)

Yes if you bottled from the first FV at the time you racked to the 2nd, then the debris would be in the bottles. If you left the beer in the first FV, then the debris you are looking at in the picture would just have settle on top of what was already there......eg 7 days in the first and 7 days in the second gives a total 14 days. The total of 14 days would have resulted in the same total settlement, but the debris would just be all in the first FV.....less hassle!

[Barticus]

New it would be something obvious

Cheers.

[Kev888]

Racking to a second FV won't usually speed up settling, in fact it can mix up stuff that was beginning to settle and slow it. The reason most people who use a secondary FV do so, is because they're concerned about autolysis - getting odd tastes from leaving too much dying yeast at the bottom.

Opinion varies (a lot) on if/when this becomes a problem, and many people just leave it in the first fermenter, me included. But you won't actually harm the beer 'if' everything is well sanitised, if you avoid oxidising/splashing the beer and if you don't do it too soon (to rob the fermenting beer of yeast prematurely). Its a trade-off realy; the more playing around with the beer then inevitably also the higher are the chances or something going wrong.

I'd suspect that you may have done it a little soon if you got 'that' much sediment so quickly after racking; as you can see, you perhaps haven't gained that much in terms of possible autolysis effects because quite a lot was still carried forward. Also though, cooling can help it settle, so if it lost heat after transferring that may be a reason for the sudden sediment. You have to be sure that the fermentation has ended, but cooling to fridge temperatures or even close to zero can be an effective way of helping it settle out.

Cheers
kev

[trucker5774]

If I wasn't such a lazy bugger i should have said what Kev said above

[Kev888]

Its more likely the long, tedious, frustrating day at work on my part.. Sometimes I'd swear that JBK is the only thing keeping me vaguely sane..

Cheers
kev