First brew attempt. I have a wood fords wherry beerkit.
I started fermentation at about 10 wednesday evening, it's in a brew bucket with lid , i intend to transfer it to a barrel over the weekend as the instructions say. I have it in the airing cupboard and it seems to be a almost constant 20-21c in there, i have taken temperature reading throughout the day and night.
After about 12 hours is was fermenting well with a good yeast cake on the top. Then after checking again late thursday evening it seemed to still be going strong.
Today the yeast cake has gone from over a inch thick to less than a quarter of a inch thick. Is this what is supposed to happen? Is it showing it's getting time to transfer it to the barrel? Should i check a sample with the hydrometer? Total newby, read a load of stuff up but there is still lot's i don't know, help will be very much appreciated.
wherry kit...
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Kev888
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Re: wherry kit...
Yes thats the way it works - if by yeast cake you mean the froth on top anyway (usually it means the sediment at the bottom, but I can't imagine that disapearing). The exact speed of the process differs a lot between situations and yeasts but it sounds normal to me - it builds up from not much to lots of froth and then gradually subsides to leave a largely lifeless looking beer with a bit of scum floating on top.
Racking to the barrel is usually done after the fermentation (and therefore also the creation of sediment) has pretty much finished - and the remaining froth suggests that it is slowing but hasn't yet finished.
Once the foam has dissapeared (leaving just a bit of scum) you could take readings with the hydrometer to verify that it has. Make sure anything contacting the beer has been sanitised though. If the readings remain consistant over samples of the same temperature and a day or two appart then it should be mostly done.
There's no major hurry though, if the vessel is properly covered I happily wait ten days to two weeks from beginning the fermentation before racking to the next container - it allows more time for solids to settle out and there'll still be more than enough yeast left in suspension for thesubsequent priming to get going. The only time I feel more urgency is if the fermentation is happening in a very loosely covered fermenter, such as having a tea towel instead of a proper lid, in those cases I rack it to something a bit better protected soon after activity ceases.
Cheers
kev
Racking to the barrel is usually done after the fermentation (and therefore also the creation of sediment) has pretty much finished - and the remaining froth suggests that it is slowing but hasn't yet finished.
Once the foam has dissapeared (leaving just a bit of scum) you could take readings with the hydrometer to verify that it has. Make sure anything contacting the beer has been sanitised though. If the readings remain consistant over samples of the same temperature and a day or two appart then it should be mostly done.
There's no major hurry though, if the vessel is properly covered I happily wait ten days to two weeks from beginning the fermentation before racking to the next container - it allows more time for solids to settle out and there'll still be more than enough yeast left in suspension for thesubsequent priming to get going. The only time I feel more urgency is if the fermentation is happening in a very loosely covered fermenter, such as having a tea towel instead of a proper lid, in those cases I rack it to something a bit better protected soon after activity ceases.
Cheers
kev
Kev
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BeerJam
Re: wherry kit...
cheers man thats pretty much sorted my misunderstandings, i'll keep an eye on it and see how it goes, if this works i'm going to be doing a lot more homebrew 