No more autolysis

[Blktre]

There has been some discussion with Denny Con about autolysis, oxidation, and HSA. He posted an excerpt about a conversation. Ive been experimenting with primary cold crashing and have found no autolysis issues. But its nice to have some justification from industry leaders. Ive always been a huge secondary fan. But this is going to change my entire technique for clear beers and yeast storage for cultivated strains. Thought I'd share in case you missed it. Just remember to make starters and aerate properly if you are going to do this.

If you're an AHA member, I can direct you to what John Palmer, Jamil, and Chris white have to say about it. Here's an excerpt....

"But then modern medicine appeared, or in our case, better yeast and better yeast-handling information. Suddenly, death by autolysis is rare for a beer because of two factors: the freshness and health of the yeast being pitched has drastically improved, and proper pitching rates are better understood. The yeast no longer drop dead and burst like Mr. Creosote from Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life when fermentation is complete – they are able to hibernate and wait for the next fermentation to come around. The beer has time to clarify in the primary fermenter without generating off-flavors. With autolysis no longer a concern, staling becomes the main problem. The shelf life of a beer can be greatly enhanced by avoiding oxygen exposure and storing the beer cold (after it has had time to carbonate).

Therefore I, and Jamil and White Labs and Wyeast Labs, do not recommend racking to a secondary fermenter for ANY ale, except when conducting an actual second fermentation, such as adding fruit or souring. Racking to prevent autolysis is not necessary, and therefore the risk of oxidation is completely avoidable. Even lagers do not require racking to a second fermenter before lagering. With the right pitching rate, using fresh healthy yeast, and proper aeration of the wort prior to pitching, the fermentation of the beer will be complete within 3-8 days (bigger = longer). This time period includes the secondary or conditioning phase of fermentation when the yeast clean up acetaldehyde and diacetyl. The real purpose of lagering a beer is to use the colder temperatures to encourage the yeast to flocculate and promote the precipitation and sedimentation of microparticles and haze.

So, the new rule of thumb: don’t rack a beer to a secondary, ever, unless you are going to conduct a secondary fermentation."

[Rob Martin]

Wow...this is a fundamental shift in how I approach fermentation. I'm up to my 92nd batch of beer; I've secondaried at least 85 of them.

Typical ale fermentation for me is 1 week primary, 2 weeks secondary, one week carbonating in a keg. Typical lager for me is 4 weeks primary between 45-58, raise to 65ish for 3-4 days, rack to secondary and sit another 4 weeks 45-58, then carbonate in keg for 1 week.

So does this comment basically mean don't secondary...at all?

[JMcG]

No where near the experience of either of you guys, but the only "secondary" I've ever used is the keg for dry hopping, conditioning/lagering, etc.
jim

[Matt]

Rob, note that he said "for ANY ale", no secondary is needed of any kind. 3-8 days with proper pitch and temp is all you need.

On lagers, he said you'd still do your lagering, he's just saying that you don't have to rack to a second container for that, because the yeast will drop out and hibernate, and not cause off-flavors IF you're pitching correct volumes and maintaining correct temperatures.

At least, that's how I read it.

I'm with Andy though. Mad respect to Mr. Conn. I love his recipes and he's brilliant, but I've always gotten better results when I've racked my beer off the trub into a fresh container and let the beer continue to age and clarify as the haze and microparticles drop out of suspension once I've hit my numbers in primary.

Maybe it's BECAUSE I'm not as good of a brewer as he is that I feel the need to get the beer off the trub. I am awesome as far as santization goes, but I have lost a few beers due to yeast that went wonky. So I get it off the yeast as soon as I hit my numbers. And again, I'm with Andy... cold crashing is my tried and true method of halting the fermentation and getting the yeast to go dormant and drop out.

And yes, as he puts it, it's not really a "secondary fermentation" -- just aging and clarifying in a fresh container -- because I'm not actually getting the yeast re-activated -- just letting them clean up after themselves. But it does allow me to better dry-hop, etc. In a carboy, I can see the beer, I can easily use a wine thief to take samples. I can see the sediment on the bottom. When I've used a mesh bag in-keg to dry-hop, I can't see what's going on. But I know there's going to be sediment at the bottom of the keg, which causes at least the first few pints pulled to be murky. It's a small issue, but when I tap a keg, I want carbonation to be my only concern. Not sediment.

Plus, once it's in the keg, I just want to drink it. :) So by the time it's perfectly dry-hopped, the volume has dropped, or worse, I'll leave the bag in too long and over-hop the beer, and it starts getting overly grassy, etc. When it's in carboy, it's in front of me daily and I won't forget to take a sample and rack off the hops into keg when it's time.

Anyway, I know a lot of you just "secondary" in-keg, and I've tasted your beers and liked them... so I'm probably just being overly cautious. But it works for me, so I'll probably keep doing it the old way.

Matt

[Matt]

Oh, and on the issue of oxidation, which is really what they're trying to avoid by not racking to secondary, I fill my carboys with CO2 (which we all know is heavier than air), then rack into them, so when I put the airlock on, there's nothing in the carboy but beer and CO2.

Oxidation in secondary has never been an issue for me.

Matt

[Matt]

As a side-note, I should probably also mention that it's guys like Shane and Andy and other venerable members of the club who taught me these techniques in the first place, so it's no surprise that I'm as surprised as Andy is at these new recommendations. I suppose in the end I'll likely adopt whatever methods/changes they find to produce the best beer too.

Matt

[Blktre]

Matt,
What I get from this is if you pitch quality cell counts then crashing a primary after reaching terminal gravity and aging as we would normally do in secondary, but in primary then oxidation and autolysis isn't a issue. I build my starters on a plate with steps anyways and feel my cell counts are good. Even tho Ive never experienced oxidation by secondary bulk ageing as far as I know, Im going to start crashing primaries on 95% of my beers. Style specific. Since I am now 100% using sanke kegs as primary>serving with closed system transfers, this might be beneficial to me. It also gives me a place to store my yeast for a extra few weeks. Of course if I need the cake, dryhop, or sour a true secondary will be needed.

Ive done this technique a handful of times. But Im old school and have had closed ears to change. As you noted, once you find something that works, why stray from it. I dont really see this as a shortcut, but instead refining technique. Im actually excited about it. One less step. One less thing to clean.

I encourage others to try this and report towards the end of the year your conclusions!

Cheers,
Andy

[klickcue]

I haven't used a secondary in near on 200 batches. I use the kegs as bright tanks. My beer sets in the primary for 2 weeks. If you beer cannot set on the yeast for two weeks, what do you think the chances are that you can buy yeast to use

The only time that I secondary is with Belgian ales that will set for a long time. Even at that, the beer is removed from the primary yeast and the bugs are added.

[Blktre]

I haven't used a secondary in near on 200 batches. I use the kegs as bright tanks. My beer sets in the primary for 2 weeks. If you beer cannot set on the yeast for two weeks, what do you think the chances are that you can buy yeast to use

The only time that I secondary is with Belgian ales that will set for a long time. Even at that, the beer is removed from the primary yeast and the bugs are added.

Something I will not ever do is serve from a keg that was used as a secondary or bright tank. There are a few hazy styles I see no issue doing this. I move my kegs around to much to have to deal with disturbed yeast trub. And its ultra sweet to clean a keg with zero drop out. Hoping the new technique will be close to my current results.

[Steve Brown]

I haven't used a secondary for ales in quite a while; since about 1996. Back then I read somewhere that autolysis wasn't a big factor for up to three or four months. I figured that I'd save a step, avoid an infection point, and not break any glass.... To help fermentation, I agitate my (plastic bucket) fermenter a few times between days 5 to 8, then after 10 - 14 days total I move my fermenter to a kitchen counter where it's a few degrees warmer for another week as the yeast settles.

When I rack into keg, I start the syphon only about half-way to the bottom and gradually lower it as the level drops - I figured that this would help leave even more of the trub behind. Dry hop and cold crash while carbonating. After 3 or 4 days I agitate the keg just a bit so that the yeast will slide further to the bottom of the keg; after a week total in the keg I draw most of the remaining trub off in about a half-pint.

[Frank]

First I am completely down with the original posted article. I rarely use a secondary container for any reason, been that way since day one. That being said, one thing that hasn't been brought up yet is the use of plastic fermenters and this technique. Like most people I am still in the 5 gallon batch range and use ale pales for fermentation. Understand that these buckets are still semipermeable to Oxygen. The evidence is the fact that the buckets take on color after a few batches. If microscopic amounts of wort/beer "soak" in the bucket, oxygen can certainly make it in. 10 to 12 weeks seem to be the most common time for how long to leave it before racking to a non-permeable container (glass). Unfortunately there is very little "scientific" evidence for proof because who wants to let their beer sit in a fermentation bucket until it oxidizes? However this is the rule in my practice, better safe then sorry.

[Blktre]

First I am completely down with the original posted article. I rarely use a secondary container for any reason, been that way since day one. That being said, one thing that hasn't been brought up yet is the use of plastic fermenters and this technique. Like most people I am still in the 5 gallon batch range and use ale pales for fermentation. Understand that these buckets are still semipermeable to Oxygen. The evidence is the fact that the buckets take on color after a few batches. If microscopic amounts of wort/beer "soak" in the bucket, oxygen can certainly make it in. 10 to 12 weeks seem to be the most common time for how long to leave it before racking to a non-permeable container (glass). Unfortunately there is very little "scientific" evidence for proof because who wants to let their beer sit in a fermentation bucket until it oxidizes? However this is the rule in my practice, better safe then sorry.

Excellent thinking here on plastic. Of course that has been the thought for a long time. Here is a little graph that Raj Apte came up with after some testing on o2 and different types of vessels. This came about for questions about brewing sour beers.



Tank Volume [L] O2 cc/L.year
Burgundy barrel 300 8.5
Rodenbach tank, wood, small 12,000 0.86
Rodenbach tank, wood, large 20,000 0.53
HDPE bucket 20 220
Homebrew barrel 40 23
Glass carboy, 30cm vinyl immersion tube 20 0.31
Glass carboy, silicone stopper 20 17
Glass carboy, wood stopper 20 0.10

[Rob Martin]

Tank Volume [L] O2 cc/L.year
Burgundy barrel 300 8.5
Rodenbach tank, wood, small 12,000 0.86
Rodenbach tank, wood, large 20,000 0.53
HDPE bucket 20 220
Homebrew barrel 40 23
Glass carboy, 30cm vinyl immersion tube 20 0.31
Glass carboy, silicone stopper 20 17
Glass carboy, wood stopper 20 0.10


Sorry Andy, but I'm not comprehending this. Will you please long hand write this out for me? Sorry to be a pain, but I really want to grasp this.

[Blktre]

Rob,
The chart shows the different types of vessel material and how much o2 penetration each has in terms of volume of the vessel and the amount of o2 per year.
I highlighted the HDPE bucket and carboy since these types of vessels are the most common home brewers use. The volume of each is the same, but the HDPE plastic allows a shit ton more o2 penetration than glass with a silicone stopper.

So the point here is if someone is going to do extended cold crash primary in HDPE, then this should be helpful to know there is a marginal risk of oxidation in doing so. Altho, Ive read where some brewers have had no ill effect.

[Frank]

So you saying

a HDPE bucket with a volume 20liters lets 220 cubic centimeters of Oxygen in every year.