Maximum amount of time in Primary?

[Mr_Booze]

Evening all,

I am quite a simple brewer. I chuck in the can of syrupy stuff, along with (usually) a Brew Enhancer. Add yeast. Then, leave for about a week or so (a few days until the airlock stops bubbling) and then bottle. All good so far. In fact, just opened a Czech Pilsener (1 and a half months in bottle) and it is magic!

Anyway, having read a bit about racking (which I can't see myself ever doing, as I am far too lazy) on this site and having also read the hearsay comments of some of the HB experts (John Palmer, I think?) who say racking is not the way to go, but instead leave the wort in primary for an extended period of time, my question is this:

Without racking, is there a maximum time you can leave the wort in the primary? To be honest, the longest I've ever left one in before bottling is 11 days!

To get the effect of racking, should I leave it in there for 5 weeks or so? Could this perhaps ruin the beer?

P.S. Hope I've got all the terminology right, I'm kinda new....

[beernut]

Mr Booze
You wont get "the effect of racking", unless you do it.
It depends on what type of beer ur brewing. Eg:
Belgian Wit - (low floc yeast)no racking required.
Bottle or keg immed after primary complete.
Czech Pils - rack with finings (crystal clear beer)& lager if possible.
Lazy or not, you need to get your beer off those dead cells as soon as u can after ferment complete to avoid oxidisation.
NB. the tecnical brewing term for the syrupy stuff is "Goo"
Cheers Glenn.

[rodman]

Mr Booze,
Racking is a good idea, it just has to be done right.
Here's the link to Palmers page on the subject:
http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter8-4.html

And here's a quote from him:
"I have always argued that through careful transfer, secondary fermentation is beneficial to nearly all beer styles."

Having read his thoughts on glass carboys, I've used a plastic one for all my secondaries and they come out well.
As for purging the headspace of oxygen, try adding 3 teaspoons of sugar to the brew before sealing. (You can add this in with finings if you're using them.)
This kicks off fermentation again for about a day, producing enough CO2 to fill the headspace.
I leave mine to sit for 7 days.

Rodman

[Pale_Ale]

I now rack, and have found benefits, mostly in the colour of the beer but also in the taste.

You can also achieve these benefits by leaving in the primary for a longer time. I would suggest in a normal ale 1 week for fermentation to be complete and leave in for a further 2 weeks to condition.

This would give you a similar result to racking IMO.

As to the length of time you can leave in primary, as long as the fermenter was sanitised properly etc., I think it would be months before the trub would be an issue.

When I am racking I leave in secondary for minimum 2 weeks, as recommended by Palmer.

[Chris]

I rack everything. It has so many benefits. It's also good to hear that Palmer has made that statement- ie that racking benefits beer. Everyone always wants to quote him as saying the opposite.

[The Proud Anselmo]

I just tried this out by accident, I can't actually remember when we made this batch that we bottled yesterday but it was there on new years when I was thinking its been in there a month or so already.
My experience from that is more time = more good. Sitting it in the fermenter on the yeast cake will NOT ruin your beer, unless it was infected or crap to start with, or your being completely over the top leaving it for months and months.
But leaving it in for longer will allow it to clear out more (but not as much as racking), except for that bottom bit which is a bit tricky to get without heaps of yeast in it too.

[Chris]

I assume you are referring to leaving it in primary, not 2ndary.

Having made that assumption, I really disagree. Leaving the beer in primary for months is just begging for off flavours to be produced from autolysis.

I agree that fermenter time is good, but get it off the cake.

[Pale_Ale]

I think you'd be pretty safe with a few weeks in the primary though

[Chris]

A few weeks won't be an issue. I'd avoid months though.

[chris.]

Mr Booze,
Racking is a good idea, it just has to be done right.
Here's the link to Palmers page on the subject:
http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter8-4.html

And here's a quote from him:
"I have always argued that through careful transfer, secondary fermentation is beneficial to nearly all beer styles."

Correct me if I am wrong but the version of how to brew on the internet is the first (or perhaps 2nd?) addition?

A more upto date quote by Palmer can be found here:

http://www.brewboard.com/index.php?s=00 ... 3281&st=32

"Since I am one source of racking-to-secondary dogma, let me change my tune:

In the next edition of HtB, I confess that I rarely rack to a secondary these days, and I no longer recommend racking every beer to a secondary to get it off the trub.

As many other brewers have noted, just leaving it alone in the primary for 3-4 weeks accomplishes the secondary fermentation or conditioning processes, and the beer is much improved over one that was moved too soon. Like MtnBrewer, I rack lagers*, and high gravity beers, and fruit beers. Otherwise I just leave it in the primary.

*I didn't rack a Vienna I make for the SCal homebrew fest last year, just lagered it in the primary and it was great.

I have tasted autolyzed beer while judging, so it can happen, but I have never had it happen to me. Good yeast practice, good fermentation practice, = no need to rack most of the time.

Cheers,

John"

[rwh]

It's the first edition. Also, note that Palmer probably has good temperature control. The risk of off-flavours is increased as the temperature increases and/or fluctuates, and the advantage of racking is greater in these conditions.

[chris.]

It's the first edition. Also, note that Palmer probably has good temperature control. The risk of off-flavours is increased as the temperature increases and/or fluctuates, and the advantage of racking is greater in these conditions.

I own the 3rd edition. In which he advocates stable temperatures but nothing about elaborate forms of temperature control.

The "I have always argued that through careful transfer, secondary fermentation is beneficial to nearly all beer styles." comment is nowhere to be found.

[ryan]

It's the first edition. Also, note that Palmer probably has good temperature control. The risk of off-flavours is increased as the temperature increases and/or fluctuates, and the advantage of racking is greater in these conditions.

I own the 3rd edition. In which he advocates stable temperatures but nothing about elaborate forms of temperature control.

The "I have always argued that through careful transfer, secondary fermentation is beneficial to nearly all beer styles." comment is nowhere to be found.

Chris., nowhere to be found in 3rd. edition, do you mean? Or nowhere to be found in any of the 3 editions?
I agree with his comment in the 3rd edition, myself. I racked to secondary for years but only do so now if I want to reuse clean yeast slurry from the secondary fermenter. Otherwise, its 2-3 weeks in primary at 18*, then into bottles for "secondary".
I see Palmer also says "plastic carboys do not work well for secondary....etc.", so a lot of people might be doing unnecessary work.
That would be something I wouldn`t agree with though.

[rwh]

Be careful with using yeast slurry from secondary, as it has different flocculation characteristics (weaker in this case) than the primary.

[ryan]

thanks. I`ve heard that,but never had any problems. I always repitch at least 500 ml., usually a litre. The slurry from secondary is always much more free of hop debris than from primary.
As a point of interest and more out of curiosity, I`ve reused the same US-56 yeast 3 times. Only defect it had on its 3rd use was longer to fire up.
{about 8 hours or so}
But I think if you get 2 goes out of a yeast pack for $4, you`re doing ok.

[Pale_Ale]

Yep, and I'd actually just skim off the primary anyway, and do a darker beer with the harvested yeast. That way any hop residue or other flavours aren't going to stand out as much.

[Chris]

That's why more people enter dark beers into comps!

And that doesn't fit with your name PA!

[Pale_Ale]

And that doesn't fit with your name PA!

I make the occassional exception and winter is only a few months away

[drsmurto]

When reusing the slurry wont the hops form the previous brew influence the flavour of the 2nd one, particularly if you are changing hops?

I have started using the US-56 yeast instead of kit yeast and would love to reuse it, save a little cash on each brew.......

[rwh]

I think the influence of the hops is fairly minimal, because to extract anything from the hops apart from the most volatile compounds, you need to boil them. You're obviously not doing this in the fermenter. Also, any volatile compounds that would have come out of them probably have already come out.