Brown Lager not fermenting

[brendweer]

Hi everyone,

I'm trying a brown lager (Heineken Gerste) recipe from a book that I found about old Dutch beers.

Recipe:
28L water (14.5L mash, 13.5L sparge)
3.9kg Pilsner malt
155g Carafa 3 malt

48g Hallertau Mittelfrüh pellets

Mash temperatures:
60 min 68C
10 min 75C

Boiled it for 60min

I've got a OG of 1.042 with a batch size of 23L in my fermenter.

Cooled it down to 18C and after aerating the wort, I added 2 pack of Saflager w34/70 on top of the foam and though it would eventually fall though it into the wort, but after 24 hours it was still on top of it so I stirred it into the wort.
The fermenter has been at around 14C since stirring it into the wort, but after 48 hours it still looks like nothing is happening, is the yeast dead? Should I add more packs of Saflager w34/70 or should I do something else?

It looks like this:

 

[Rodcx500z]

to me that looks a nice healthy krausen i would leave it, the experts will be along shortly, stick the lid back on

 

[IainM]

Looks good to me.

 

[brendweer]

Then I probably have an leak somewhere, because I have no bubbles in my airlock. I will spray some star san on the areas it might leak and take a gravity sample saturday or sunday to see what's happening.

 

[brendweer]

I had a Plaato Valve installed beneath my airlock and it was leaking, sprayed starsan on the outside but didn't see any bubbles so it was probably leaking on the sealing rubber on the inside. The gravity was at around 1.020 last friday, the recipe calculator from brewersfriend says I should aim for a final gravity of 1.007. The fermenter is at 14c/57f, I read you could bump the temperature up to 16c/60f to speed it up a bit. Is this adviced or should i keep it at 14c and wait till it's finished fermenting?

 

[RichardM]

Be patient and leave it. When it is a couple of points above expected f.g. you raise the temp for a diacetyl rest for a few days. Then rack it off to a secondary fermenter and lager it for 4 to 6 weeks before bottling or kegging.
And don't worry about your primary fermenter not being air tight, it really doesn't matter.

 

[brendweer]

Took a gravity sample with my hydrometer yesterday and it was at 1.012, it came out quite foamy so it's probably not done fermenting right? Something i found a bit odd was that it taste like it had carbonated for a bit, is this normal?

 

[IainM]

You won't know it has finished unless you leave it long enough to be sure, or take consecutive gravity readings that stay the same. Lagers take time so it's very unlikely to have finished yet. It will be slightly carbonated, because the yeast release CO2 and some of that will be in the beer, this is particularly true if it's still fermenting. If it has krausen on top, it probably still fermenting. If it's hazy with yeast, it's probably still fermenting. It seems to me that it's doing its thing, so put the lid on and leave it alone.

 

[jof]

If it's still fermenting, then it's producing CO2. So you should be able to detect a slight carbonated taste, but it shouldn't be much.

If you think it's quite carbonated, has your airlock (or valve as you mentioned it before) got blocked to prevent the CO2 escaping? Was there a hiss when you opened the top to sample it?

Edit: see. Iain beat me to it

 

[brendweer]

I don't sample at the top, I take a sample at the bottom of my conical fermenter. The airlock bubbles sometimes, not really at regular intervals. it was just enough carbonation that I though hey this is not flat like my last beer that came out of the fermenter. I will leave it and look again friday/saturday or so if it's ready to go to secondary. Should I cold crash before transfering to secondary or does it not really matter? I'm thinking of putting it into a corny keg for secondary/lagering or should I put it into a bucket/carboy?

 

[jof]

We need a lager expert to answer that question.
I only make ale & wine. I also bottle my produce rather than put it in barrels.

Maybe one of them will get back to you once the football has finished

 

[IainM]

I don't sample at the top, I take a sample at the bottom of my conical fermenter. The airlock bubbles sometimes, not really at regular intervals. it was just enough carbonation that I though hey this is not flat like my last beer that came out of the fermenter. I will leave it and look again friday/saturday or so if it's ready to go to secondary. Should I cold crash before transfering to secondary or does it not really matter? I'm thinking of putting it into a corny keg for secondary/lagering or should I put it into a bucket/carboy?

Lager is fermented at a lower temperature, and the colder it is the more CO2 it will hold on to. I don't really make lager either, but if it were me and I wanted clear, bright lager, I'd wait until it was completely finished, cold crash, and transfer onto finings in the keg.