Young's American IPA Brew

[Howard Taylor]

Hi everyone,

I am now just a week into brewing a Young's AIPA kit. Starting SG was 1.070, currently it's reading 1.012 but still has quite a lot of activity going on and lots of krausen. In these cooler days I have used a submersible tube type heater to keep the fermenter at a decent temperature of 23-25°C. I note that te instructions for this kit suggest a final SG of around 1.010 for my brew. As I am already near to that level after one week and I realise that the level will continue to fall over the next week, my question is would it still be worth leaving this brew in the fermenter for maybe as long as 3 weeks before I move to the next stage, that is would it give me a better brew at all? Also, for those of you that have brewed this beer ( many I guess!!!) what may I expect as a typical SG after this sort of extended fermentation period? Would it matter to the brew if it gets down to say 1.004 for example?

Thanks for any help you can offer me on this.

One final point, is it worthwhile using some king of things to clear the beer before bottling. I can't cold crash as I don't have the kit required.

 

[Mungri]

Hi everyone,

I am now just a week into brewing a Young's AIPA kit. Starting SG was 1.070, currently it's reading 1.012 but still has quite a lot of activity going on and lots of krausen. In these cooler days I have used a submersible tube type heater to keep the fermenter at a decent temperature of 23-25°C. I note that te instructions for this kit suggest a final SG of around 1.010 for my brew. As I am already near to that level after one week and I realise that the level will continue to fall over the next week, my question is would it still be worth leaving this brew in the fermenter for maybe as long as 3 weeks before I move to the next stage, that is would it give me a better brew at all? Also, for those of you that have brewed this beer ( many I guess!!!) what may I expect as a typical SG after this sort of extended fermentation period? Would it matter to the brew if it gets down to say 1.004 for example?

Thanks for any help you can offer me on this.

One final point, is it worthwhile using some king of things to clear the beer before bottling. I can't cold crash as I don't have the kit required.

I've made this kit 3 times in all. FG has been 1006 twice and 1005 on one occasion.
Fermentation time between 18-21 days on mine. Longer than most kits but well worth it. I hardly ever do kits now, but this would be the one I'd go back to.
As for fining, it's up to you. Cloudy beer never bothers me as long as the taste is there.
Hope you enjoy when it's ready. I'm sure you will.

 

[terrym]

The reason your beer has fermented down to 1.012 in about a week is the 23/25*C temperature you are fermenting at, which some would say, including me, is too high for this kit. Around 19/20*C would have been better imo. Anyway what's done is done. Although the instructions tell you to start the dry hop at 1.010 this kit can go down to way below that, so I suggest you leave it until the SG has more or less bottomed out say around 1.007/8, then lower the temperature to about 18/19*C for your 5 day dry hop. If you lower the temperature too early there is, imo, a slight chance the fermentation will stick. The problem with adding hops too early is that if the fermentation is still going at a reasonable rate the CO2 strips out some of the oils you are trying to infuse, plus if the SG is still going down, five days might not be enough to see it bottom out, and the hops will then be in your beer for much longer than intended. And the extra time in the FV between 1.010 and 1.007/8 before you dry hop will do no harm to your beer whatsoever.

 

[Howard Taylor]

Thanks for your replies Mungri and terrym. The temperature of my brew is that high as I am using the heater. If I don't use the heater at this time of year my house is often too cold to maintain a temperature of around 20°C, especially overnight. Maybe I can adjust the thermostat in my heater, I can see a small adjusting screw inside the glass tube, so I will try that with a vessel full of water for a simple test, see what temperature it achieves over say 24 hours. For this brew I will let the fermentation finish then lower the temp before adding the hops as suggested. Once again thanks for the responses, your assistance is appreciated.