Belgian Tripel: 3 weeks primary 4 weeks secondary.. more yeast?

[brew4you15]

Hi guys,

So I have a Belgian tripel that I left in primary for three weeks and then transferred to secondary to clarify for a month...

I'm thinking of bottling soon and was wondering if you all think I'll need to add more yeast at bottling time to get proper carbonation?

If so what would the process be to do this? I pitched with two liquid packets of White Labs Abbey Ale yeast (530).

Thanks for the help!

 

[Mer-man]

If the beer has turned out well, I would do it right and use CBC-1.
http://www.danstaryeast.com/company/products/cbc-1-cask-bottle-conditioned-beer-yeast

That long is too long, generally. I have only used WLP530 once so I cannot comment on this case specifically.
But you definitely won't hurt anything to use CBC-1 as directed.

 

[porterpounder]

You probably won't have to add more yeast, but it won't hurt to do so. Pitch half of another packet of the same strain into the bottling bucket or use a dropper to add a couple drops of slurry to each bottle. Doesn't take much.

 

[jmos]

What is your ABV, and what's the alcohol tolerance of the yeast? I've made a couple batches of 9% to 12% beers (including a tripel) using S-04 and had significant issues with it carbonating. (It finished fine, but just couldn't get the beer carbed.) Now I add yeast at bottling (usually CBC-1) if the yeast has a lower tolerance, and it has worked well.

 

[brew4you15]

Jmos,

The ABV is roughly 8.8% as of the last time I checked, so altogether not wayy up there. The alcohol tolerance of the yeast is 10-15% according to the White Labs website, although I believe I slightly under-pitched the recommended amount (haven't had any issues reaching target FG though)

Thinking about adding the yeast just to be sure though, although if I do do I need to be more careful about creating bottle bombs? I've never had to add yeast at bottling time before.

 

[secondbase]

Definitely wouldn't hurt to add fresh yeast at bottling. If you use champagne yeast or a bottling yeast like cbc-1 you don't have to worry about bottle bombs. a few grams of yeast in the bottling bucket should do the trick

 

[griffi]

If your beer is completely done fermenting, adding yeast is not going to create bottle bombs. Adding too much priming sugar could create bottle bombs. Use good strong bottles and prime only to the volumes of co2 they can safely withstand. Use a priming calculator and measure your sugar with an accurate scale.

 

[brew4you15]

Just a follow up to what I ended up doing with this..

I decided to add about a third of a packet of re-hydrated CBC-01 yeast just to keep my mind at ease about having enough yeast left to carbonate well.

I added about 5.84 ounces of corn sugar to carbonate to 3.3 volumes, I'm just hoping that's not so high that I'll get any bombs.. I've got most of them in regular brown 12oz bottles that I've re-used so this could get interesting.

On another note my gravity was reading the exact same as it was when I moved it over from primary to secondary (1.020). I was hoping it would dry out a bit more in the month I left in secondary, but I guess not. Any thoughts about why this might be?

When I plug my recipe and details in to beersmith recipe calculator this is the expected FG, but everything I had read led me to believe that belgians typically get down a bit lower.

Either way it tasted great, a bit fruity, but all in all it was tasty and cleared really well!

 

[griffi]

That's a lot of sugar for a 5 gal batch and it worries me some that the beer finished out at 1.020. If I were you, I'd box them up and put them in heavy duty plastic bags - hope none of them explodes but have a backup plan in case they do. For next time, they do sell extra strong Belgian bottles.