Lagering

[Aracer]

I have a few questions regarding the layering process.

First: the wort has been fermenting for the last 2.5 weeks at 57º F, should I now raise the temperature to 62 to allow the yeast to absorb the diacetyl produced by fermentation? For how long?.

Second: After this, is time to bottling and adding the priming sugar?

Lagering: does this happened after bottling? at what temperature should this be done?

 

[Pappers_]

Are you making a lager? if yes, then 57F is a little warm, perhaps, or at least warmer than what I use for primary fermentation for lagers.

For your first question, raising the temp at the end of primary fermentation as you suggest is pretty standard for lager brewers, for a diacetyl rest as its called, which makes the yeast more active and better able to reprocess any diacetyl, as you said. If you leave it at primary temps, the yeast will eventually reprocess the diaceytl, if they stay active. Raising the temp so the yeast become more active also encourages the yeast to fully attenuate your beer.

I usually let my lagers sit between 2 and 4 weeks at primary fermentation temps, fwiw. If I do a diacetyl rest, I usually leave it at 65 for four days or so.

Also, if you pitched sufficient amounts of healthy yeast at the proper temperature, you may not have to worry about diacetyl at all. You can always sample your beer and see if you taste diacetyl and or not.

For your second and third questions, I usually lager before packaging, but you can lager after bottling, if that is your preference. For lagers, I usually lager at 32F for at least two weeks, and sometimes as long as four weeks.

 

[Aracer]

Are you making a lager? if yes, then 57F is a little warm, perhaps, or at least warmer than what I use for primary fermentation for lagers.

For your first question, raising the temp at the end of primary fermentation as you suggest is pretty standard for lager brewers, for a diacetyl rest as its called, which makes the yeast more active and better able to reprocess any diacetyl, as you said. If you leave it at primary temps, the yeast will eventually reprocess the diaceytl, if they stay active. Raising the temp so the yeast become more active also encourages the yeast to fully attenuate your beer.

I usually let my lagers sit between 2 and 4 weeks at primary fermentation temps, fwiw. If I do a diacetyl rest, I usually leave it at 65 for four days or so.

Also, if you pitched sufficient amounts of healthy yeast at the proper temperature, you may not have to worry about diacetyl at all. You can always sample your beer and see if you taste diacetyl and or not.

For your second and third questions, I usually lager before packaging, but you can lager after bottling, if that is your preference. For lagers, I usually lager at 32F for at least two weeks, and sometimes as long as four weeks.

Thank you! very good explained. And, regarding the priming sugar, when should I add it? temps and time?

 

[Dland]

If you are going to prime & bottle, you would do that after D rest and before lagering. At lager temps (ideally around 30-33F) the yeast will drop and you probably will not get carbonation. After carbed, lager cold, the longer the better, to a point anyway.

I time my lagers; fermentation, D rest, rack, then spund and then lager for at least 4 weeks. But that is with kegs.

 

[cactusgarrett]

As Pappers said, if you pitched healthy, you wouldn't have to worry about diacetyl nor raising your temps. However, if you pitched right, you might be done fermenting after 2.5 weeks and a d-rest wouldn't work anyway. My lagers are typically finished in 7-10 days.

I'm a huge proponent of doing a d-rest with about 25% of the extract left to ferment out. For example, if your OG was 1.055 and you're expecting 1.013 FG, then do the rest around 1.025 to "gain momentum" in fermentation and help it along to hit that FG without stalling and clean up diacetyl.