I have also had mild sulfur with 3068 during primary. Always dissipates quickly for me.
+1 to conditioning the beer longer.
would a tranfer to secondary help with this problem? Getting the beer off of the yeast cake…
If you are getting the eggy sulfur smell, a transfer to secondary can be helpful as the eggy odor will be stripped out by the carbon dioxide that will be lost during the transfer. However, getting the beer off the yeast cake is generally not helpful for green home brews as the yeast reabsorbs some undesirable taste/odor compounds at the end of primary fermentation like diacetyl.
Well, increasing the yeast activity prior to bottling will help as well.
- Agitate the beer without oxidation.
- Increase the fermentation temperature.
I’ve heard of brewers injecting some CO2 into the bottom of the fermentor. CO2 helps to allow off-flavors to escape. Just don’t confuse CO2 with Oxygen, you’ll oxidize your beer and you’ll end up drinking cardboard.
Both of those things might help to increase the yeast activity. When yeast are more active more CO2 will escape releasing the sulfur compounds. Perhaps you are bottling too early for this to happen?
Regular poster on here, but found this thread on a google search (I am having a similar problem)…though I was originally trying to turn this beer around in about 9 days for a party…not looking too good right now. The beer has a real clean, fresh, wheaty, citrusy aroma, but I am getting a weird sulfury, almost papery/cardboardy oxidized aroma. The taste starts out really bright, but ends with a strange (and slight) farty thing thats somewhere between eggs and paper.
Not contained in the notes below:
-1L starter, decanted, made additional 1L starter and pitched when active (entire starter with starter beer of 2nd step)–borderline overpitch so the beer would finish quicker
-cold-pitched at 66* (partially due to the fact that I likely pitched about 1.3x the recommended amount), fermented there for 3 days, raised to 68, checked sample, gravity was down to 1.011, ramped to 70 after 5 days (today), might consider going to 72* tomorrow
-15min Protein rest @ 122, 5 min decoction to 155*, sacc rest 65 minutes, decoction to mash out, single batch sparge
-used centennial to try to get some citrus in the beer from another ‘angle’
-the wort smelled so amazingly delicious when I pitched (almost like a fruity muffin of some sort), I ran to a buddy’s to pick up some distillery-grade fermcap, which I was convinced would help keep some of the post-boil aroma goodness in the beer (it didn’t…would love to know how to retain more of the aromas this beer had).
Even in tasting between today and yesterday, it seems as though the sulfur might have dissipated a bit. Or maybe it was the silicone fermcap of death that I added that’s going to kill me.
Would love to hear if the OP’s sulfur problem subsided…
Wit and Wisdom
16-A Witbier
Author: mcp
Size: 6.0 gal @ 68 °F
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 174.35 kcal per 12.0 fl oz
Original Gravity: 1.052 (1.044 - 1.052)
Terminal Gravity: 1.013 (1.008 - 1.012)
Color: 4.58 (2.0 - 4.0)
Alcohol: 5.15% (4.5% - 5.5%)
Bitterness: 13.4 (10.0 - 20.0)
Ingredients:
5.5 lb (45.8%) Bohemian Pilsner Malt - added during mash
5 lb (41.7%) Wheat Flaked - added during mash
.5 lb (4.2%) Munich Malt - added during mash
1 lb (8.3%) Oats Flaked - added during mash
.25 oz (50.0%) Centennial (10.0%) - added during boil, boiled 60 m
.25 oz (50.0%) Centennial (10.0%) - added during boil, boiled 30 m
1.5 oz Orange zest - added during boil, boiled 1 m
.4 oz Corriander crushed - added during boil, boiled 1 m
.5 oz Chamomile (dried) - added during boil, boiled 1.0 m
1.0 ea White Labs WLP410 Belgian Wit II Ale
Schedule:
Ambient Air: 70.0 °F
Source Water: 60.0 °F
Elevation: 0.0 m
Notes
added chamomile tea and zest in muslin bag at 30 seconds wort smelled great, seems like a lot of aroma blew off with fermentation (though silicone added to cap krausen)
Results generated by BeerTools Pro 1.5.24
I think it is from your yeast and pils malt. I would warm it up to 75 for a day, then crash cool. That will help drive off the H2S (which is what I think you have).
Isnt pilsn malt supposed to be boiled a minimum of 75 minutes because of DMS which contains sulfer?
90 minute boil probably would have been advisable. I usually go that long, but was running low on gas and didn’t want to risk it. So instead I decided to risk having vegetable beer.
Mordecai, H2S is hydrogen sulfide? Would raising it to 75 for a few days help more than one day?
One great trick to remove sulfur from beer is to run the beer through a line of copper. You can even take a copper pipe and stir the carboy/bucket/keg.
I had similar issue with 3068. I always used wlp300, and decided to use my same recipe with 3068. Never got any sulfur smell from wlp300 even at 65-67f. 3068 the first time I used it i also fermented 65-66f first 72 hours, then let it rise up to 70. While at lower temps, the sulfur was very noticeable. I was hoping it would go away but after 6 weeks it was still there and I couldn’t stomach it, so I dumped it. Tried it again on another batch, and started fermentation at 68f and held for 72 hours. Sight sulfur that quickly dissipated and was gone by end of 2 weeks.
Sounds like at least part of both problems raised in this thread comes from DMS. The other issue seems yeast driven, like everybody else said.
I’ve brewed with both WLP300 and WY3068 and while both produce lots of sulfur during fermentation I’ve never had it carry through to the bottle. I’ve opened bottles of weizen that were only 10 days old (and were carbonated) with no sulfur issues. The sulfur will naturally come out of the beer with time but you don’t want to lose the fresh character of either the wheat or yeast in these beers. I’ve never tried the copper method but I always let my beers sit at room temperature for a day or two before bottling to make sure everything is cleaned up. The warmer temperatures will allow more CO2 to come out of the beer which seems to help push any remaining sulfur out.
If it’s already bottled it sounds like letting the bottle breathe for a little while after opening will allow carbonation to push most of the sulfur out. Otherwise I guess drop a penny in the bottom of your glass.
I heard on BrewStrong that if added post-fermentation, copper can be a catalyst in oxidation reactions.
That is correct. The copper is oxidizing the sulfur.
The sulfur never did totally leave this beer. By the time it had diminished significantly in the bottle all of the other flavors you are looking for in a wit had also minimized.
I talked to wyeast and they told me that this is common, but more typically with yeast that is not fresh. I did not document the date on the yeast pack but I doubt it was older than a month. I enquired if there was a yeast that could be used in a wit with less sulfur production and they told me to use 3463 forbidden fruit.
So in summation, next time i am going to leave the beer at room temp for 48 hours or more post fermentation (14 days), I will probably use 3463, draw a sample prior to bottling, if it smells let it sit longer at room temp and swirl it. I would advise against bottling a beer that smells of sulfur.
I think you are better off with having the copper contact at a pre-fermentation stage. That way, the yeast will consume all the dissolved copper and keep it out of your finished beer. The does its work with the sulfur almost immediately, so it will have done its work before the yeast gobble it up.
I’ve used both those strains and have not had any issues with sulfur. I make proper sized starters of healthy yeast, ferment in buckets and use a blow off tube . The Hefe yeast I start at 60 and allow to rise to 65 and the other I start at 65 and allow to rise to 70.
My opinion is stressed yeast and under pitching producing excessive sulfur notes which is a somewhat inherent byproduct of these strains.
+1. I’ve used both strains multiple times and not had the sulfur carry over to keg.
I pitched an appropriate starter for the wit beer. The bavarian hefe I did not in hopes that stressing the yeast would produce more banana and clove flavors.