I’ve finally made the leap to better fermentation control with the use of a converted chest freezer. I have my first lager fermenting away nicely and about ready to drop the temp for lagering. How quick should I do this to get it down to the low 30’s?
Thanks,
A couple of degrees per day. Not to fast to crash the remaining yeast. We want them to do their thing while lagering.
If you did a Diacetyl rest at 60+ degrees, and taste no diacetyl as the yeast have cleaned up, crash away. I go down to 32F quickly these days.
No Diacetyl rest, take it down slowly so the yeast can clean up. You might even pause for some time around 40F.
There are some temperature time profiles on Kai’s page. I have been using F.
http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=Fermenting_Lagers
Same here. I always do a diacetyl rest or bump the temp up nearing the end of fermentation to ensure good attenuation anyway. Then I’ll crash as fast as it takes to 38F with the carboy sitting in the kegerator before kegging and lagering.
I’m with the crashers. As long as fermentation and a d rest, if needed, are done, there’s no reason not to crash.
I’m a stepper, but that’s because that’s how I was taught by the man who cloned Budweiser. 1 deg per day until you hit 34F
Cooling the fermenter with air, it’s going to take several days for the temperature to drop anyway, but I’m with the crashing school of thought.
I have always been in the cold Crash camp but IDK now that I have read the Yeast Book.
Chris White (White Labs) states in his book about yeast, "Very little happens once you take the yeast below 40 degrees Fahrenheit… Rapid reduction in temperature below 40 degrees F (less than 6 hours) at the end of fermentation can cause the yeast to excrete more ester compounds instead of retaining them. In addition, if you plan to use the yeast for repitching, you should avoid very rapid temperature changes (up or down) as they can cause the yeast to excrete heat shock proteins. Traditional lager conditioning utilizesd a slow temperature reduction…The brewer will start the process of slowly cooling the beer at a rate of 1 to 2 degrees F per day to avoid sending the yeast into dormancy. After a few days the beer has reached a temperature of 40 degrees with still some fermentable sugars remaining, about 1 to 2 degrees Plato.
Now I’m not so sure a rapid cold crash is a good idea although I have never noticed off flavors from doing a cold crash and my re-pitched lager yeast seems to ferment the next batch without issue.
So… does white labs and Wyeast reduce temp by one degree per day when they are done propagating?pretty sure they refrigerate the slants and smack packs.
I wonder sometimes if info like this is true but not to the extent that we imagine
I think the key here is that they’re talking about bringing the beer down to lagering temps while the yeast is still actively fermenting. I think those of us that are in the cold crash camp are waiting until the yeast is finished before cold crashing. I don’t know if all of his points hold true once the yeast is finished and you’re just trying to get it to drop bright.
Never seen a problem. I ferment at 50F for 4 weeks, take a reading and rack to cornies, which go into the lager chest at 34F. I do a D-rest rarely, but certain lager yeasts are necessary d-resters, so I begrudgingly do them on those.
So, why not trust your own experience? All the science in the world doesn’t really matter if you have direct contradictory experience.
THIS^^^^
After my D-rest last week I dropped the temp to 38F to lager. Then happened to notice in HTB that S-23 should never go below 45F…
I’m wondering if this minimum temp setpoint matters after the attenuative phase? To be safe I raised the temp to 46.
In my experience, once fermentation is done it doesn’t matter. You have my sympathies for the S-23. 
Passion fruit lager!
I am a crasher like Steve. But I can’t get over the word “excrete” right now. Eww. Excretions in my beer.
I do 5 degrees per day, only so as not to overstress my chest freezers.
isn’t ETOH an excretion too Amanda?
Without excretions, all you’d have is wort. Excretions ARE your beer. :
Agree with you, but I think that’s secretion idn’t it? Excretion is like bad stuff, waste products etc. Secretion is intended good stuff. Could be way wrong though. My last science class was about 35 years ago.