Don't Secondary

So much for putting this to bed, eh @inchrisin ?

I voted for 'never use a secondary' although I keg so I guess it depends on how you look at it. Personally, I don't consider a keg a secondary any more than I consider a 12oz bottle a secondary. The beer is carbonated and ready for consumption at that point.

Regarding why I never use a secondary...it doesn't seem necessary for the beers that I brew. Dry hop? That happens in the primary. Oaking? That happens in the keg. Lagering? It's usually for less than 6 weeks and I don't mind contact with yeast for that amount of time.

The only time I've secondaried in the last 5 years was for fruited beers, and we're probably talking 2-3 times max., although I intend to do more fruited sours in the future. For fruited beers, using a secondary is absolutely imperative IMO.

 

That brings up a great point. Can a keg be considered a secondary or not? A few mentioned using a separate secondary for lagers. Most of the beers I make are lagers, and for lagering purposes I use the keg as I would a secondary. Once it has sat on the yeast in a primary for 2-3 weeks, it goes directly into a keg, and I then lager it for 4-6 weeks before I drink it. The same with oaking and dry hopping any beer (except sours). I do both directly in a keg. After it has oaked or dry-hopped for some time (say two weeks) in a stainless steel strainer container at room temperature, I pull the container with the oak or pellets out, flush out the sediment, put the keg in my keezer, carbonate it for 1-2 weeks, and for ales, i't's ready for drinking. For lagers I will lager it for a further 2-4 weeks. So in these circumstances, I'm doing exactly what I would be doing if I used a carboy as a secondary, but instead I'm doing it directly in the keg without having to transfer it yet again. As mentioned before, I also do use glass carboys as secondaries for other purposes.

Therefore, the keg can be used exactly as you would a secondary. So, can the keg be considered as a secondary or not? I would say Yes.

 

I keg, but I don't transfer/jump to another keg, so I don't consider that a secondary.

Never for a "normal" beer, including dry hops. I have dry hopped in the primary and dry hopped in the keg.

Only "normal" beer I have put in a secondary was a RIS that I wanted to split on to different treatments (coffee, bourbon, oak,...). If I was doing a RIS with coffee, I would add it to the primary.

 

Sometimes if I don't feel like or won't have the the time for bottling for a while.

 

Pretty much exactly this, minus the 14 batches this year.

 

IMO the purpose of a secondary is for a vessel between the primary fermenter and the final serving vessel. For the case of folks who bottle their beers the progression would be primary -> secondary -> bottle. If a keg is utilized as the secondary vessel in this scenario then a keg can indeed be a secondary.

Let’s consider an alternative scenario of primary -> secondary (keg) and the beer is served from the keg. IMO, in this scenario the keg should not be considered a secondary since it is the serving vessel.

One more scenario: primary -> secondary (keg) -> serving keg. In this scenario the keg that was utilized as the secondary can be considered a secondary. The serving keg is not a secondary.

I just want to emphasize the “O” of IMO.

Cheers!

 

But what purpose would be served by moving the beer from one keg to another? To me, it's just another unnecessary step, unless you were also filtering the beer or didn't have a straining container or mesh bag for the oak or hops. I prefer to use the same keg for both secondary purposes (e.g. adding oak, dry hopping, lagering) as well as serving.

I guess the distinction is "secondary" as a completely separate vessel, and "secondary purposes" as in also using the serving vessel for "secondary purposes".

 

Because you intend to physically move the kegged beer to another location for serving immediately? (Not common)

 

I do not keg my beers so I will let others respond. I have read a number of posts where folks conduct a transfer from keg A to keg B.

Cheers!

 

To leave settled yeast, proteins, and polyphenols behind. Or to rack away from dry hops without additional exposure to O2.

 

But, other than the reasons I mentioned, why move the beer physically from one keg to another?

 

But it settles to the bottom, and your fiirst pour will flush it out.

 

If it makes you feel better to think so. "First pour" in reality means first several pours. And even then, you're kicking that stuff up into suspension each time, unless you think the dip tube is a perfect trub-seeking siphon that only picks up sediment, finishes that job, and then picks up beer.

And how do you "flush out" the dry hops?

ETA: I should mention that a shortened dip tube is better for racking away from sediment.

 

I've never had a problem - the dip tube sits low in the well where most of the sediment falls. My hops or oak is contained in a stainless steel mesh container, so I get very little sediment from the hops or oak (what I do get is very fine and is easily sucked up through the dip tube). When it's finished oaking or dry hopping, I simply remove the container from the keg, close the lid, flush it with CO2 again, put it in the keezer, and pressurize it. When I do my first pour, most of the sediment comes out since the dip tube is sitting right in the midst of the fine sediment in the small depression. I may get a little in my second and third pours (I don't do that until it has re-settled after the first pour), but after that it comes out clear. So yes, as long as there's not too much sediment, the dip tube does pick up the sediment first, and when it's mostly gone it then picks up the beer. I've been doing this successfully for years.

I can see why it wouldn't work in your keg - you have shortened the dip tube so it won't pick up the sediment. I prefer to leave mine long specifically for the purpose of sucking out the fine sediment.

 

Exactly. So you introduce O2. Flushing is better than not introducing O2, but not as good as not introducing O2.

The point is I don't want the sediment in the beer at all. Ever looked at the yeast at the bottom of an empty keg? And please don't say that you never have any with your kegs. It ain't healthy, and it's contributing to the flavor of the beer.

I'm not saying that racking is necessarily warranted for every style. But it has its purposes.

 

Not exactly. CO2 is heavier than O2. When I lift the lid, there is still CO2 in the space above the beer. I lift the strainer out slowly, so there is still a layer of heavier CO2 over the surface of the beer. Then I close the lid, and flush to ensure that ALL the O2 is gone from the space above the beer. Thus the exposure of the beer to O2 is negligible if any. Transferring the beer either transports some of the same sediment from one keg to the other or leaves more beer behind, depending on the length of the dip tube.

I agree that the sediment should be removed early. That's why I flush the sediment out with first, second and third pours, if necessary, as soon as it has settled. I likely end up flushing out much less of the beer than you would leave behind when transferring the beer from one keg to the other. We both accomplish the same thing, but transferring the beer involves much more work and likely leaves more beer behind.

 

I'm not going to have the CO2 blanket argument, other than to say that it's partially a myth and you can find many discussions about it on this forum. Flushing... Huh? You said flushing, as in flushing the O2 away. Do you mean racking? If so, no it doesn't transport everything...remember the shortened dip tube.

 

The CO2 argument applies as well to the keg you're transferring the beer to.

With regard to the air pocket in the keg above the beer, "flushing" is the best word I could come up with. I attach the CO2 to the "In" side of the keg, turn on the CO2 tank with a little pressure, and open the relief valve on the keg sebveral times, thereby "flushing" any air out with CO2.

With regard to the sediment at the bottom of the keg, I also used the word "flushing" as in "flushing" the sediment out from the bottom of the keg with the pressurized beer in the keg. The word "flushing" seemed to apply to both situations (sory for the confusion), although different. In one case I flush with pressurized CO2, and in the other, with pressurized beer. I don't rack in this case.

Again, the key difference in our approaches/arguments involves a difference in the length of our dip tubes. Your approach only works with a shortened dip tube, while my approach only works with a full length dip tube (not intending the phallic sense :-).

 

No, it doesn't. It's a closed transfer, into a keg that has been purged to within a gnats hair of 0 O2. The beer is never exposed to an inrush of O2 and subsequent mixing from the turbulence of the added CO2 pressure.

 

OK. But still, I think the amount of O2 exposure when lifting out the strainer is negligible. There's still CO2 in the pocket, and any possible disturbance "might" expose a tiny amount of beer to a tiny amount of air for a split second. The strainer is lifted out, the lid re-attached, the pocket flushed with CO2, all within less than five minutes. If necessary, one could even add a little CO2 during the entire time the strainer is pulled out and the lid re-attached by attaching the CO2 to the "In" side at a low pressure for the entire time.