How many of you do the 3 days in a row rule for checking final gravity? I see that a lot of experienced brewers do it…certainly doesn’t hurt anything, but I guess I’ve never found it necessary, I always just do primary fermentation for 3-6 weeks when I’m not aging a brew and havn’t had any problems to date. Has anyone had their gravity drop after 3-4 weeks of fermentation?
I don’t check FG for three days in a row for for three reasons:
1st: I’m kind of lazy and this would be more work.
2nd: I’m cheap and stingy so it would pain me to pull out enough beer to test the hydrometer three times.
3rd: I’ve never had a problem just waiting two to three weeks for average beers with good yeast and optimal temperatures.
I just take a reading and if its close I wait a few day and check again. If theres no change I assume its finished. I wouldnt waste time with 3 straight days though
I Take a reading as I am kegging. If I suspect something not going as planned I will pull a sample, but other than that I just leave it be for about 3 weeks.
I ferment my beers for about 3 weeks then I take a refractometer reading the day I plan to bottle. I run the numbers for alcohol correction. So far they have all been at target so I have just assumed they have been done. I have had no problems. If the gravity is ever suspect I will then try to trouble shoot.
I might have done that a time or two when I first started, but I have not done it in 12+ years. To be honest, sometimes I don’t even take a gravity reading at all (I would not recommend that, but often, I am in a hurry, forgetful or lazy). I always give the beer plenty of time in fermenter and it is always done. Plus, I think the more often you mess with your beer the more likely you are to infect it. When I do check it, I just check the first sample out of the bottling bucket/fermenter before I start kegging or bottling.
I’m still using glass for primary, and I can pretty much tell if everything is going ok and when it’s done just by looking at it. For this reason, I typically check it twice - once after about 2 weeks when transferring to secondary, and again when transferring to the keg. Sometimes it will drop another couple of points in secondary, but usually the reading doesn’t change.
Not any more. Mine almost always ferment 3-5 weeks in primary. Then another 4-8 weeks secondary, before bottle. I check at bottling only so I can crunch the numbers. But, only on new recipes.
On my last batch, a repeat from a previous recipe, I didn’t even check OG. ABV etc just aren’t that important to me any more. If it tastes good, I’m happy and am ok with estimates when people ask.
cheers.
I use glass as well and can watch all of my fermentation but i let everything go for at least 2 weeks and dont touch it for about 4 weeks if its over 1.080 or so.
