This is a story about impatience, a brewers worst enemy… I finally got a chamber (chest freezer+inkbird) and have my first sub70 fermentation happening now. I was excited to have a batch that didn’t completely finish primary in under 72 hours. This one bubbled away for almost a whole week! Anyway I decided to transfer to secondary on day 11. Its an extract Grapefruit Pulpin kit so I thought it necessary to rack to the carboy. I only pitched 1 pack of US-05 but still had a a seemingly healthy fermentation so far. Gravity measured 1.016 which I’m told should be about right for an extract kit with a higher OG. I noticed too late however that not much flocculation had occurred (actually ended up with a few mm of sediment in my sample tube) and I wish I had waited a full 14 days and maybe “cold crashed” to the lower end of the range?
Anyway more to the point. I didnt double check the instructions and I added my soaked peels and dry hop additions immediately upon transfer which I later realized was much sooner than I was supposed to. The recipe calls for 4 weeks secondary and dry hop and grapefruit addition no more than a week before bottling. What is my best coarse of action? Should I condition ro schedule and lose most of the aroma I added or should I just do a significantly shorter secondary and let these bottle condition for an extra month? Or option 3 do I just do another dry hop later on?
Sorry theres a lot of questions rolled into this post. I appreciate the help!
I would NOT do a four week secondary, that’s just aging a fresh ipa for no good reason. Wait to have a stable gravity, cold crash, and bottle. Could be in just a few days depending on whether gravity is stable. There’s actually some benefit to dry hopping while the yeast is still active, so this might be a bit of a happy accident.
I brewed the grapefruit pulpin all grain, and I only put it in the secondary for about 10 days. Tossed the vodka soaked peels into the keg on the 10th day along with the brew.
As I recall the grapefruit flavor stayed strong through the whole keg, and it was not consumed all that quickly (it was a bit over 7% abv ) I also dry hopped 5 days into the secondary.
I bet it will be good. I have dry hopped New England IPA’s in the primary like 2-3 days into fermentation, then other batches in the keg only … they all turned out great. So who knows, you may have brewed the best tasting beer you have ever had, I am constantly amazed at the amount of variability that can be introduced with either no detectable difference or at least not harming the taste.
I have a hard time with racking any IPA into something other than a keg after primary… Do all you can to eliminate O2 when racking… You can even, well, do as Tom did… Put the grapefruit pulpin’ in the keg… let it sit at room temp for a few days… The keg, well sealed, won’t allow O2 into the mix and cause the flavor to fade… fast… Sneezles61
Me most the time. I dryhop. About. 2 weeks. After primary fermetation. Than dryhop. 10 days before. Kegging. Seems to work. I like 2 oz dryhop most the time.
I think it’s been mentioned in other posts that yeast don’t use a calendar. 
You mentioned the gravity is where you think it ought to finish? If it were me, I’d do a few gravity checks to make sure it’s finished over the next few days, cold crash and bottle/consume as normal. The guys gave you great advice IMHO to not let it sit for four weeks and doing your best to keep oxygen out by minimizing splashing the beer during your transfers and bottling. I tend to make some pretty hop forward beers and have experienced the loss of that great aroma and flavor over time as well as having beers ruined by oxygen. I’m on the “it’s going to be delicious” bandwagon. 
Thanks for all the great advice everyone! I’ll go ahead and bottle this up in another 5 days or so or once I’m satisfied its fully attenuated. Its useful to know I dont need to let an IPA sit for 6 weeks before bottling without much ill effect and maybe even some benefit. Why is it that some (including NB) recommend the long secondary for IPAs?
Instructions are written for the lowest common denominator… that is, so that someone without any significant knowledge or experience can work their way through the instructions step-by-step and end up with something decent with as few pitfalls as possible. It rarely will produce the best beer, though.
As you wish! I am not sure if you maybe have an older copy of the instructions for the extract kit but HERE is the current version from the website. Their instructions used to be much more general in nature and have gotten a bit better, but the current version shows 1-2 weeks primary, 1-2 weeks secondary. My standard MO for beers is 2-3 weeks primary and then transfer to keg depending on what I’ve got in the pipeline. I dry hop directly in the keg using muslin bags. I brewed up the AG version of this beer in 2016 looking back through my notes and it was 3 weeks primary, then into keg for dry hopping and zesting.
Typically, and especially with hop forward beers, IMO the fresher you drink them the better.
Rad
@radagast love you too
I’m now looking forward to enjoying this brew by Thanksgiving so again thanks to all!
Since this is the fermentation section of the forum I have another question regarding this brew.
I practiced my yeast washing with the leftover cake on this batch and was thinking of using the slurry (with a starter) on the dead ringer kit I have on deck. I haven’t reused yeast other than racking right on to the cake on subsequent batches but as I understand it, the “pulpin’s” gravity may be a bit high for harvesting viable yeast. Am I playing with fire if I go this route or should I give it a shot?
BAH! 1.064 OG?? that’s not high gravity and no where near an alcohol level that would cause concern for yeast viability. I routinely harvest slurry from beers that are considerably higher. Save yourself some time with the rinsing nonsense though. Total waste of time. Swirl that slurry up and pour it in a mason jar. If it’s in the fridge more than a month or two make a starter when you’re ready to use it.
It’s clear where you sit on the spectrum of opinions on this matter! As I find most of this advice to be anecdotal, hearing 1 person such as yourself say “it worked for me” is enough to try it myself and see how it goes…
I second the swirl and dump method of harvesting. But as I posted on the other thread I prefer harvesting off of the starter.
My MO is the swirl and dump. I make a starter off it. I have pitched directly on a yeast cake in the fermenter as well.
I too have done that… Build up the starter so you can save half and pitch the other… I have been a bit too busy to do this… I was told by the the “big shooter” its called propagation… Sneezles61
