American Yeast Woes

[Graculus]

G'day all.

For a reason I cannot fathom I don't seem to have much luck brewing with American type yeasts.

Firstly I have made a few batches of the Mangrove Jacks Pink Grapefruit IPA. The  M44 US West Coast yeast is supplied with the kit.
After making a couple of these I was finding I had a scum on the surface. As though the krausen would not drop.
And it just didn't look or smell right. With these I syphoned into a bottling bucket as much as I could and bottled.
And the finished product was pretty good.
I contacted MJ about the issue and they sent me two new kits. One of which fermented fine & one that the scummy surface.
The kit I complained about to MJ had yeast that was only about 3 months from expiry.
The ones they sent must have been brand new from their stocks. Yeast was in date by over 18 months.

Anyhow, fast forward to now. I decided to have a go at making something similar to
Stone and Wood Pacific Ale which called for an American Ale yeast.
Having had great success with Lallemand Diamond Lager yeast I thought I'd give BRY-97 a go.

Now for one thing I've found these yeasts seem to take a while to get going.
This time I rehydrated the yeast hoping that it would give it a bit of a start.
But, no it didn't seem to, and then took 10 days or so to ferment out.

Once again I have this nasty scummy surface. I have tasted the beer from the tap and it tastes fine.
So in an attempt to save it, I've syphoned it off into a bottling bucket and added the dry hops.

The MJ Pink IPA was brewed in a blue Bunning water container.
The Stone & Wood, brewed in a Coopers FV, so not the FV.
The last two brews I've used the FV for have been a Lager & SMOTY, both of which were fine.

So, knowledgeable one's of the forum. What's going wrong?
My next brew was going to be using the harvested BRY-97, but that's been washed down the drain.
What am I doing wrong????

Maybe I should go back to US-05. I don't think I've ever had an issue with that.

 

 

[Aussiekraut]

48 minutes ago, Graculus said:

G'day all.

For a reason I cannot fathom I don't seem to have much luck brewing with American type yeasts.

Firstly I have made a few batches of the Mangrove Jacks Pink Grapefruit IPA. The  M44 US West Coast yeast is supplied with the kit.
After making a couple of these I was finding I had a scum on the surface. As though the krausen would not drop.
And it just didn't look or smell right. With these I syphoned into a bottling bucket as much as I could and bottled.
And the finished product was pretty good.
I contacted MJ about the issue and they sent me two new kits. One of which fermented fine & one that the scummy surface.
The kit I complained about to MJ had yeast that was only about 3 months from expiry.
The ones they sent must have been brand new from their stocks. Yeast was in date by over 18 months.

Anyhow, fast forward to now. I decided to have a go at making something similar to
Stone and Wood Pacific Ale which called for an American Ale yeast.
Having had great success with Lallemand Diamond Lager yeast I thought I'd give BRY-97 a go.

Now for one thing I've found these yeasts seem to take a while to get going.
This time I rehydrated the yeast hoping that it would give it a bit of a start.
But, no it didn't seem to, and then took 10 days or so to ferment out.

Once again I have this nasty scummy surface. I have tasted the beer from the tap and it tastes fine.
So in an attempt to save it, I've syphoned it off into a bottling bucket and added the dry hops.

The MJ Pink IPA was brewed in a blue Bunning water container.
The Stone & Wood, brewed in a Coopers FV, so not the FV.
The last two brews I've used the FV for have been a Lager & SMOTY, both of which were fine.

So, knowledgeable one's of the forum. What's going wrong?
My next brew was going to be using the harvested BRY-97, but that's been washed down the drain.
What am I doing wrong????

Maybe I should go back to US-05. I don't think I've ever had an issue with that.

 

 

That looks like pellicle to me. Looks horrible but shouldn't harm the beer. The problem is that if you skim it off, you break the film and actually get things into the beer. I've had it a few times and simply leave it behind when kegging. You lose beer but at least it's clean.

I'm not sure if it is a sanitation issue or what causes it but apparently, pellicle is a biofilm of microbes. 

Edited June 2 by Aussiekraut

[Classic Brewing Co]

3 minutes ago, Aussiekraut said:

That looks like pellicle to me. Looks horrible but shouldn't harm the beer. The problem is that if you skim it off, you break the film and actually get things into the beer. I've had it a few times and simply leave it behind when kegging. You lose beer but at least it's clean.

I'm not sure if it is a sanitation issue or what causes it but apparently, pellicle is a byproduct of fermentation and consists mainly of cellulose from cell walls. 

I agree with AK, I had an episode like that last year, it looked disgusting but there were no telltale off smells, I left it intact & kegged leaving the junk behind being careful not to disturb it & the beer was fine.

 

[Graculus]

Thanks guys.

I bottle my beer, and in the past I've syphoned into a bottling bucket, making sure I leave the nasty stuff behind.
And the beer has always come out OK, although losing 3 litres or so.
And of course not be able to harvest the  yeast.

The problem I had this time was I wanted to add hops. So obviously could drop the hops in through that.
As I said I've syphoned into another FV leaving the crap behind & then adding the hops.

Just scratching my head as to why this happens only with these two yeasts.
 

[Shamus O'Sean]

22 minutes ago, Graculus said:

Thanks guys.

I bottle my beer, and in the past I've syphoned into a bottling bucket, making sure I leave the nasty stuff behind.
And the beer has always come out OK, although losing 3 litres or so.
And of course not be able to harvest the  yeast.

The problem I had this time was I wanted to add hops. So obviously could drop the hops in through that.
As I said I've syphoned into another FV leaving the crap behind & then adding the hops.

Just scratching my head as to why this happens only with these two yeasts.
 

I agree with AK, it looks like a pellicle.  One of the ingredients for this is oxygen.  However, it obviously does not happen every time a bit of oxygen gets in the FV.

I doubt it is "caused" by the yeast because plenty of other people have used the yeasts you mentioned and have not had this issue.  Perhaps the slow starting for the yeast is a factor.  Maybe temperature has an influence too.  You mention using lager yeasts without issue.  But if you have these temperature controlled, the cooler temperature might stop the pellicle from happening.

If US-05 works for you, it is a perfectly fine substitute for BRY-97. 

[Graculus]

7 minutes ago, Shamus O'Sean said:

I agree with AK, it looks like a pellicle.  One of the ingredients for this is oxygen.  However, it obviously does not happen every time a bit of oxygen gets in the FV.

I doubt it is "caused" by the yeast because plenty of other people have used the yeasts you mentioned and have not had this issue.  Perhaps the slow starting for the yeast is a factor.  Maybe temperature has an influence too.  You mention using lager yeasts without issue.  But if you have these temperature controlled, the cooler temperature might stop the pellicle from happening.

If US-05 works for you, it is a perfectly fine substitute for BRY-97. 

All temperature controlled Shamus.

The SMOTY I made was with Nottingham yeast, that I harvested after making an English style IPA.
And fermented at the same temperature this brew was done at.

Just weird that it seems to happen with American style yeasts.

A bit of googling has results for slow starts on BRY-97, M44 & US-05.

I'll grab some US-05 tomorrow and maybe for the next brew I'll create a starter.

[Graculus]

I've been thinking about this today.

@Shamus O'Sean what you say about oxygen makes me wonder.

Is it the fact that the yeast takes so long to get going it allows the nasties to get a foothold on the surface of the wort.

Whereas the Lager & Nottingham yeasts get going quicker, and thus there's a blanket of CO2 over the wort quicker.

Anyhow, next time I'll try a starter and make sure it's well and truly going before putting the brew on.

 

[Uhtred Of Beddanburg]

1 hour ago, Graculus said:

I've been thinking about this today.

@Shamus O'Sean what you say about oxygen makes me wonder.

Is it the fact that the yeast takes so long to get going it allows the nasties to get a foothold on the surface of the wort.

Whereas the Lager & Nottingham yeasts get going quicker, and thus there's a blanket of CO2 over the wort quicker.

Anyhow, next time I'll try a starter and make sure it's well and truly going before putting the brew on.

 

perhaps but then again some lager pitched low takes a while to get going. Maybe this is where the second pack of lager yeast comes in handy. 

If you have been using 18 degrees for slow yank yeast maybe go up to 20? I found that best for US05

[Shamus O'Sean]

2 hours ago, Graculus said:

I've been thinking about this today.

@Shamus O'Sean what you say about oxygen makes me wonder.

Is it the fact that the yeast takes so long to get going it allows the nasties to get a foothold on the surface of the wort.

Whereas the Lager & Nottingham yeasts get going quicker, and thus there's a blanket of CO2 over the wort quicker.

Anyhow, next time I'll try a starter and make sure it's well and truly going before putting the brew on.

 

I do not know enough to say "yes" to your question about the yeast taking a while to get started.  But it is possible.

I have only had one pellicle.  It was in a Passionfruit Sour, fermented with Philly Sour.  I put mine down to my clumsy removal of the hop sock containing the passionfruit pulp.

[Graculus]

11 hours ago, Uhtred Of Beddanburg said:

perhaps but then again some lager pitched low takes a while to get going. Maybe this is where the second pack of lager yeast comes in handy. 

If you have been using 18 degrees for slow yank yeast maybe go up to 20? I found that best for US05

The lager would have been done at 13C or so. Maybe the pellicle doesn't like it cold?
I actually put the yank yeast in at 20C, even upped it to 22C on one of the MJ brews.

Just bouncing some ideas around in my head.

Thanks for the replies.

[Uhtred Of Beddanburg]

8 hours ago, Graculus said:

The lager would have been done at 13C or so. Maybe the pellicle doesn't like it cold?
I actually put the yank yeast in at 20C, even upped it to 22C on one of the MJ brews.

Just bouncing some ideas around in my head.

Thanks for the replies.

Maybe right regarding lagers I'm not sure. Think I had it a few times as well and kegged without disturbing it and drank it young with no problems