Beer styles and pressure fermenting

[AnimatedGIF]

I got an Allrounder with pressure kit for Christmas.
I was wondering, are some styles of beer better done under pressure, or more to the point, any that are not suited to fermenting under pressure?

 

[Corbières]

I do lagers under pressure 12psi - FG reached in less than 7 days.

 

[Leon103]

I brew everything under pressure

 

[AnimatedGIF]

Sounds good. I wasn't sure if pressure would suppress certain characteristics or not.
I have a Bass clone and a saison lined up, so I'll crack on with them in the allrounder

 

[BlackRegent]

Fermenting under pressure is quite a polarising topic so I'll keep my comments focussed to avoid reopening the debate. There are lots of threads on the forum where the pros and cons are discussed. I personally wouldn't ferment under pressure any beer that derives an important part of its character from the yeast. At the very least, I wouldn't apply pressure for the first few days of fermentation.

 

[MickDundee]

I had been using my Fermentasaurus for most beers and a different fermenter for witbier, bitters, Hefeweizen etc.

Recently I’ve just been doing everything in the Fermentasaurus but for the ones I’d previously do in my other FV I don’t apply pressure until the krausen subsides.

 

[MrJay83]

Sounds good. I wasn't sure if pressure would suppress certain characteristics or not.
I have a Bass clone and a saison lined up, so I'll crack on with them in the allrounder

How did you get on with the saison under pressure? I'm planning on doing one this weekend and if appreciates lessons learned.

 

[AnimatedGIF]

How did you get on with the saison under pressure? I'm planning on doing one this weekend and if appreciates lessons learned.

I must admit, I did it in my normal plastic bucker fermenter as I had a lager in the allrounder at the time I brewed the saison, so unfortunately I didn't learn anything that'll be of use to you I'm afraid

 

[MrJay83]

No worries. Experimentation time it is so.

 

[LeeH]

1-2 PSI for me for all styles, unsure of any advantages going higher.

 

[MrJay83]

Would having it at say 10 psi not give you a head start when it comes to carbonation? Most videos I've seen say to keep it 8 to 10. I'm brand new to pressure fermenting so I don't know to be honest.

 

[foxy]

Would having it at say 10 psi not give you a head start when it comes to carbonation? Most videos I've seen say to keep it 8 to 10. I'm brand new to pressure fermenting so I don't know to be honest.

No you are suppressing the yeast. Let the yeast get its job done and carbonate at the last couple of points.

 

[MrJay83]

Sorry, I should have been a bit more specific. That's what I done. I followed the approach I saw in a David Heath video. I was using Voss, let it do it's thing with the spunding valve fully open until it was stable, dry hopped and set the valve to 8ish psi and let it sit for a couple more days until I cold crashed it.
Everything went well until I mixed up the posts on my keg when transferring. Let's just say the wife wasn't happy and I won't be repeating that mistake.

 

[hoppyscotty]

Well you need to determine why you want to pressure ferment...what you trying to achieve? the only benefit as I can see is you can ferment faster or warmer. That doesn't buy me any advantage really as usually I'm not in a great rush and have a good fermentation cabinet so managing fermentation temps is easy. I've done a few pressure ferments just to see what all the fuss is about but I can not see any advantage in terms of the resulting beer. A pressure fermented beer tastes as good as a non pressure fermented beer and I've done back to back batches of the same recipe.

On my larger system I'm now putting it on pressure in the closing stages of the fermentation simply to carbonate the beer and save a bit of CO2 and in my experience you get a better quality head from a naturally carbonated beer.

But I really struggle understanding the fermentation temp vs pressure relationship. Most people just choose a temp and pressure almost at random or are following a schedule. I'm looking for a calculator that says for a particular yeast a relationship between pressure and temp. It is the higher pressure that enables the yeast to tolerate higher temperatures, so if you're under pressurising or over pressurising then you're unnecessarily stressing the yeast. There much be a relationship to the correct temp for a given pressure.

 

[MrJay83]

Well you need to determine why you want to pressure ferment...what you trying to achieve?

The three things I want to get out of it are...
1) Natural carbonation & save gas.
2) Oxygen free transfers and better retention of hop flavours.
3) Make a decent lager. My couple of attempts have been very poor even though I followed the recipes & fermentation schedule/temp exactly (as far as I know). I get ester issues that I'm hoping the AR might help.

 

[MickDundee]

The three things I want to get out of it are...
1) Natural carbonation & save gas.
2) Oxygen free transfers and better retention of hop flavours.
3) Make a decent lager. My couple of attempts have been very poor even though I followed the recipes & fermentation schedule/temp exactly (as far as I know). I get ester issues that I'm hoping the AR might help.

Lagers and NEIPAs are my reasons for pressure fermenting.

Also my Fermzilla is the one with the collection jar so there’s the advantage of being able to harvest yeast (although the only time I’ve done so it sat unused in the fridge for about a year and then I binned it ) and closing the jar to avoid the need to transfer to secondary.

I also only keg, so closed transfer makes kegging less of a PITA for all styles.

 

[hoppyscotty]

The three things I want to get out of it are...
1) Natural carbonation & save gas.
2) Oxygen free transfers and better retention of hop flavours.
3) Make a decent lager. My couple of attempts have been very poor even though I followed the recipes & fermentation schedule/temp exactly (as far as I know). I get ester issues that I'm hoping the AR might help.

You'll certainly see benefits there, though I regularly pressure transfer without pressure fermenting, just close up and pressurise the fermenter once fermentation is over.

I don't brew lagers...did one once and too much faff and not a style I particularly like so just not worth the effort for me, but can see the benefits for larger, though the pseudo lagers with Kveik and this new nova lager hybrid yeast strain seems to solve all the lager problems I see so might revisit the style.

 

[MrJay83]

I like lagers but I'm only interested in them because my brother & father don't like hop bombs which I like making. I am very slowly getting them to appreciate them
My dad does like the odd strong saison though!

 

[hoppyscotty]

Saison has become my lager substitute, though the Belgium banana ester thing isn't necessarily my favourite, but might try my next saison with the new Novalager yeast

 

[MrJay83]

I've only used Belle Saison and stuck with it because I like it so much. Hardly any banana and a bit peppery.
I'm doing one this weekend (hopefully). I plan to have 0 psi for the bulk of the active fermentation and then ramp it up to 10 psi for the remainder.
If you did it with pressure from the start would it not help to suppress the esters you're not fond of?