Very slow neutral wash ferments

Johnboy

Ok so I currently have 2 40L Neutral washes taking their sweet time,
Recipe was as follows

Wash 1- 6kg of Dextrose 6kg Raw Sugar, 25gms EC1118, 25gms Distillmax Nutes, 10gms DAP, 1 teaspoon of Citric, 5 B Complex tablets SG 1.095

Wash 2- 12kg of Dextrose, 25gms EDV 493, 25gms Distillmx Nutes, 10gms DAP, 1 teaspoon of Citric, 5 B Complex tablets, SG 1.085

I have them in an electric blanket and have been at a constant 26 degrees C for 4 weeks

Wash 1 is SG 1.035 Ph 3.4

Wash 2 is SG 1.025 Ph 3.3

I can taste a lot of alcohol in the wash but still a long way off SG 0.990 as still a sweet taste.
Recipe I am following said 10-12 days completion.
Am i missing something??
Its still bubbling away just not like any of my other washes, my UJSSM washes usually take around 6-10 days and my Pugirum washes are done in 48hrs. my current UJ batch has no heat and is bubbling harder at 14-16 Degrees C.
Am i just getting impatient or does something seem off??

Clickeral

Thats a lot of sugar for a 40l batch I normallu use 6kg per 30L

1kg per 5L of water is the rule of thumb I thought ?

Johnboy

Both yeasts I'm using are good for 18% ABV 12kgs will be 17.5% ABV maybe i should add some more water and repitch my yeasts?? I don't like the Dex wash smell and taste very cidery. I'll stick to sugar in future.

punkin

Much too strong. Stick to 10-12% and you'll fare much better. Better to do 2 x 10% washes in a month than one x 18%.

Kapea

You need to get you wash pH up above 4 and things will speed up. Allow them to get below 3 and they will stop.

crozdog

Agree with @kapea - raise your pH

Johnboy

cool thanks guys

Mickiboi

At the risk of being shot down.

EC1118 is used in wine and champagne fermentation. I have been using this yeast for around 10 years to make Chardonnay and Pinot.

Both Chardonnay and Champagne ferment best at a pH of 3.29. We strive to hold this pH through out the entire ferment of 10 to 14 days. It very rarely needs any additions to keep it at that level, the grapes seem to do ok on their own. If it does deviate it normally falls under 3.29. It NEVER goes up.

Bottled wine has an ABV of 14.5%. When we pick the grapes we do so when the baume is at 14-14.3 which equates to a Brix of 25.3 or an sg of 1.107. This equates to a potential alcohol of 14.5 - 15.5%ABV.

EC1118 has no trouble working under these conditions. In fact it will happily go down to pH 3.1 no problems and will also happily ferment out at 19% ABV with no off flavours provided you keep the temp down. It is meant to work under these conditions and parameters. Email Lalvin and get the the proper specification sheets for the yeast and see the pH range they recommend to ferment in. Sugar, grape must, its all the same to the yeast.

I have developed my own neutral wash recipe based on years of using EC1118 and fermenting wine. See my wash record. I keep very good records and calibrated instruments. Everyone has their own way of doing things. But I can tell you, pH 3.3 is fine for EC1118.

Kapea

Fruit fermentation is different than sugar and honey fermentation. Fruit is loaded with yeast nutients. I've had explosive fruit fermentation that have painted my ceilings. I do not do fruit fermentations under airlock anymore. Malt fermentations also have excess yeast nutients in them.

I believe that nutrient augmented sugar and honey washes, lacking the broad spectrum of yeast nutients that occur naturally in fruit, make the yeast fermenting the sugar and honey washes more suseptable to the yeast inhibition effect of low pH.

There's a saying among homebrewers, "Your're not a true homebrewer if you've never mopped your ceiling."

FWIW I am a big fan of R2 for my honey ferments. I find that EC1118 makes an astringent mead.

Mickiboi

Yes I know they are different. Yes grape must is loaded with nutrients, I don't add any to our must. This does not change the operating range of the EC1118, it doesn't care, pH 3.29 is fine, that is what I replied about. The fact is that this yeast is engineered for the specific purpose for making wine, which is a pH of 3.29 and an alcohol content up to 18%, with a neutral flavour. Hence its acceptance in making neutral washes and why johnboy's problem does not lie with the pH.

Mickiboi

EC1118 is not as susceptible to those problems as you think. It has no no nutrient inhibition at pH 3.29 whether its a grape must or a nutrient loaded sugar wash, which is, once again, why the wine industry use it for that specific purpose and it's use in sugar washes is widely accepted.

Kapea

Yes, EC1118 is an amazing magic bullet that knows no bounds,
except in Johnboy's sugar wash.

punkin

Surely you can accept that someone has intimate and detailed knowledge and experience that may supersede your experience @Kapea and just acknowledge that you could be mistaken without coming across as mean about it?

We are not all authorities on every subject, but there is an amazing amount of knowledge here and it would be a shame if someone felt they couldn't post because they would be jibed at.
I know i have spoken out my arse plenty of times.

rossco

Cheers Mick, I'll use your notes. 1118 has been giving me the shits for ages. :D

Kapea

The point I was making is that there is a huge difference between fermenting wine and fermenting a sugar wash. What works for one may not work for the other.

A quick look at Mickiboi's spreadsheet shows he is making repeated base additions to raise his sugar wash pH from near 3 to above 4.

If what I said seems mean, I apologize. I felt like I was being talked down to about fermenting wine, while his spreadsheet confirms what I said about low pH in sugar washes.

Mickiboi

I add KOH 3 times. 10ml once at the start before yeast pitching, 10ml again at day 1 and 10ml again at day 4. The pH drops back under 4 in about an hour. After the last addition you can see??? the pH steadily drops from 3.7 to 3.3 where it finishes, I make no more additions. You can see my morning readings are all under 4 and the whole idea of this wash recipe is to finish off at 3.3 which is where EC1118 is designed to work. Other yeasts are different and yes what does work for some does not work for others. Which is why I went to a hell of a lot of trouble to develop this wash recipe for ME and it works for ME. I posted it as a record of the pH consistently under 4 and the sg dropping .1 every day to show you how happy it ferments at that level.

My spreadsheet confirms what I said in the beginning not what you said, EC1118 running at a pH of 3.3 is fine and you will see the only time it goes above 4 is when it has dropped under 3.2 and I make the addition. If people don't want to try my recipe that's fine I'm OK with that, no skin off my nose, I really don't care one way or the other.

I wasn't talking down to you about making wine. I was simply stating that I do have a lot of knowledge about EC1118 and what it can do, how I use it and the parameters in which I use it. And once again I will state that pH3.3 is what this yeast was designed to work at. Don't believe me.......email Lalvin and ask them. Google Chardonnay, pH 3.29 and EC1118 and see what comes up. No one in the wine industry ferments there Chardonnay above 3.6 no matter what yeast they use, but in particular using 1118, they all aim for 3.29.

But my last word on this is EC1118 is fine at 3.29 because that's where it was designed to work.

Kapea

Nice.
Thank you for sharing.

fadge

@Mickiboi when you said you take notes I was not expecting such details, excellent.

Bloody hell, I'm lucky to remember to actually write a date down on my scrap bit of paper for my washes! I think my last lot was 3mths ago, sitting in the barrels waiting for me to strip, at least 6 runs worth, 4 x whiskey ferments and 2 x tpw, they should at least be well settled by now!

I personally had no idea how well EC1118 actually worked, I've used it, I have several sachets in the fridge, but have just used Lowens bakers yeast for all my neutrals, may be time to rethink my methods moving forward, great information.

Cheers

Fadge

btw have not hooked up pid's as yet, winter cold has really slowed down my stilling and time out in the shed, as soon as the weather improves I'll be back at it.

Mickiboi

@fadge thanks mate. Let me know how you go with the PID's.

punkin

+1 on that, thanks for the advice it is an outstanding post.

Johnboy

So after trying all things suggested with little change, contact was made with Lalvin and after discussion and them looking at my recipe. It was suggested that my initial pitch was light on, the recommended rate being 1gm/L of both yeast and nutrients. I asked about PH and he said 3.3-4.0 is perfect as @Mickiboi said. Added 25gms of both to each wash and away it went. I figured 25gms would be plenty originally as it would multiply as the process went on I guess it pays to not assume.

Cheers for all the advice fellas.

EdInNH

@Johnboy Did you aerate or add oxygen to the wash before adding the yeast?

The yeast needs oxygen for the first stage of development where the number of yeast cells multiply. The yeast then lives anaerobically to produce alcohol.

I now bubble oxygen from my welding tank through my mash for 15 minutes before adding yeast. I have found this makes a big difference.

EC1118 does a great job on my bourbon.

ElectricEd

Sorry for the cross post, but I think this could help here. Having done more TPWs in 200 litre batches I find the wash always becomes stuck about half way through. This is using EC1118, Uvaferm 43 or Mycoferm Champagne yeast. The wash runs out of nutrients. I then started looking around for commercial nutrients and found Nutrozim sold by Enoltec. I'm sure Lallemande make an equivalent but their distributor is on the other side of town and just too far away. A wash I started last week stuck 3 days ago so I put 80g of hydrated Nutrozim into it. It has taken off like a rocket and is dropping more than 0.010SG each day.

Nutrozim @ EnolTech AU

Here's a bit of the blurb from their flyer:

• NUTROZIM is a bio-activator of recent concept, with a balanced composition of Nitrogen salts, yeast-cell walls preparation, thiamine and microfibers of pure Alpha Cellulose.
• NUTROZIM is a very efficient additive for a regular fermentation kinetic, even in critical conditions (e.g. low temperature, clean musts etc).
• NUTROZIM finds its ideal usage in clarified and/or filtered musts where it supplies microelements, growth factors, free amino nitrogen and long chain fatty acids (C18 and C20) which regulate the cellular permeability. It also provides a physical support function for the active dry yeast, which at the end of thefermentation would become easily separated from the liquid phase, in the clarification sediments orthrough filtration.

I hope this adds to the discussion.

Mickiboi

Lallemande equivalent is Fermaid AT.

From the enoltech website......

Usage: Added to ferments in fractioned doses commencing at around 3% alcohol and up to and beyond 8-10% and to assist difficult ferments. (high alcohol / high temperature) In white wines, Nutrozim will assist turbidity and hence the reduction in the production of volatile acidity.

They state the same parameters as Lalvin for their nutrients. Don't add all the nutrients at once, stagger the dose. 1/2-2/3 at the start and the remainder at 1/3 through the fermentation cycle. You will get a better result.

Smaug

Nice pro tips.