Suspended halo in carboy

MMO

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I have been using this site for a while now but this is my first post.

I recently brewed a light blonde ale to kick off summer and had what i thought appeared to be a stuck fermentation.

My OG was 1.047 and it stuck for a few days at 1.020. I used safale us-05 dry yeast so i don't think under pitching was the issue. I don't have a fermentation chamber so my guess is it may have fermented too hot?

Anyways, to try and get the fermentation to complete last night i put dry yeast into a galss carboy (didn't re-hydrate) and racked the wort out of my primary bucket onto the yeast. This morning, there is a ring or halo of particles suspended about an inch below the surface of the wort around the edge of the carboy. It kind of looks like granulated yeast. Has anyone encountered this before?

I use StarSan and am diligent with sanitation so I am hoping its not an infection. I will try and upload a photo when I get a chance.

Thanks everyone!
 
Got a picture? I suspect poor conversion leading to starch haze, given the stuck fermentation. You might have some grain particles in there suspended by the CO2 in the beer, also possibly an indication of poor conversion. Post a pic so we can see what you're talking about (it could merely be an artifact of lighting and routine chill haze).
 
Thanks! I will post a picture this evening.

I have done about 6 BIAB batches now and am milling fairly fine to help with efficiency (I get 70-75% brewhouse every time). What causes poor conversion leading to starch haze? Mash temperature?

I strike at around 158 and by the time the grains are all added it drops to around 154. From there I turn the burner back on and bring the temp back up to 154 if it drops to 150 during the mash. I also typically do a 90 min mash with BIAB and this batch I only did a 60 min.
 
Thanks! I will post a picture this evening.

I have done about 6 BIAB batches now and am milling fairly fine to help with efficiency (I get 70-75% brewhouse every time). What causes poor conversion leading to starch haze? Mash temperature?

I strike at around 158 and by the time the grains are all added it drops to around 154. From there I turn the burner back on and bring the temp back up to 154 if it drops to 150 during the mash. I also typically do a 90 min mash with BIAB and this batch I only did a 60 min.
Could be temperature or time. Or for BIAB, it could be that some of the grain didn't get wet. There are any number of causes, one of which could be grinding too fine (as you mentioned). Looking forward to the picture....
 

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Looks like a trick of the light to me , during fermentation the heat produced by yeast forms convection currents through the wort which would prevent layers of different density forming .

Try a light source like a low powered torch from different angles and that halo will either disappear or move
 
If it's yeast (reasonable guess, I'd say), it'll disperse throughout the carboy. I've had layer lines like that in cold-crashing but it drops down as clearing continues. At fermentation temps there should be some activity with the new yeast and I would doubt that you'd get dropping and clearing.
Hope you get your fermentation unstuck.;)
 
Looks like a trick of the light to me , during fermentation the heat produced by yeast forms convection currents through the wort which would prevent layers of different density forming .

Try a light source like a low powered torch from different angles and that halo will either disappear or move

I gave it a try and appears to be an actual particulate layer. I'm going to give this time, fine it with gelatin and see how it goes. After all its just beer... relax, have a homebrew ;)
 
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Thanks for the input folks... I will update this thread with how things turn out an post pictures of any changes!
 
I'm putting my money on geletin make sure you chill her down too if your going to clear it up geletin works best on haze formation.
 
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Yep, I'm going with a trick of the light on this one. If you've ever seen a star sapphire or a real tiger eye, it's the same effect: You have a lot of particles suspended in there and the light is diffracting it into this ring. As to cause, I'm still betting it's a starch haze, meaning isinglass or gelatin will not clear it up. You'll need something differently charged like kieselsol or polyklar. There's a kit called SuperKleer that has both - if you can get your hands on it, give it a try.
 
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fine it with gelatin and see how it goes.

US-05 will floc like a champ once you get it cold. I've never used gelatin and within a reasonable time it's dead clear in the keg. Unless you're just in a hurry to keg and serve, you won't need it.
 
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If you slosh it around does it go away?
 
Over a few days the ring slowly dissipated. I took another reading and was still stuck at 1.020 and (OG 1.047)

I went to my last resort and added a tsp. of amylase enzyme and its going again... Chalk this one up to poor starch conversion. Thanks for all the input!

Cheers

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