Us 05: strange behaviour

[vicjuve]

"Hello, I'm an Italian hb. In one or two of most important hb italian forums, some users report a strange behaviour of the famous US05. Does anyone, here, notice any problem with the last strains of us05, such as low flocculation, high attenuation, restarts in the bottle?
thank you. "

 

[Michael_biab]

My last use of US05 was about 90 days ago, and I did not find any issues you mentioned. (Don't know if they ship a slightly different product here to the States, but that's where I live)

 

[Hawkbox]

I don't find US05 flocculates particularly well but overall I haven't had any notable problems with it.

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

I have, many times, in the past its been good but the last few years I get a bad batch every couple of brews, so I switched to bry97 it's very consistent

 

[Nosybear]

Low flocculation and high attenuation seem normal to me for US-05. Restarting in the bottle? I'm betting on an infection of some kind: Once US-05 consumes all the fermentable sugars, it's done, period.

 

[J A]

restart in the bottle?

That's not a yeast issue ...any yeast would have to restart in the bottle to add carbonation. If you're seeing over-carbonation, gushering on opening, broken bottles then that's a sign of infection, bottling too soon or using more priming sugar than necessary.
The other issues you describe can be attributed to infection as well, depending on the severity. I've had US-05 attenuate to 87% for some very clean (though slightly dry) beer. Extremely clear beer without gelatin or other clearing additives could take 2-3 weeks in the keg or maybe longer if bottle conditioned.
Since you're bottling, I suspect that a slight secondary infection in the bottle has caused all the problems. When an otherwise good beer that's finished clean and attenuated fully is subjected to a wild yeast infection in the bottle, it will over carbonate and gush and stir up all the yeast sediment even though it had settled clear in the bottle.

 

[Nosybear]

That's not a yeast issue ...any yeast would have to restart in the bottle to add carbonation. If you're seeing over-carbonation, gushering on opening, broken bottles then that's a sign of infection, bottling too soon or using more priming sugar than necessary.
The other issues you describe can be attributed to infection as well, depending on the severity. I've had US-05 attenuate to 87% for some very clean (though slightly dry) beer. Extremely clear beer without gelatin or other clearing additives could take 2-3 weeks in the keg or maybe longer if bottle conditioned.
Since you're bottling, I suspect that a slight secondary infection in the bottle has caused all the problems. When an otherwise good beer that's finished clean and attenuated fully is subjected to a wild yeast infection in the bottle, it will over carbonate and gush and stir up all the yeast sediment even though it had settled clear in the bottle.

I'm wondering too about the low flocculation and high attenuation - sounds like it was infected before going into the bottle to me. @vicjuve - can you taste anything odd about the beer?

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

the flocculation has always been low in 05 but I get a pear taste and not a clean one when its off, sometimes it over powers the hop flavor

 

[vicjuve]

Thank you for the answers... I give hou Some other elements:
For high attenuation I mean that it is high in relation to the grist and the mash: no sugar, 3-5% of cara and mash monostep at 154*F. I reached an AA of 85-89% in two different batches.
For the restart I can't esclude an infection, but the AA was "normal".....
While for the low flocculation is more correct say that sedimantation is not as in the past: it is less compact and easier to move.

 

[GFHomebrew]

Ive used it once then moved on to other clean fermenting chico strain like wlp090 my long time house ale strain.

Might be time to make a yeast switch

 

[dankbrewing@gmail.com]

I too like the Danstar, BRY97 as a dry, clean fermenting yeast. Also a fan of the 04.

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

I was very surprised especially how cheap it is on my last brew I used Coopers ale yeast and it's very clean, it flocculated and attenuated very well and my temp was high due to a power outage, I had and strange off flavor at first taste test from the high temp but went away after conditioning, I'm trying a low 60's next time

 

[I_playdrums]

I am replacing SO5 with WLP 090 for many of the reasons stated above.