Beer Forum

Can anybody offer advice on reducing the quantity of yeast in my beer prior to kegging/bottling? I would still like enough in suspension to allow for carbonation but only the bare minimum to achieve this. I know some brewers such as the great Sierra Nevada filter totaly and pitch a specific quantity for conditioning, I was thinking I could remove say 90% of the yeast. Any idea what grade of of filter would be needed for this?

DangeRuss wrote:Can anybody offer advice on reducing the quantity of yeast in my beer prior to kegging/bottling? I would still like enough in suspension to allow for carbonation but only the bare minimum to achieve this. I know some brewers such as the great Sierra Nevada filter totaly and pitch a specific quantity for conditioning, I was thinking I could remove say 90% of the yeast. Any idea what grade of of filter would be needed for this?

You could set 10% of the beer aside in a sanitized container of some sort and filter all the yeast out of the other 90%.Then mix. I would skip the filtering, though, and just let the beer in the carboy clear naturally before packaging. Cold-crashing will hasten this process.

Unless you are on a tight schedule, I'd let time do it for your. Even beer that appears quite clear in the carboy will have enough yeast to carbonate.

spiderwrangler wrote:Unless you are on a tight schedule, I'd let time do it for your. Even beer that appears quite clear in the carboy will have enough yeast to carbonate.

Time... and cold. If you have the capability to chill your beer it will drop fairly clear farly quickly, depending on strain. Cal ale takes about 24-48 hours for me. Fullers strains floc so quickly they don't even need the fridge. Wyeast kolsch is so powdery it needs an extended lagering period.

I've never tried it but I've read that you can use gelatin to clear and there is still enough non-visible yeast in suspension to carbonate.

Avoid dropping yeast before they have a chance to clean up after themselves (DMS, etc).