Second brew using pressure fermenting.
Day 1-4 Temperature 18C Pressure 5-6 psi SG from OG 1.058 to 1.029
Dry hopping at Day 5 using Hop Bong went well. Definitely affects RAPT pill readings for a few days while hops settle down.
Days 5-9 Temperature 18C Pressure gradually increased to 22.5 psi (maximum) SG to 1.014 close to FG of 1.012. Agitated fermenter daily to help with CO2 absorption.
Day 10-14 Temperature gradually reduced to 5C Pressure to 15.8 psi as cooler temp meant CO2 dissolved. During this period, Volumes of CO2 held steady at 2.7. No agitation of liquid to ensure trub dropped out. FG of 1.012 at Day 12 although had already reached 1.014 at Day 5 pre DH addition. So 95% of fermentation was probably complete after Day 5.
Plan for bottling day was to lower pressure in fermenter to 3 psi, hold it at that with external CO2 and bottle into chilled sterilised bottles. With slow release of pressure all well until 7 psi when trub exploded causing massive mixing. Had to wait 4 hours for clearing sufficiently to bottle. This impacted fizz slightly, but so far mouthfeel ok. Two ways forward, either bottle at 15 psi using a sealed pressure diff system, or use Fermzilla with trub system. I’m going to try the latter as bottling at 3 psi into chilled bottles works well so long as done immediately following pressure reduction in fermenter.
