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Author Topic: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste  (Read 16752 times)

Offline kramerog

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #15 on: February 07, 2013, 08:51:22 am »
A possibility is that you are smelling DMS, a sulfur-containing compound that smells like canned corn or a corn refinery, or that the yeast reduce DMS to hydrogen sulfide, which has the classical eggy sulfur smell.  You may not be boiling enough to drive out all the DMS-precursor compounds since you are using a Pils malt and you missed your post-boil gravity. 

Offline hulkavitch

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2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #16 on: February 07, 2013, 09:55:16 am »
boiled for 60 mins in cold cold weather I wasnt surprised that i missed my gravity. Next time I would do a 90 min boil but I dont know if I would do 90 in the summer.

Offline mabrungard

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #17 on: February 07, 2013, 09:55:53 am »
I don't see a reason why the water would contribute to excessive sulfury notes.  It is probably the yeast.  Another good practice is to make sure that wort contacts copper during the brewing process.  Copper complexes with sulfurous compounds in the wort and removes them as a precipitate.  I piece of copper tubing may be all you need.
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Offline morticaixavier

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #18 on: February 07, 2013, 10:03:32 am »
I don't see a reason why the water would contribute to excessive sulfury notes.  It is probably the yeast.  Another good practice is to make sure that wort contacts copper during the brewing process.  Copper complexes with sulfurous compounds in the wort and removes them as a precipitate.  I piece of copper tubing may be all you need.

I didn't mean to imply that the water might have anything to do with the sulfur. I am just not used to seeing so many different salt additions. but I also use RO instead of Distilled so perhaps you need the extra sodium in that case. I'm also lazy so if I don't need it for the calcium or the chloride/sulfate balance I don't add it. (or pH of course)
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Offline Delo

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #19 on: February 07, 2013, 10:15:21 am »
I used 3068 in a hefe and it had a sulfur smell while fermenting. Without looking at my notes I had it in the primary for about the same time, but probably a little higher temp. I cant remember how strong the sulfur smell was when I bottled it, but after conditioning in the bottle a few weeks it was not there.  As far as the banana goes the lower temp may have not produced as many esters as I did have banana flavor. Also according to their website, overpitching the yeast may reduce the banana flavor.

Also if it was cold outside and you did not have a rigourous boil could the sulfur compounds from the mash not have boiled off?
Mark

Offline HoosierBrew

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #20 on: February 07, 2013, 10:18:01 am »
I have also had mild sulfur with 3068 during primary.  Always dissipates quickly for me.
Jon H.

Offline topher.bartos

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #21 on: February 07, 2013, 11:59:21 am »
+1 to conditioning the beer longer.
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Offline hulkavitch

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2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #22 on: February 07, 2013, 02:03:34 pm »
would a tranfer to secondary help with this problem? Getting the beer off of the yeast cake...

Offline kramerog

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #23 on: February 07, 2013, 02:22:38 pm »
would a tranfer to secondary help with this problem? Getting the beer off of the yeast cake...

If you are getting the eggy sulfur smell, a transfer to secondary can be helpful as the eggy odor will be stripped out by the carbon dioxide that will be lost during the transfer.  However, getting the beer off the yeast cake is generally not helpful for green home brews as the yeast reabsorbs some undesirable taste/odor compounds at the end of primary fermentation like diacetyl.

Offline topher.bartos

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #24 on: February 07, 2013, 04:56:58 pm »
Well, increasing the yeast activity prior to bottling will help as well.

1. Agitate the beer without oxidation.
2. Increase the fermentation temperature.

I've heard of brewers injecting some CO2 into the bottom of the fermentor. CO2 helps to allow off-flavors to escape. Just don't confuse CO2 with Oxygen, you'll oxidize your beer and you'll end up drinking cardboard.

Both of those things might help to increase the yeast activity. When yeast are more active more CO2 will escape releasing the sulfur compounds. Perhaps you are bottling too early for this to happen?
« Last Edit: February 07, 2013, 04:59:07 pm by topher.bartos »
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Offline mpietropaoli

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #25 on: April 29, 2013, 05:57:26 pm »
Regular poster on  here, but found this thread on a google search (I am having a similar problem)...though I was originally trying to turn this beer around in about 9 days for a party...not looking too good right now.  The beer has a real clean, fresh, wheaty, citrusy aroma, but I am getting a weird sulfury, almost papery/cardboardy oxidized aroma.  The taste starts out really bright, but ends with a strange (and slight) farty thing thats somewhere between eggs and paper. 

Not contained in the notes below:
-1L starter, decanted, made additional 1L starter and pitched when active (entire starter with starter beer of 2nd step)--borderline overpitch so the beer would finish quicker
-cold-pitched at 66* (partially due to the fact that I likely pitched about 1.3x the recommended amount), fermented there for 3 days, raised to 68, checked sample, gravity was down to 1.011, ramped to 70 after 5 days (today), might consider going to 72* tomorrow
-15min Protein rest @ 122, 5 min decoction to 155*, sacc rest 65 minutes, decoction to mash out, single batch sparge
-used centennial to try to get some citrus in the beer from another 'angle'
-the wort smelled so amazingly delicious when I pitched (almost like a fruity muffin of some sort), I ran to a buddy's to pick up some distillery-grade fermcap, which I was convinced would help keep some of the post-boil aroma goodness in the beer (it didn't....would love to know how to retain more of the aromas this beer had). 

Even in tasting between today and yesterday, it seems as though the sulfur might have dissipated a bit.  Or maybe it was the silicone fermcap of death that I added that's going to kill me. 

Would love to hear if the OP's sulfur problem subsided...


Wit and Wisdom
16-A Witbier
Author: mcp

Size: 6.0 gal @ 68 °F
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 174.35 kcal per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.052 (1.044 - 1.052)
Terminal Gravity: 1.013 (1.008 - 1.012)
Color: 4.58 (2.0 - 4.0)
Alcohol: 5.15% (4.5% - 5.5%)
Bitterness: 13.4 (10.0 - 20.0)

Ingredients:
5.5 lb (45.8%) Bohemian Pilsner Malt - added during mash
5 lb (41.7%) Wheat Flaked - added during mash
.5 lb (4.2%) Munich Malt - added during mash
1 lb (8.3%) Oats Flaked - added during mash
.25 oz (50.0%) Centennial (10.0%) - added during boil, boiled 60 m
.25 oz (50.0%) Centennial (10.0%) - added during boil, boiled 30 m
1.5 oz Orange zest - added during boil, boiled 1 m
.4 oz Corriander crushed - added during boil, boiled 1 m
.5 oz Chamomile (dried) - added during boil, boiled 1.0 m
1.0 ea White Labs WLP410 Belgian Wit II Ale

Schedule:
Ambient Air: 70.0 °F
Source Water: 60.0 °F
Elevation: 0.0 m


Notes
added chamomile tea and zest in muslin bag at 30 seconds wort smelled great, seems like a lot of aroma blew off with fermentation (though silicone added to cap krausen)

Results generated by BeerTools Pro 1.5.24
Bubblin': helles
Flowin': IIPA, Doppelbock, Flanders
Sittin': More Flanders, Braison,
Thinkin': wit, more helles

Offline tschmidlin

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #26 on: April 29, 2013, 06:02:22 pm »
Regular poster on  here, but found this thread on a google search (I am having a similar problem)...though I was originally trying to turn this beer around in about 9 days for a party...not looking too good right now.  The beer has a real clean, fresh, wheaty, citrusy aroma, but I am getting a weird sulfury, almost papery/cardboardy oxidized aroma.  The taste starts out really bright, but ends with a strange (and slight) farty thing thats somewhere between eggs and paper. 

Not contained in the notes below:
-1L starter, decanted, made additional 1L starter and pitched when active (entire starter with starter beer of 2nd step)--borderline overpitch so the beer would finish quicker
-cold-pitched at 66* (partially due to the fact that I likely pitched about 1.3x the recommended amount), fermented there for 3 days, raised to 68, checked sample, gravity was down to 1.011, ramped to 70 after 5 days (today), might consider going to 72* tomorrow
-15min Protein rest @ 122, 5 min decoction to 155*, sacc rest 65 minutes, decoction to mash out, single batch sparge
-used centennial to try to get some citrus in the beer from another 'angle'
-the wort smelled so amazingly delicious when I pitched (almost like a fruity muffin of some sort), I ran to a buddy's to pick up some distillery-grade fermcap, which I was convinced would help keep some of the post-boil aroma goodness in the beer (it didn't....would love to know how to retain more of the aromas this beer had). 

Even in tasting between today and yesterday, it seems as though the sulfur might have dissipated a bit.  Or maybe it was the silicone fermcap of death that I added that's going to kill me. 

Would love to hear if the OP's sulfur problem subsided...


Wit and Wisdom
16-A Witbier
Author: mcp

Size: 6.0 gal @ 68 °F
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 174.35 kcal per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.052 (1.044 - 1.052)
Terminal Gravity: 1.013 (1.008 - 1.012)
Color: 4.58 (2.0 - 4.0)
Alcohol: 5.15% (4.5% - 5.5%)
Bitterness: 13.4 (10.0 - 20.0)

Ingredients:
5.5 lb (45.8%) Bohemian Pilsner Malt - added during mash
5 lb (41.7%) Wheat Flaked - added during mash
.5 lb (4.2%) Munich Malt - added during mash
1 lb (8.3%) Oats Flaked - added during mash
.25 oz (50.0%) Centennial (10.0%) - added during boil, boiled 60 m
.25 oz (50.0%) Centennial (10.0%) - added during boil, boiled 30 m
1.5 oz Orange zest - added during boil, boiled 1 m
.4 oz Corriander crushed - added during boil, boiled 1 m
.5 oz Chamomile (dried) - added during boil, boiled 1.0 m
1.0 ea White Labs WLP410 Belgian Wit II Ale

Schedule:
Ambient Air: 70.0 °F
Source Water: 60.0 °F
Elevation: 0.0 m


Notes
added chamomile tea and zest in muslin bag at 30 seconds wort smelled great, seems like a lot of aroma blew off with fermentation (though silicone added to cap krausen)

Results generated by BeerTools Pro 1.5.24
I think it is from your yeast and pils malt.  I would warm it up to 75 for a day, then crash cool.  That will help drive off the H2S (which is what I think you have).
Tom Schmidlin

Offline gymrat

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #27 on: April 29, 2013, 06:11:08 pm »
Isnt pilsn malt supposed to be boiled a minimum of 75 minutes because of DMS which contains sulfer?
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Topeka, KS

Offline mpietropaoli

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Re: 2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #28 on: April 29, 2013, 06:26:40 pm »
90 minute boil probably would have been advisable.  I usually go that long, but was running low on gas and didn't want to risk it.  So instead I decided to risk having vegetable beer. 

Mordecai, H2S is hydrogen sulfide?  Would raising it to 75 for a few days help more than one day?
Bubblin': helles
Flowin': IIPA, Doppelbock, Flanders
Sittin': More Flanders, Braison,
Thinkin': wit, more helles

Offline majorvices

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2 beers, 2 yeasts, same nasty sulfur smell and taste
« Reply #29 on: April 29, 2013, 07:12:40 pm »
One great trick to remove sulfur from beer is to run the beer through a line of copper. You can even take a copper pipe and stir the carboy/bucket/keg.