Hi all,
I am new to home brewing and therefore this group. I wonder if I could ask
some advice to what is probably a silly question to old hands?
I have made 2 brews one from a muntons bitter kit and one from a coopers
real ale. They are both in Hambleton Bard pressure barrels (40 pint). I have
followed the instructions and after adding the second sugar and leaving for
a week, placed them in my garage to cool and clear.
It has been a week so far but neither show any signs of clearing and are
still cloudy.

How long does it normally take to clear?
How cold must it be?
Is there anything you can add to help?
Any general advice?

I would really like to drink some of my hard work soon!

Thanks in advance

Andy

Irish moss is supposed to help clarify beer a bit. I usually add about
a teaspoon during the last 15-30 minutes. There are other finings that
you could add as well. Also, after about two weeks of room temperature
you might want to put the bottles in the fridge to help them clear.
Room temp will help them carbonate faster and then once carbonated you
can put 'em in the fridge.

If clarity is a concern you may want to do a secondary in a 5 gallon
glass carboy. This will get the beer off the yeast cake and trub.

A have a Williams Brewing catalog and under almost everything they sell
they give a pretty good description of what the items are used for.
They organize their catalogs really well IMO and they're free.

[Heath]

It can take a month or two to fully clear a beer, the colder it is the quiker the clarification.

You can stick the carboy or whatever fermentation vessel you have in the coldest area you can find before bottling, this will speed up the process. 30 degrees is a good temp and at this temp its not unlikely for the beer to clear in a week or two. THats why many homebrewers have a fridge, not only so they can make lagers but to help in making bright beer.

You can add geletin, this will clear it up fast, but I dont recomend rushing brewing. Time is your best friend and costs you nothing.

Heath

Ales are generally "cloudier" than lagers.
If there are kits that you boil, next time you sould add 1 tsp to the
last 15 minutes of the boil and that will help make it clearer.
As for these batches, time will help a bit, wspecially if you use a
secondary fermenter.
Ferrment in the primary for a week or so then rack into the secondary
for about another week, then bottle per your directions.
Since these are both ales you should keep right around 64F while
fermentin and bottle conditioning untill the carbonation level you seek
is achieved then refridgerate, they will also clear a little bit more in
the fridge.
Hope that helps.
Cheers,
Michael Herrenbruck
DragonTail Ale
Drunken Bee Mead

joanne fee wrote:[color=blue]
> Hi all,
> I am new to home brewing and therefore this group. I wonder if I could ask
> some advice to what is probably a silly question to old hands?
> I have made 2 brews one from a muntons bitter kit and one from a coopers
> real ale. They are both in Hambleton Bard pressure barrels (40 pint). I have
> followed the instructions and after adding the second sugar and leaving for
> a week, placed them in my garage to cool and clear.
> It has been a week so far but neither show any signs of clearing and are
> still cloudy.
>
> How long does it normally take to clear?
> How cold must it be?
> Is there anything you can add to help?
> Any general advice?
>
> I would really like to drink some of my hard work soon!
>
> Thanks in advance
>
> Andy
>
>[/color]