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Sealing Times and Yeast Entry Times

I performed a few tests to determine whether sealing times have any effect on the total alcohol produced or other characteristics of the finished beer. One of these was also a test of the yeast entry time, to see whether that had any effect. My results so far suggest that neither the sealing time nor the yeast entry time have any effect on the finished beer, as long as the same compliment of yeasts is present when sealing at different times or testing in different spots.

Note: Additional supporting data can be found on my MultiYeast Tests page.

My most recent tests involved Yeast 8, for which I have several spots near my camp that have that as the first yeast. Each spot has a different seal time to isolate Y8, which demonstrates that Y8 is entering the kettle at a different time at each spot. I used the exact same recipe for each test. Here's the data:

Location 1

Coordinates:	Seal Time:	Yeast(s) Present:
848, -3376	600	Y8

Recipe:	Alcohol	Color	Vitamin	Glucose	Maltose	Barley	Orange	Bannana	Cherry	Date	Honey	Nutmeg	Cinnamon	Tanin	Grass	Nasty	Result:
60 Honey and 60 LM at 1176	992	89	66	13	315	354	11	73	15	36	69	11	11	177	100	76	Potent Sweet Beer. Hint of barley flavor.

Location 2

Coordinates:	Seal Time:	Yeast(s) Present:
880, -3376	700	Y8

Recipe:	Alcohol	Color	Vitamin	Glucose	Maltose	Barley	Orange	Bannana	Cherry	Date	Honey	Nutmeg	Cinnamon	Tanin	Grass	Nasty	Result:
60 Honey and 60 LM at 1176	992	89	66	13	315	354	11	73	15	36	69	11	11	177	100	76	Potent Sweet Beer. Hint of barley flavor.

Location 3

Coordinates:	Seal Time:	Yeast(s) Present:
912, -3344	1300	Y8

Recipe:	Alcohol	Color	Vitamin	Glucose	Maltose	Barley	Orange	Bannana	Cherry	Date	Honey	Nutmeg	Cinnamon	Tanin	Grass	Nasty	Result:
60 Honey and 60 LM at 1176	992	89	66	13	315	354	11	73	15	36	69	11	11	177	100	76	Potent Sweet Beer. Hint of barley flavor.

Results

As you can see, I used the exact same recipe at all three locations and got the exact same result each time. Somehow I just barely escaped getting "Grassy" beer with this recipe. I can only assume that the Grassy flavor was actually 99.9 and got rounded up to 100, or something, but that's not the interesting part....

Here are some of the implications:

• Clearly the Y8 yeast is entering the kettle at Location 3 much earlier that at Location 1 (sealing at 800 at Location 1 yields no yeasts or microbes -- see my Yeast Test page for the data), therefore the yeast entry time at any given spot doesn't seem to affect the total alcohol that will be produced or the other beer characteristics.
• Furthermore, the seal time to isolate Y8 at Location 1 is just 600 seconds, which implies that a total alcohol of 992 can be achieved within 600 seconds, so either yeasts produce more than one alcohol per second, or time is not factored in at all and the kettle simply produces as much alcohol as the yeast(s) is capable of, regardless of how much time is left in the Fermentation phase.
• Different seal times also seem to have no effect on the outcome of the beer -- seal time does not seem to be factored into the equations for the final results.

Caveat: It may be that the equations do factor time in somehow, but that each yeast is capable of producing 4 alcohol per second (or something like that), which would mean that in the tests I did above, only 248 seconds would have been required to produce 992 alcohol, or thereabouts. If that is the case, it is unlikely we would ever see the effects of time on the first yeast to enter the kettle, and probably not on the 2nd either, but it may affect the 3rd, 4th, or 5th yeasts if they enter the kettle sufficiently late in the Fermentation phase.