I have just over 25 litres of Vienna Lager in the Fermzilla, and because I don’t want to try bottling carbonated beer later on I’m moving 5 litres into my SS Brewtech Mini Bucket before increasing fermentation pressure in the Fermzilla to 20 PSI.

The idea is simple; gradually reduce pressure over a couple of hours right down to nothing, connect the beer out post to the bucket’s spigot, close the spunding valve and let fermentation push the brew out. I’m hoping that there’s enough yeast in suspension to keep the fermentation going without anything else needed, but if it looks like it’s stalled then I can always move some Krausen across later on as well, or just pitch more yeast. Gravity presently at 1.023 so we’re about 75% complete.

One thing was slightly weird; the hose connecting both vessels seemed to be pulling quite a lot of gas, even though both ends were fully submerged in the brew. I can only guess that this is CO2 being produced by the wort as its inside the tube, otherwise I’ve got a leak and a problem when it comes to kegging from the Fermzilla later on.

15 minutes later: the bucket’s airlock’s bubbling away happily, looks like my little Opshaug friend doesn’t mind his new environment. Pressure going up again gradually in the Fermzilla too – I didn’t want to add CO2 from the tank so as to increase pressure gradually because I’m concerned about the effects of all these changes on the Tilt.