New homebrewer needs help

Welcome! Try posting your question in the Homebrewing forum. A lot of knowledgeable folks hang out there and should be able to help.

Cheers, and good luck!

 

Hello N2Brew, welcome to BA. Yes, your questions would reach a wider audience in our homebrewing forums. Of course your comments are welcome in the other forums as well.

 

Welcome to the BA site, N2BREW, and to the Homebrewing forum and this great hobby. You've found the right place to get feedback on your brewing session.

The first thing that I'll comment about is that it looks like you chose a difficult beer to brew on your first attempt. You didn't mention what your OG was, but I'm guessing that it would be a number north of 1.070 specific gravity. When brewing 'big' beers, they have some potential issues that are unique to them, one being that they can have a violent fermentation. Google 'blow-off tube' to see what I mean. That device would have handled the excessive krausen that developed on your beer andamade a mess of things. But mistakes are a great way to learn.

You also didn't say what the wort temp was when you pitched your yeast, but if it was too warm, well those little buggers love balmy temps and that could have contributed to the over-active fermentation.

Not sparging your grains would likely have left some sugars and flavor behind, but that is kind of minor.

I think you will have a drinkable beer, but it may not be what you were expecting.

If this is a breakfast stout I assume coffee is involved. Did that go in the boil, or is yet to be added after fermentation? There are different ways to add it, so you can do a search of this forum for that topic and ignore your recipe instructions if other methods that you read about here make more sense.

 

Firstly, I would be willing to guess that this batch will turn out OK.

@PapaGoose03 pretty much discussed the topics but permit me to expound upon them.

“I didn't get my wort down to temp for 3 hours.” Ideally you want to cool down more quickly, and your future purchase of an immersion chiller will help here, but a slow cool down will not ‘ruin’ the batch. One of the benefits of a quick cool down is improved clarification of the resulting beer.

“I also didn't know about sparging just curious how much these errors are going to effect the final product.” If you neglected to sparge that means that you did not extract all of the sugars from the mashed grains like you could. The net result is that your original gravity will be lower. Did you measure your original gravity (i.e., with a hydrometer)? If so, what did you measure? The only negative consequence here is that you will end up with a lower original gravity for this batch.

“I unscrewed the lid washed and sanitized the airlock and put it all back on. I am using the conical fast fermenter 7.9g was at just about 6g when I pitched my yeast and covered.” PapaGoose03 discussed how a blow off tube would be helpful here. Just to further discuss placing 6 gallons of wort in a 7.9 gallon fermentor does not provide a lot of headspace for the formation of krausen (foam). In the future other options are to place less wort (i.e., 5.5 gallons) or use a product called Fermcap-S which mitigates the amount of krausen formed.

As with any hobby, homebrewing is a learning process. The good news is that nothing you have detailed are onerous issues. Enjoy this batch and your next batch will be even ‘better’.

Cheers!

 

1.062, maybe?

That wouldn't cause fermentation to pause/cease. Why do you think it's stuck?

 

As was discussed above your OG was likely 1.062. If you had sparged you would have obtained a higher value.

The standard is to measure specific gravity at 59/68 degrees F depending upon the hydrometer so your reading at 80 degrees F is a little off. For the case of a hydrometer calibrated for 68 degrees F the original gravity would be 1.063. Here is a link for this:

https://www.brewersfriend.com/hydrometer-temp/

You pitched at 80 degrees F which not optimum. Depending on the ale yeast strain it would be 'better' to pitch cooler; something on the order of 68 degrees F. Higher temperatures will result in increased production of esters and higher alcohols (e.g, fusel oils). At what temperature is your fermenter now? Do you have a means to measure this (e.g., a fermometer)?

Cheers!

 

The airlock isn't a perfect indicator of fermentation activity. However, it's possible that fermentation has finished. 80F is really high for most yeast strains, and fermentation will be much faster there. I'd recommend waiting a few days, then taking a hydrometer reading. Then take another two days later. If they are the same, and in the area of what you'd expect, attenuation is done. At that point, taste the beer. If there are no off-flavors, go ahead and bottle.

 

OP, you mentioned in your initial post that the krausen mess was on the walls near the fermenter, and that kind of tells me that something violent happened. Either the lid was blown off the fermenter or the air lock was blown out of its hole in the lid and the krausen sprayed everywhere. If the air lock is a standard three-piece model, and if it has plastic cross-hairs at the tip of the tube at the end that is in the fermentor, take some wire snips and cut those cross-hairs off. Those things restrict the flow of krausen which likely caused your 'explosion' with some built-up pressure involved. I don't know what the functional purpose of those cross-hairs are, but to me they're a hindrance.

Also, one method that homebrewers use to install a blow-off is to place a plastic hose onto the outside end of that air-lock tube which then directs the excess krausen and the CO2 into a nearby bucket of water/sanitizer, so those cross-hairs would still be an issue if not removed and still potentially block the safety effect that the blow-off is supposed to give you.

(Another blow-off method involves connecting the blow-off tube directly to the fermenter in place of the air-lock until the violent fermentation has ceased, at which time the it can be reinstalled.)

 

I agree with you here. I have removed the cross-hairs from my three piece airlocks.

Cheers!

 

You’ll be fine. Take good notes so as to improve your process in the future.

Relax, don’t worry. Have a home brew

 

I figured you for a blow off tube kind of guy Jack.

 

Well, I use a 7.9 gallon plastic bucket which provides me with plenty of headspace. When I do brew a high gravity beer (e.g., my Quads) I do also use some Fermcap-S to ensure a 'manageable' krausen. I have never employed a blow-off and I am prepared to state I never will.

Cheers!

 

I also use the vintners harvest bucket, and have had a few issues in the past. My main complaint about them is that the joke in the lid for the air lock grommet has a propensity to tear when trying to remove the air lock. Made the move to a speidel and never looked back.!

 

I don't use airlocks or equipment with that type of grommet much, but back when I did, I found that a spray-bottle squirt of star san solution lubes the connection enough for easier insertion/removal.