Hello all, This is my first time on the forum, and first time to home brewing. However, I am no stranger to good tasting beer, or chemistry for that matter. I would like to apologize in advance if these questions are already answered somewhere in the forum however i am an Army Nurse and I just don't have time during the day to browse for answers. So here goes: I bought a northern home brewing kit on amazon. Its the one that comes with the 2 5 gallon buckets, I don't think it's the deluxe because there is no glass carboy. I just brewed on Sunday. Well I followed the instructions to a t, but after reading up on stuff online I'm not getting warm and fuzzies. The instructions made no mention of what temp to pitch the yeast, or store the fermenting brew at. Or to take a pretty gravity reading..... Well here's what's gone down so far. I put my wort in the fermenter at about 90 degrees, mixed it with the cold water like it said to bring it to 5 gal. And aerated it, then added my yeast. I then put it in a closet that is "quiet and dark . However the temp in there was probably around 74-76, and reading online ales will get funky if they ferment in temps higher than 74 if I'm not mistaken... Well I moved it to a spare bathroom that is nice and cool, and the temp probe on my fermentor is reading between 72-74 now. But I'm worried damage is already done, yesterday my airlock was bubbling like crazy, now its bubbling like maybe a couple times every 5-10 seconds. Should I worry or do I have a good brew? Any tips on what to do? I do have a hydrometer and a syphon, but I'm scared to crack the lid to test gravity. Thanks in advance! - Logan
Did you boil this water to sterlize it before adding? Let your fermentor alone at least 7-8 days before taking any measurement of gravity, remember to sanitize everything that touches the beer, the less you bother it the better, be patient.Once you take a gravity read discard the sample, do not pour it inside your fermentor again. Please , take a look at here :http://www.howtobrew.com/ Good luck
The good news is that you made beer. You had active fermentation so you did not kill your yeast. Its not abnormal for very active fermentation to quickly finish, especially when fermented warm. The bad news is that you possibly pitched your yeast too warm, and definitely fermented too warm. You should pitch most ale yeasts and ferment in the low to mid 60s. Higher temps cause off flavors. After you see no activity in your air lock check for krausen and if none take a gravity reading. If its close to an appropriate finishing gravity be patient and let it sit at least another week. You need extra time in primary to help clean up off flavors.
Unfortunately it was not boiled, and is not distilled water. I know I probably should have used distilled, or at least sterile water but I kind of just blindly followed the recipe. I haven't opened my fermenter, I did move it though when I noticed the room it was in was too hot. p.s. I will definitely check that website out when I get a chance, especially before my next batch! Glad to know I at least made beer, but I'm worried it is going to be gross. I just hope it is at least palatable, because I'd really like to share my first batch with friends. There is definitely still activity going on, so that is a plus. The temperature on the fermenter is now at about 72 degrees. That is as low as I can get it without giving it some sort of ice bath or using a fridge (which isn't at my disposal.) But it should stay steady at 72 degrees, which is a high end, but if I'm not mistaken within safe range. My fermenter is a white bucket, so I can't see the krausen, however I can tell that there is about an inch more of "something" above the fill line, so I assume that that is my krausen. Is a 1 inch krausen ok or is that weak? Lastly, when would you say it's safe to crack it open? When I see what I think is the Krausen subside? Or when the airlock stops being active? Or maybe a set amount of days like the 7-8 suggested above? Thanks all for the help!
You are likely seeing the deposit that the krausen leaves on the side of the bucket. It may be only 1" deposit height, but likely was a bit higher in the middle. The amount of krausen will generally vary with the amount of ABV, the vitality of the yeast, etc. so you can't count on a certain amount of it for any specific beer or style. You do need to be aware that beers with an expected ABV of 7% or more are very likely to have a huge krausen and push it out through your airlock (especially if you don't have a great amount of head space in your fermentor). Potentially the krausen can make a mess with its overflow, or in the worst case, it clog the airlock to the point of blowing the lid off of your bucket and send beer and krausen to the ceiling. So you should attach what we call a blow-off tube in place of the airlock for those beers. It is merely a tube that is connected to the fermentor on one end and is inserted into a bucket of water at the other end, which becomes your airlock. You can google 'blow-off tube' or do a search of this forum for discussions on the topic as well as how to hook one up. Normally it will be safe to crack open your fermentor for a gravity reading around the 10-12 day mark, BUT if you're still seeing bubbles then let that be your guide and hold off any peeking and gravity readings a bit longer. In your case, since you pitched yeast and fermented on the warmish side, I'd give your beer some extra time to allow the yeast to try to clean up after themselves if they made any mess from the warmth.
It's hard to say for sure if it will be drinkable or not. Patience will likely be a virtue with this batch, as time may help. I also ferment in plastic buckets. It's not ideal to open them, but while the fermentation is still very active it likely won't hurt. I'm confident enough in my ability to pitch adequate, healthy yeast, and maintain adequate temperatures for brewing, that I usually don't open the brew bucket at all until I'm ready to check FG and transfer, which is usually about 3 weeks from brew day. You can observe active fermentation through the air lock, and see krausen above the beer from the outside as you mentioned. Regarding krausen, there are no hard and fast rules as different yeasts behave very differently. In general, however, ale yeasts leave a krausen "ring" around the brew bucket right above the beer line. This is likely what you are seeing. Even after the krausen dies down, this "ring" will remain as it dries onto the side of the bucket.
Thanks everybody, I have one more question about this. Let's say my airlock stops at 3 days. Should I still just go ahead and be patient and give it the 2-3 weeks even with zero visible activity. Or crack it open to check my gravity at a certain point? Also. Do you guys filter your beer any? This particar recipe didn't call for a secondary fermentation, but after 2 weeks it says to bottle and condition them, with some sort of sugar or corn starch powder that came with it. I assume that's to add the carbonation, but can I filter my beer any, or just bottle it as is and pay heed to.the sediments in my bottles?
Since you are a new brewer I would go ahead and wait a few days after signs of airlock activity and then go ahead and check gravity. If it's close to finishing gravity than go ahead and wait at least a week to recheck.
Don`t you worry for your first beer clarity, it is probably going to be hazy, pretty normal for a homebrew beer. Try to get knowledgment before taking decisions regarding new tasks , it is very important to try to do not make things when you are plenty of doubts. Let the beer go and in the meantime read as much as you can, when you have a doubt before doing something, please call this forum for help. I think we will have you being here , it would be very nice. Cheers!
Thanks for all the help guys! I think I'm just gonna wait it out and see how this one turns out. Would there be any harm in me just waiting the "2 weeks" the recipe calls for before I check my FG? Or should I not wait around once I see the airlock cease to bubble? Is there any harm in leaving the beer in the primary after the fermentation stopped? I really don't wanna crack it open until the yeast is done handling it's business.
At those ambient temps I would recommend looking into saison/trappist/abbey/franco-belgian xxx yeast strains which can tolerate high temps. You can make fantastic beer from around mid 40s og to mid 80s. You could also look into getting a cool brewing bag. I let me wort sit in there with frozen water bottles for over 24 hours sometimes if I am brewing something needs to ferment in the 50s and I never have problems.
There is no harm in waiting the two weeks. You can go longer if you decide that fermentation is still occurring, but you reach a point that fermentation is so slow that you need to take a couple of readings to define where your beer is. Your first reading may disclose that you are still short of the predicted FG in which case you have to wait another 3-4 days for another reading to define your status again. If your reading is still short of the predicted FG, then you need to determine why you are short of the FG to help determine if your fermentation is stuck, or if there might be other reasons for the high readings (i.e. you may have less beer than what the recipe makes, thus your beer is thicker). But it doesn't happen often as long as you've paid attention to detail while managing your liquids and other factors in the brewing process, especially if you are doing an extract brew.
The biggest problem is I never got an OG reading. But I'm hoping my FG will be low enough that I can just trust what I got
Not getting an OG reading is no big deal. If your recipe gave an expected number, and if you are doing an extract beer, then as long as your liquid amount was close to correct after the boil, you can use that predicted OG. (Extract is really predictable as long as the liquid amount of your wort is right.) However, you'll really only want that number to calculate your approximate ABV, so use the recipe's OG if you have it. Whenever you take your first FG gravity reading, and if your amount of liquid is where it should be, that first reading when compared to the recipe's expected FG will guide your next step. If your liquid amount is much too low, you should have a higher-than-expected gravity reading. You can decide at that point to correct the amount by adding boiled water, or leave it alone. (However, I'd wait until bottling the beer and then use the needed amount of water to make your priming sugar syrup solution and add that into the bottling bucket.) If you have too much beer when taking that first reading, it will be too low, but there is no correction that can be made for this issue since you can't remove water at this point. If your liquid amount is close to correct, and if the first gravity reading is close to the recipe's predicted FG, then wait 3-4 days and take another reading. If the second reading is the same or very close to the first reading, you've now got the go-ahead to bottle the beer. Be sure to sanitize your equipment for the readings, and to drink the samples that you take for your readings. The taste at this point isn't what the finished beer will necessarily taste like, but the taste can give you a hint of whether you might have issues because of your too-warm pitch and warmish fermentation.
While we're on the topic of FG, how far above would it have to be before you were concerned it wasn't finished?
It's easy to misread a hydrometer and your liquid can easily be off a bit without your knowledge so that 5 points too high on a reading should not be a concern. If you're sure that the 5 points are real (correct read on the gauge and correct liquid amount) if refermentation starts again in the bottle eating the remaining sugar and the priming sugar, I don't think 5 extra gravity points would cause bottle bombs. Gushers maybe, but not bottle bombs. If the gravity reading is greater than 5 points too high, then I'd suggest efforts to reawaken the yeast to see if you can get them to finish up before you bottle. I don't think being too high is as much of a concern if you are kegging as it is if you are bottling. It's the over-carbed bottle bombs that you need to pay attention to and to avoid creating. I don't know of any data source that says how many extra points of gravity can be the danger line. Maybe there are other opinions on the number of points too high, or knowledge of a data source that can be more precise. Anybody?
