I'm experimenting with using a Spunding Valve as an airlock on a primary fermenter. i.e. not for carbonation, but to simply release pressure. The reason I'm doing this is so that I can switch from blowoff hose to spunding valve as soon as any blowoff danger is past (but while there's still a stream of CO2 being produced), and then keep the fermentation (and subsequent pressurized transfer to keg) O2 free...never has to be open to air again. My question is has anyone done something similar, and if so, what pressure do you set your valve to? Mine is at ~1 PSI. Any pressure issues for the yeast I should be worried about? I'm guessing not, given the very large pressures in commercial fermenters just due to their height. TIA!
Nope. 10 gallon cornies are hella expensive for what they are. I'm using my 8.5 gallon MoreBeer Conical for this. Here's the setup:
Commercially, I add a spunding valve set to 15 PSI when there is about 2 degrees plato remaining in fermentation. I've never done this at home. If there is too much pressure during primary fermentation, you can get diacetyl, sulphur trapped in solution, and less ester development. You could combat these with different pitching rates, temperature, and aeration.
Damn homey…that's an impressive spunding build. What's going on with the dual gauge system? I've got the pieces to build one, but haven't yet, but my plan was similar to honkey…leave off until fermentation is significantly slowed down, then apply spending to a psi depending on temp (lager temps would be like 20psi iirc)
There's a stainless section and a brass section, each of which has its own gauge. The spunding valve is really just the brass section. The stainless section is for doing pressurized transfers. (Note the plastic gas quick disconnect connecting the two sections.) When it comes time to keg, I'll just remove the quick disconnect (and the spunding valve along with it) and replace it with the quick disconnect attached to the hose from a CO2 push cylinder. The spunding valve then gets attached to the receiving keg to vent it while filling. Yes, this is the kind of stuff that keeps me awake at night.
Gotcha…sweet! This is the part of home brewing that I now love…tinkering…just motorized my grain mill with an old garage door opener. Put it in service this past week, and already itching for the next project…spunding valve...
