# First Brew....oops!



## namela (13/11/16)

Hi All,

First post and first brew under way!

A couple of questions if I may, I bought the Brigalow as a start up and introduction to HomeBrewing and my first brew is under way.
I have followed all of the instructions so I hope, but....

Have I filled my Fermenter up too much? I mean there are notches on the side and for the life of me I cannot work out the 23 litre mark, also my Airlock keeps bubbling over?

Is this normal? Or is it because I have over filled it?

Many thanks in advance.

Paul


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## manticle (13/11/16)

Looks to be about 21L although if you really want to be sure, you can fill with a known quanity of water (measure using an accurate jug for example) or weigh the fermenter empty and full (accurate scales).

Airlock eruptions aren't uncommon. Best to remove, clean, sanitise then fill with no rinse sanitiser or something like vodka (or ethanol if you have access).

Keep temp around 20, exercise patience before bottling (at finished, stable gravity) and drinking.


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## Pommielogger (13/11/16)

Good luck mate. I have my first (not yet) bubbling away!


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## namela (13/11/16)

Pommielogger said:


> Good luck mate. I have my first (not yet) bubbling away!


Yep it's, on it's way alright, finding myself checking it all of time for the just in case! Good luck with yours too!


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## namela (13/11/16)

manticle said:


> Looks to be about 21L although if you really want to be sure, you can fill with a known quanity of water (measure using an accurate jug for example) or weigh the fermenter empty and full (accurate scales).
> 
> Airlock eruptions aren't uncommon. Best to remove, clean, sanitise then fill with no rinse sanitiser or something like vodka (or ethanol if you have access).
> 
> Keep temp around 20, exercise patience before bottling (at finished, stable gravity) and drinking.


Many thanks for your lightning response, I will do as you say, great advice! I should of filled the fermenter up firsly to get the correct level but I was way too quick off the mark, this I will do when this one is done and dusted!

Paul


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## decr (15/11/16)

No oops, just chill . My kits have been taking off like nobody's business lately, the current stout made a nice black sticky mess shooting out the airlock overnight. With your fermenter the longer lines are 5l marks and as mentioned you have a 21l batch going.

All good, relax and have a (homebrew) beer.


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## Barge (15/11/16)

Pretty soon you will leave the lid off altogether, and just use glad wrap


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## PhilipB (21/11/16)

namela said:


> Hi All,
> 
> First post and first brew under way!
> 
> ...


Paul, 

The markings on the fermenter indicate 25 litre capacity when looking at your photo. 

Looks like you have filled to 21 litres. 

If you want to avoid the mess through the airlock two things you can do: 

1. Implementation of temperature control.

2. Use glad wrap instead of the lid. To do this, remove the rubber ring from the lid. Use a sheet of glad wrap instead of the screw on lid and use the rubber ring to hold the glad wrap sheet in place. 

Welcome to AHB. 

Cheers, 

Phil


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## Yob (21/11/16)

PhilipB said:


> 2. Use glad wrap instead of the lid. To do this, remove the rubber ring from the lid. Use a sheet of glad wrap instead of the screw on lid and use the rubber ring to hold the glad wrap sheet in place.


or install a blow off tube, having only limited head space, this could well save a lot of cleaning up, gladwrap wont solve that but a blow off will..

2 ha'penny


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## Coodgee (21/11/16)

I'd say the bubbling over is the symptom and not the cause. The cause is lack of temperature control (does that make me sound all wise and shit??). I see you are in Wollongong, and I see it's predicted to hit 30 degrees there today and 31 tomorrow. It means your yeast is going nuts in the hot weather. This causes a fast, vigorous ferment, but not in a good way. It means the yeast will produce a lot of extra compounds besides ethanol and carbon dioxide that will contribute "off" flavours to your beer. There is a good chance that beer will not taste very nice if it's been fermented at 30 degrees. It will also probably give you a bad hang over. 

Might as well forge ahead with this brew, it might turn out ok, but for your next brew try to keep the temperature of the fermenter and it's contents under 20 degrees. There are a range of ways to do this, search the forum for ideas.


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## namela (21/11/16)

decr said:


> No oops, just chill . My kits have been taking off like nobody's business lately, the current stout made a nice black sticky mess shooting out the airlock overnight. With your fermenter the longer lines are 5l marks and as mentioned you have a 21l batch going.
> 
> All good, relax and have a (homebrew) beer.


Thanks Kitmaster, makes me feel a whole lot better and don't feel like I have asked a daft question.


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## namela (21/11/16)

Coodgee said:


> I'd say the bubbling over is the symptom and not the cause. The cause is lack of temperature control (does that make me sound all wise and shit??). I see you are in Wollongong, and I see it's predicted to hit 30 degrees there today and 31 tomorrow. It means your yeast is going nuts in the hot weather. This causes a fast, vigorous ferment, but not in a good way. It means the yeast will produce a lot of extra compounds besides ethanol and carbon dioxide that will contribute "off" flavours to your beer. There is a good chance that beer will not taste very nice if it's been fermented at 30 degrees. It will also probably give you a bad hang over.
> 
> Might as well forge ahead with this brew, it might turn out ok, but for your next brew try to keep the temperature of the fermenter and it's contents under 20 degrees. There are a range of ways to do this, search the forum for ideas.


Thanks for the info...yes it was quite warm today, and tomorrow? There is a storm brewing at the moment, not the sort of brew I was looking for, the brew is in the garage so I think I may have to move the next batch to a cooler spot...maybe the laundry? It got a bubble every 20 or so seconds through the air lock but the temp has been around the 25 degrees apart from today that is..so fingers crossed or big head aches!


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## namela (21/11/16)

PhilipB said:


> Paul,
> 
> The markings on the fermenter indicate 25 litre capacity when looking at your photo.
> 
> ...


Thanks Phil, I do feel welcome, I did email Brigalow and they replied with the same filled level you and manticle mentioned so thanks for that, so I have marked it for future reference, glad wrap? what about the airlock?


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## PhilipB (21/11/16)

Paul,

You don't need an airlock when using glad wrap. 

Have attached a couple of pictures for you. 

The only thing to consider is ensuring that the glad wrap is sufficient to cover the opening on the fermenter and your rubber ring has enough glad wrap to form a seal. 

Cheers, 

Phil


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## Vini2ton (21/11/16)

Blow-off tubes are easy to rig up and great insurance against wasted time cleaning shit up. I learnt that from making wine in these 30 litre fermenters. I have no room for more fridges and today I wrapped a couple off damp towels around 2 fermenters. It works at a pinch, but summer in Australia is saison time.


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## Rocker1986 (21/11/16)

Don't even need an airlock with the lid either. Been using gaffa tape over the hole in the lid on my FV for ages with no problems at all. Just don't tighten the lid on fully.


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## namela (5/12/16)

PhilipB said:


> Paul,
> 
> You don't need an airlock when using glad wrap.
> 
> ...


Thanks Phil for the info...never thought this could be done but looks like it can! Very interesting indeed. Apologies for no replying sooner been a bit on busy side. The first batch is bottled and the second has been in for a week, I have moved the kit into the laundry which is considerably cooler.

When I crack the first bottle I will raise it you guys for the support and direction you have given me.

Paul


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## pablo_h (6/12/16)

Does the fermenter with tap fit in the box it came with?
Early this year I was using water baths/wet towel + fan to keep my fermenter cool (around 24C), then switched to a crate, smaller fermenter and a couple of frozen bottles wrapped up in a sleeping bag (kept at 18C).
A couple of weeks ago I realized that my larger fermenters would fit in it's old box (minus one flap on the lid due to airlock but you don't even need an airlock anyway) - it's the old coopers fermenter that came with 30 PET bottles so it's a huge box.

Anyway, with the fermenter in the box and 4x 1.25L PET frozen bottles (with another 4 in the freezer to rotate the bottles), and wrapped in a sleeping bag after 2 days and 2 sets of frozen bottle changes I got the fermenter down to 13C. Fermentation was already finished the week before; I was trying to get the beer as cold as possible to clear the beer up as best I could before bottling.
But for temp control to 18-20C you'd only need 2x 1.25L bottles I think, like I used early in the year for 18C with a crate and sleeping bag for a smaller fermenter.

Other people can find styrofoam boxes big enough which does a better job as is obviously more water resistant to the sweating ice bottles and thicker insulation. But a cardboard box wrapped in a sleeping bag or blanket is good enough (but yes put in the house in the coolest place you can find)


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## decr (7/12/16)

pablo_h said:


> Other people can find styrofoam boxes big enough


Like a fridge? 

I got an old fridge off gumtree for free and use it for poor man's temp control. It fits two fermenters, insulates when necessary and a couple of hot water bottles are enough to keep them going at 18c even in the tassie winter.

Happy brewing!

Edit: it's disconnected obviously


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## pablo_h (7/12/16)

Are you saying that it's a non working fridge? Sounds OK it fits two fermenters. Makes up for all the downsides of using a dead fridge. If it didn't then non working fridges are not so great. Better than a cardboard box of course, but I wouldn't go out of my way to get one - maybe if neighbours were chucking one out and I'd only need to travel 20m with a fridge trolley.
Normally with old fridges the seals and insulation is shot, wasted ugly space with a dead useless freezer, have to maybe make up a bottom support to hold the fermenter over the compressor hump (wouldn't trust the vege drawers). Of course due to piping the inside heats up when the outside compressor and piping heats up in ambient, metal cabinet, drain is open too, lose cold air when opening up. Stuck with something to get rid off when moving house (matters to me because I'm a dirty poor renter that lives in cheap cheap houses destined to be knocked down.

An insulated box made from foam or plastic with good insulation would be smaller, more efficient , better use of space etc than an old dead fridge that only fits one fermenter.
Of course, disregard if it does work in cooling mode.
I can't use a fridge because I'm already uses 2 fridges for food and storage and drinks. No where to put a 3rd here and don't want to pay a few hundred extra per year to run another one.

e: Also if the OP is using I assume brigalow yeast, that's usually OK at 24C. I did some early this year and compared to coopers yeast (which is horrible at 22c+), the brigalow stuff doesn't have a strong bad flavour at slightly warmer temps.


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## damoninja (7/12/16)

The glad wrap is great, also lets you see down in to the fermenter and have a look at what's going on without having to remove lids, condensation and krausen being a much more reliable indicator of fermentation health than the ploop ploop sound


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## decr (7/12/16)

pablo_h said:


> Are you saying that it's a non working fridge?


Nah, it works fine, previous owners got rid of it as apparently it was freezing the veggies and got a new one. Not too old and in decent nick, not dirty and no smells etc.

What I meant to say was I use it for the insulation, not cooling. Free and no running costs = win.


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## damoninja (7/12/16)

decr said:


> no running costs


My last ferm fridge costed me about 60 cents a month run in summer, when it was sitting around 18 degrees... tested with a watt meter...

I will benchmark my new one again this one this summer over a hot week. I should have done this over winter too.

Costs considerably less to run at 18C than it will at say 2C.


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## decr (7/12/16)

damoninja said:


> Costs considerably less to run at 18C than it will at say 2C.


For sure. However where mine is it hardly reaches a stable 20c ambient anyway even in summer so for my use it's for the insulation for winter when it hits ~13c at worst. It's in the old boiler room in the middle of the house so temps are quite stable anyway. A very good idea though, picked up on it from someone on here


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## Rocker1986 (7/12/16)

I highly doubt it would cost a few hundred dollars a year to run a fridge for fermentation temp control...


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## pablo_h (8/12/16)

Not for most, see decr gets along fine gets along fine without running one at all. For me though it may, since 35-43C temps here Nov-April and the only place I could put one is in direct sunlight or a tin shed. A running fridge would cost to run, a non running fridge worse than an esky/insulated box that I could have inside the house for me. But feel free to miss the point.


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## Stouter (8/12/16)

I dunno about 'a few hundred dollars a year'. Even in direct sunlight, out in the exposed area of my black bitumen driveway with some reflective mirrors shining their arses off, I reckon any shitty old fridge would still only add up to a few shillings.
I think we need Choice to run a comparative test on this one Pablo  .


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## damoninja (8/12/16)

pablo_h said:


> Not for most, see decr gets along fine gets along fine without running one at all. For me though it may, since 35-43C temps here Nov-April and the only place I could put one is in direct sunlight or a tin shed. A running fridge would cost to run, a non running fridge worse than an esky/insulated box that I could have inside the house for me. But feel free to miss the point.


Likewise, miss the point

The point being I don't see how you can keep it at say 18-20C on a 35-43C day unless the ambient temperature in your house is 18-20. I mean, if that's the case then fine. Must be refrigeration since evaporative won't get near that low. 

Run RCAC 24x7 for a whole room that's got to be more cost effective than a fridge h34r: h34r:


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## The Flyingscrapyard (9/1/17)

Rocker1986 said:


> Don't even need an airlock with the lid either. Been using gaffa tape over the hole in the lid on my FV for ages with no problems at all. Just don't tighten the lid on fully.


As I don't have enough height in my bar fridge to fit an airlock, I resorted to spraying some sanitiser on a freezer bag, and on the outside of the fermenter lid around the airlock hole, then putting the bag over the hole to seal the hole and used a small weight to hold it in place. If there is positive pressure in the fermenter, the gas can force its way out from under the freezer bag, but remain closed the rest of the time. I haven't had the bag suck into the fermenter (even when I forget to take it off during transfer for bulk priming), so I count that as a win.


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## Quokka42 (23/1/17)

I find the airlock is handy to monitor action of the yeast. I have had brews which blow out the airlock at 18C - certain European yeasts are rather vigourous!

Unfortunately for the OP, his problem was too high a temperature - the main cause of crap beers even back when we draped a towel over the bucket!

The tip I would give for noobs in warmer weather is to stick the fermenter in the laundry trough, fill it with water, wrap a towel around it and put a fan on it during the day (the bulk of water and wort will keep it warm enough at night.)

When I lived in Perth I bought a fridge and equipped it with a temperature control, but I had terrible trouble with mould and other infections. Up North it was just plain too hot to try to brew most of the year and I had to buy stubbies like everyone else. In Kalgoorlie, I used the trough method quite successfully.

I picked up a wine fridge on ebay for $4.50, ripped out the guts and added stacked Peltiers. The cooling heatsink gets cold enough to suck moisture out of the air to prevent the mould and bacteria, and the running costs are reasonable. As a bonus, the seller gave me another small wine cooler which I fixed for about $15, so my wine and chocolate are doing well this summer also.


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## Rocker1986 (24/1/17)

Airlocks are very unreliable though. Sometimes they don't bubble at all (mine never did once) due to seals not being completely airtight, sometimes they bubble when no fermentation is happening. A hydrometer is a much better tool for telling what the fermentation is doing.

Calcium chloride is apparently quite effective at removing moisture from the air to prevent mould buildup. I do get a small amount of mould in my brew fridge but it's nothing major. I wipe it out every batch, but after this next one is kegged I might put some CaCl in there with the next batch and see if it stops the mould from appearing.


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