Air Lock Tightness

[UsernameTaken]

I am just about to brew and I have noticed the rubber grommet for my air lock is broken.

I tried to work around it but busted it more!

So now I am debating sticking the air lock in loose or wrapping some tape around the base to seal it?

Or holding off until I can get a new one tomorrow?

Cheers,
UNT

 

[pnorkle]

Just put some glad wrap over the top of the fermenter & use the rubber seal in the lid as a "lacky band" around the glad wrap to seal it. Everything will be fine.

 

[Bribie G]

You could try blu-tack.
However if you use the cling wrap method (as I've been doing since 2009) I bet after the next few brews you'll be saying "what's that airlock you speak of?"

Edit: totally off topic but I feel like a rant.

pnorkle rightly used the term "glad wrap" because all Australians have grown up with the name.
You never hear and Australian saying "cling wrap"... it's always Glad wrap.

Aldi came along and brought out their own version which is called Goliath Cling Wrap.
You can't tell the box from the Glad product from ten paces away.

So what did Glad do? Absolutely unbelievable.
The idiotic morons have now change the name from Glad Wrap to .. wait for it...
Glad Cling Wrap. FFS.
Like they had the definitive name that everyone knows and they toss it down the gurgler. A bit like Arnotts deciding to ditch the Tim Tam name and replace it with "Chocy Creamy Thingos".

That's what is wrong with the country.

******* Glad Cling Wrap. And it's all made in China anyway. And I'm sober, don't get me going after six pints.

End rant.

 

[droid]

I have been using glad wrap for a few years now since being told about it on here. If you can get yourself some large lacky bands then just use them with some glad wrap.You wont need to use the lid. Once I couldn't find any bands and I put the glad over the opening and used some 100mph tape and that was fine, not ideal though. Most Posties used the red rubber bands for the mail - I have a couple of bags of them and they're perfect. I think they have stopped using bands and gone to re-usable straps but you could always leave a note for your postie and he/she might still have them.

The issue with the bubblers is the seal - you never really know if you have a good seal. There's a time and a place for airlocks and running hose into buckets of star-san etc but if you have a fermenter with that 250mm sort of opening, with a decent amount of head-space, the glad is the go!

 

[pnorkle]

Glad Cling Wrap. FFS.

QFT.

 

[UsernameTaken]

So you are saying sealed air tight glad wrap and no air lock at all?

 

[pnorkle]

Yeah - airlocks are really only good for keeping everything out - using airlock activity as a method of gauging fermentation isn't the greatest way of seeing that your wort is fermenting and causes undue worry if it isn't bubbling away. Glad wrap also keeps everything out, and removes that worry. IMHO, airlocks are only good if you like that "bloop bloop" sound.. and then, if you're using a fermentation fridge (which you should be) you can't hear it anyway. Best way to judge if your fermentation is finished is to do a gravity test.

 

[manticle]

Won't be airtight but that's the point.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

UNT..


Get yourself a kitten.

 

[Matplat]

Throw the airlock in the bin, that will solve all potential kitten issues, and then you won't have to worry if it's sealed or not!

once you go cling film (that what anyone who grew up in the UK will call it, sorry Bribie!), you never go back!

 

[Grott]

I use air locks only because my fermenters are in a covered foam box set up for temp control purposes and therefore can hear fermentation taking place. However as I have a temp prob readable from outside the boxes I can still tell by temperature increase as fermentation starts etc. So it's no big deal if the air lock doesn't work, just convenient.

 

[Lionman]

airlocks are useless things. I dont get why anyone ever bothers with them.

 

[Grott]

Didn't you read my post above yours, they can have a purpose but as I stated its no big deal if it doesn't work.
But also a " newbie" gets a new fermenter, it has a new lid and a new air lock. Why not use it as long as fermentation activity is not depended upon it which has rightly been stated in heaps of posts.
And for the " newbie" if it does work and bubble it can be a great feeling. I remember when I first started the sound of the bubbling was just great.

 

[UsernameTaken]

I'm all in for less crap to clean!

Cheers,
UNT

 

[Rocker1986]

This "problem" happened to me a few years ago too, the grommet breaking. Rather than go for glad wrap though I kept using the lid, but instead put a piece of gaffer tape over the airlock hole, and didn't fully tighten the lid onto the fermenter. I'm still using this method now and it's excellent too. The lid just gets cleaned when I soak the FV after a batch.

 

[Jack of all biers]

After 16 years I still use the airlocks for my fermentors. A few years ago I bought some replacement grommets and have replaced one that began crumbling rubber, however the others are going strong. Pays to have some spare parts where disposables are concerned. Like in kegging.

Something in my up bringing about using the things you have rather than throwing them away for disposables. As long as the glad wrap is recycled then, horses for courses, but the landfill issue is always in the back of my mind. I know it is only a small amount of rubbish, but the way I see it is if I don't need to I won't. Not casting aspersions, just my thoughts.

The polycarbonate lids I have are transparent enough to see the fermentation activities to not make the see through argument work for me.

 

[barls]

air lock tightness is measured in kittens.
you need at least a 3 kitten rated fermentor.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Just get kitten in a roll

 

[Hermies]

I just put down a beer couldn't be assed to put cling wrap on it didn't have a lid with an airlock hole so I just screwed on a lid and let it do its thing all good .

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

There is always open fermentation