Disaster!

[LethalCorpse]

So, I went down to the storeroom to check final gravity, drop temp to crash chill and then get the keg cleaned out. I think I must've not pushed the fermenters far enough back in, so that when the door shut, the drawer at the bottom of the door wedged against one or both taps, putting downward pressure on it. While I was cleaning the kegs I heard a creaking sound, then the fridge door flew open - leaving me stuck outside the storeroom. The glass shelf that sat above the compressor hump and held my fermenters split down the middle, launching the fermenters into the door. Both fermenters hit the deck and started distributing their contents over the entire floor, including a bit of carpet and some cardboard boxes which are going to be a bugger to remove and will stink before I can manage it. Had a party on Friday night that this brew was destined for, we now have no booze (this can be rectified, but still...). I watched 32L of beer go down the drain via the storeroom floor. I damn near cried. I saved a couple litres in the bottom of one of them, but it's not worth kegging - I'll just bottle that and drink it in a few weeks. As you can see at the bottom of the fermenters, I saved about 8L. This I'll bottle and use to console myself in a few weeks when they carb up the old fashioned way. This was my first attempt at using gladwrap on the fermenters - for the record, that's +1 for lids and airlocks.

I'm not a fortunate brewer.

 

[PostModern]

Feck, LC.

just ftr, I think you need more bandwidth for your basement webcams.

 

[LethalCorpse]

phonecam

 

[PostModern]

So your beer has just spilt all over the floor and your first thought, after straightening the fermenters, of course, is to photograph the calamity with your phone and post it on the web. Priceless

 

[LethalCorpse]

Yep. Share the misery.

 

[Stuster]

Damn. That's a crying shame, LC.

Time to go and have a good weep.

Lids FTW!

 

[white.grant]

Yep. Share the misery.

Truly LC, you had two fermenters sitting on a glass shelf?

 

[warrenlw63]

Man that's making me shake and it didn't even happen to me.

Sorry to see so much hard work going to ruin.

Edit: One more argument for the removal of glad wrap in lieu of fermenter lids... Of cold comfort to you LC but it gives me the creeps.
Perhaps some of the contents would have survived with a well fastened lid.

Warren -

 

[LethalCorpse]

nearly all of the contents would've likely survived with lids, as I was right there when it happened, but I wasn't quick enough without.

Grant, It was a tempered glass fridge shelf, and I figured it therefore should've been fine. Indeed it has been fine for many previous brews, but this is the first time I've had two in there. It was fine for 9 days with this brew too, which is why I thought it was that door/tap/wedging scenario that pushed it over the edge. There's a plastic divider for the two vegie drawers that sits in the middle of the shelf, but with two fermenters it goes from being a support under the brew to a fulcrum between them.

Hey, there's a thought. Might be a tall ask, but ya gotta try. Anyone in Sydney who has a full keg of k&k or extract they don't need to drink right away that they could lend me, to be returned full of an extract or FWK brew of their choice?

 

[pablo_h]

nearly all of the contents would've likely survived with lids, as I was right there when it happened, but I wasn't quick enough without.

Grant, It was a tempered glass fridge shelf, and I figured it therefore should've been fine. Indeed it has been fine for many previous brews, but this is the first time I've had two in there. It was fine for 9 days with this brew too, which is why I thought it was that door/tap/wedging scenario that pushed it over the edge. There's a plastic divider for the two vegie drawers that sits in the middle of the shelf, but with two fermenters it goes from being a support under the brew to a fulcrum between them.

Hey, there's a thought. Might be a tall ask, but ya gotta try. Anyone in Sydney who has a full keg of k&k or extract they don't need to drink right away that they could lend me, to be returned full of an extract or FWK brew of their choice?

I didn't want to post any criticism before, but like I posted in OCAU, I lost half of my last batch too. The ferementer was wrapped in a blanket and the tap got knocked somehow, 10L beer all over the floor!
Glass shelves aren't designed for that kind of weight, having the proper lids on the fermenters would have saved your beer loss too. Any reason why you choose not to use them?

 

[LethalCorpse]

well, using glad wrap with holes punched in is accepted wisdom round here, because it's easy to use, disposable and transparent so you can see your brew, and it's a few things less to keep sanitised. Not having the benefit of foreseeing that the lid would be required to hold the beer in when the fermenter was suddenly and catastrophically inverted, I figured I'd give it a go. In my defence, I had no good reason to suspect that it would - I had misgivings about the glass shelf when I first set up the fridge, but since it survived this long I wasn't expecting it to have a problem now.

 

[yardy]

Grant, It was a tempered glass fridge shelf, and I figured it therefore should've been fine.

Two full fermenters on a glass shelf !

it was always going to happen LC, bummer.

 

[Wrenny]

My plastic shelf has been creaking a lot lately. Maybe there's some timely advice for me in here.

Cheers,
Wrenny

 

[I like beer]

LC bad luck about the beers. Thought about the glass shelf in my serving fridge with 2 kegs on it and changed it to 2mm aluminium sheet with angle pop rivited to the front. Quick cheap fix.

 

[white.grant]

I get nervous around glass shelves, but have found that even the standard refrigerator wire shelving can let go at inconvenient times.

I think some kind of robust endoskeleton to reinforce fridge shelving and distribute load is good insurance when you have heavy kegs and fermenters in them.

grant

 

[Alouyius Phlegm]

ouch mate. makes the 6 or so litres my 2 yo boy poured on the floor when he opened the fermenter tap seem a drop in the ocean...

 

[horner34]

I feel your hurt.

on my third brew I was filling the fermenter with with my extract wort and I left the tap open, it then filled up a dirty bucket then started to spill on the kitchen floor. By the time I realised i was left with enough extract to dilute to 11litres.

Needless to say I felt like a prize nob.

 

[drsmurto]

I removed the glass shelf and prop up the fermenters with old bricks......

Its not doing the floor of the fridge any favours but then the whole thing is held together by rust and cobwebs...

Sorry to hear about your loss LC, its heart wrenching to lose a few mLs thru a leaky tap but 2 full batches!

Didnt think the gladwrap gang punched holes in them? i tried it once but spent the whole week worried about my brew. never done it since.

 

[Back Yard Brewer]

While I was cleaning the kegs I heard a creaking sound, then the fridge door flew open - leaving me stuck outside the storeroom. The glass shelf that sat above the compressor hump and held my fermenters split down the middle, launching the fermenters into the door.

Yep, had the same problem except I had two kegs sitting on the glass in the fridge. The glass broke but no beer lost. Me, in your shoes, I would have gone balsitic.

BYB

 

[Steve]

Sorry to here your loss LC. FWIW I have two lumps of iron bark (its all I could find at the time) underneath my shelf that the fermentors and kegs sit on as I was afraid of the same thing happening to me. Hard luck fella!
Steve