Lightning Fast Fermentations?

[ayellayen]

I've started brewing at my new place after a downtime of almost a year, so I'm still shaking out the cobwebs and the rust. All of my brews of late have been having some incredibly fast ferments, my latest Bitter dropped from 1.048 to 1.020 in two days and even a belgian pale I did previously dropped from 1.076 to 1.020 in three days. Usually I rack to a secondary fermenter at this stage and hope for a little more fermentation.
The temperature is generally 24C and there's been a few minor tasting notes (slight bananery taste on the belgian), but I was concerned that this was just getting a little beyond ridiculous. I've been using saflager and dunstar dried yeast and rehydrating them with water and tempering them with warm wort before adding, but I'm not doing anything I haven't previously been doing last time I was brewing.
Are my mates going to be stoked that I can produce beer on a schedule that would rival their summer thirsts? Or should I be more careful with my yeasts? Any help or insight would be appreciated.

 

[Steve]

Or should I be more careful with my yeasts?

Yes. I hope you arent brewing saflager at 24? This is too hot for an ale yeast never mind a lager yeast. Get them down to 18-20 for ale yeasts and 10-12 ish for your saflager. That is why you are fermenting in just a few days. They are too warm. Convenient yes, but if you want to get rid of those extra funny tastes brew them at the corrent temp as per the instructions on the yeast packets.
Cheers
Steve

 

[ayellayen]

Could very well explain it. My brews sit in a european laundry, so I'm just going off my air conditioner remote at the moment. I'll have to place a thermometer in there and see what it reads. Hopefully they'd be a little colder than what the unit reads. But the warmer temperatures could very well explain it.

 

[Cortez The Killer]

I had a 1.5L starter of 1272 tear through a 1.045 batch in a couple of days - down to 1.007 - temp was about 19*C :icon_cheers:

Some yeasts can chew through wort quickly - but it really depends on a bunch of factors eg how much you pitch / fermentability / temp etc

As mentioned do your best to get temps down

Cheers

 

[geoffi]

You should get those temps down to 20 or below for ale yeasts. And I'd give up on the Saflager altogether until winter comes or you get some kind of temp control system. Even wet towels should take a couple of degrees off.

If you want something simple, effective and cheap, and have the room, find a clapped-out old fridge or freezer (chest freezer is best) and use frozen PET bottles of water to keep the temps low. Even on hot days I can keep mine at 18 or lower with just a couple of new bottles every morning.

 

[buttersd70]

Danstar yeasts are fast working, hungry little buggers, adn are known to work fast....but remember that fermentation produces heat. So the ferment emperature will be higher than the ambient temperature. For nottingham, I would expect maybe 3C (ish) higher in the fermenter than ambient. I keep my fridge at 18C when using that one, in order to ferment at 21C....but you need to keep an eye on it. If it starts going fast, it can race away from you, the faster it goes, the more heat it will generate, making it go faster still.