No Airlock Activity But Bubbles On Wort?

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Chuckie

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Hi Guys,
I need advice on a new fermenter/brew. My 5th batch brewed so relatively new at this (first 4 were really good). I bought myself another (2nd - more beer is better right ;-)) fermenter (Bunnings 30L cube), fitted an S-Bend airlock and made up the following brew :
LCPA Clone (1 of the many Boonies variations):
1 can Morgans Stockmans Draught
1 can Coopers LME
250g dried wheat malt
20g cascade/10g chinook steeped @ day 0
10g cascade/20g chinook dry hopped on day 3
brewing at 18 deg C
volume 23L
Yeast Safale US-05 pitched @ 26.4 deg C
OG : 1050

There was no activity in the airlock for the first 48 hours so I pulled the lid off and the wort does appear to be bubbling so I figured there must be a air leak in the lid/gasket. Found some plastic burrs on top of container and I removed these checked everything. Re-secured the lid and if you push on the lid a bit then the water in the airlock does move up and down so it is holding some pressure.
Waited another day, still no bubbles in airlock. Opened it again and still some bubbling in wort but not a lot. Decided yeast might have crashed, not sure if this was a good idea but i dumped in another packet of "can" yeast I had sitting in the fridge.
So, after a week in the fermenter there is no bubbling in the airlock but still some reasonable bubbling in the actual top of the wort.
Took a reading today and the SG has dropped to 1010 which I would have thought after only a week is a huge amount of drop from 1050 after a short time. But I'm not sure how quickly the SG reading is supposed to drop. I was expecting the FG to be 1010 ?
However, it does smell like beer more than malty wort and it doesnt look funky, just normal.
My thought at the moment is to leave it for another 2 weeks (3 weeks total) check SG for a few days and if its settled give it a taste and bottle it.
Anyone got any thoughts on this ?
Thx,
Andrew
 
My thought at the moment is to leave it for another 2 weeks (3 weeks total) check SG for a few days and if its settled give it a taste and bottle it.
Anyone got any thoughts on this ?
Thx,
Andrew

Leave it.

Keep the lit on, don't worry about the Airlock, it's an airlock not a device to gauge anything, it's just an airlock.
measure your Gravity, that'll tell you when it's ready.

once it's in the fermenter and it has a Krausen (foam), leave it the hell alone until FG is reached.

BF
 
B)


Airlocks are sooo Nineties

clingwrapfermenter.jpg


Once you get the hang of brewing you develop a feeling for when the beer is finished, generally when it starts clearing from the top.
Those new Bunnings square 30L barrels are great as the opening is smaller and they are more easily handled.

The very worst that can happen is as below, but that's unusual.

20120613_093530.jpg
 

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