My beer is staring at me

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thunk

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Longmont, CO
Greetings. I just brewed my first brew last Sunday (pale ale) and now it is bubbling away in the fermenter. My problem is when I go and check on it, it has some sort of tractor beam and I just sit there and stare at the car boy and watch the little bubbles in the air lock. Is is a common problem?

All jokes aside, I am really enjoying this new hobby and can't wait to taste my first batch and brew my next, which i think will be a Porter. This is a great forum, thanks for the great info and tips.
-thunk
 
Welcome.
Beer Does that....especially if you find yourself hyperventilating at the air lock. When you pass out, you usually wake up with it staring at you!

Congratulations!
 
we've thought about doing that with my fermentation cabinet at my friends house. we WILL do this eventually...i will be able to check on the ambient temperature and the temperature of each of the carboys (i can fit six 6.5 gal).

eventually, a light and camera would be cool, too.
 
I just sit there and stare at the car boy and watch the little bubbles in the air lock. Is is a common problem?
I still do it and I keep between 5 and 7 fermenters going at all times.

I foresee problems in your very near future though. This is serious.

When this stuff goes into bottles you are going to go crazy because there will be three weeks before you can do anything with it. Here is the solution. Invest in another carboy and brew that Porter now. This way you can leap frog batches and always have one bubbling away - and something to watch.
 
I have my electrical/software engineering son working on a monitoring system for me. I want it to be part of my wireless network so even when I'm sitting here doing this on the laptop I could check all the fermenters, fridge temp and co2 pressure. He's not a brewer though so I don't think he understands either the importance or the urgency! LOL
 
Welcome to HBT!
I really hate it that it's eyes follow me around the room. Creepy!

This may be the only place where staring at a carboy or sniffing an airlock is a perfectly acceptable activity.
 
Welcome thunk!
Congrats on starting this amazing, obsessive hobby.

When my first batch started bubbling furiously I'm pretty sure I spent 30 minutes just watching it go. I even sent a video message to my friend who was completely dumbfounded.
 
I'm still new myself. 18 batches since January, and I still look into my fermentor waiting for the first bubbles to appear, checking how high the krausen goes, sniffing the airlock...

Watch out for the next step. Brewing doesn't lead to alcholism, it leads to freaking engineering!
 
Greetings. I just brewed my first brew last Sunday (pale ale) and now it is bubbling away in the fermenter. My problem is when I go and check on it, it has some sort of tractor beam and I just sit there and stare at the car boy and watch the little bubbles in the air lock. Is is a common problem?

Can't say I've ever had that problem.

obsession.jpg
 
utlimate idea would be to hook it up to acomputer if u have a temp regulator with a wireless internet connection connected to a website so you can alter the temperatures from the web wherever you are based on the camera says and temp readings shown on such a website...bam!
 
Thanks for the support. I like the web cam idea. Just another few days and I will bottle then say goodbye until Xmas eve, when my pale ale and I will meet again, and hopefully it will be love at first sip :)
 
As a yeast voyeur myself, you know you have a problem when you put a lava lamp behind the carboy, turn off the TV and enjoy it more.
 
> it has some sort of tractor beam and I just sit there and
> stare at the carboy and watch the little bubbles in the air lock.

It is hypnotic and addicting. I find myself wondering about what I can monitor and how. For temperature, there is the "1-wire" sensor series from Maxim / 1-wire, but their forte is temperature, but they have other sensors. I considered video for the fermentation lock, but while it would be fun to watch, it's probably not very efficient. I thought maybe an optical sensor just to count "burps" and log them over time. For that matter, I "know" that a rechargable, wireless hydrometer could be developed, probably fairly easily, using the same sensors used in digital cameras. Can you imaging getting gravity readings from a 2k-unit sensor? Interpolation could give even greater resolution, but at that point, I think it's not really worth it. It's all an approximation anyway, isn't it? And, it would take some of the craftsmanship out of it. Still... if it CAN be done, shouldn't it? ;-)

I DO have a relatively inefficient remote monitoring method set up. I phone my wife from work and have her go look at the airlock and report bubbles while I run a time on my desktop. She doesn't care for brew but she does understand my interest in it, and she does know about the fascination of watching the bubbler. Poor thing.
 
It is common. I think it's great fun listening to the bubbles. My usual yeast is pretty active so I use a blow off tube, I can here the bubbles rumbling in the basement.
 
something about pregnant carboys and airlock sniffers seems like it should be NSFW. lol. sniff away
 
i have my blowoff tube in a gallon milk jug and they are sitting in the basement shower. when i have a few minutes to "myself" i will sit and listen to the bubbles. very loud in the shower.
 
Ive fallen asleep spooning a better bottle. And just last week my wife caught me playing with its bunghole. I thought this was totally normal activity
 
MY BEER IS STARING AT ME - this is fine, you should be able to win a staring contest with a fermenter. when it starts talking to you, thats different...
 
This may be the only place where staring at a carboy or sniffing an airlock is a perfectly acceptable activity.

I noticed that while I was staring at my airlock - It puffs out little bit of beer-smell. I felt pretty silly hovering over the carboy waiting for a glug so I could take a sniff. I love it! :)
 
I noticed that while I was staring at my airlock - It puffs out little bit of beer-smell. I felt pretty silly hovering over the carboy waiting for a glug so I could take a sniff. I love it! :)


One of my new favorite hobbies :mug:
 
I like to run downstairs in the morning to check on my carboys. Its like running downstairs to see the presents on Christmas morning, except it lasts all year!

Also, is it wrong that I refer to my beer as "my baby/babies"?
 
I noticed that while I was staring at my airlock - It puffs out little bit of beer-smell. I felt pretty silly hovering over the carboy waiting for a glug so I could take a sniff. I love it! :)

Don't smell the stuff coming out of the bunghole, though... :tank:

(PS: my carboy stares at me, too. No one at work believed me, so I took a picture and made it my avatar...)
 
Awwww. I remember those days too. But wait, I still suffer from the same problem. Welcome, brotha. I've been out of the game for about two years now, but I'm now back in. Brewing my next batch on Saturday, and I can't wait. You will find this hobby maybe the most rewarding of any you could have picked. Sure beats model trains!!! LOL!!!

Cheers!!!
 
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