GRR!!! Off-flavor developing

Brewed a Fat Tire clone from Midwest Supplies here a few months back. I usually taste my beers through the process and from the beginning of dumping it into the primary the beer just didn't seem right. But I figured hey its a Belgium beer... what is right about them? Anyways fermentation finished and I racked it over to the secondary. Again something just wasn't right, not bad, but still not right. So onto bottling and aging. Let it age in the bottles for about 2 weeks before tasting one. It was drinkable still not good. It got fairly decent after about 5 or 6 weeks in the bottles. Its been close to 10 weeks in the bottles now and there's a horrific metallic flavor developing in the beer. Had my neighbor come over and try one and that was the first thing he noticed as well. I've researched flaws in beers and many sites pointed to contact with metal (This beer was brewed in an aluminum turkey fryer pot, but have brewed beers since in it that turned out fine) Also found some info that malt stored improperly can lead to metallic flavors. Can anyone help me figure out the most probable cause of this off flavor? I hadn't really noticed the metallic flavor in the beer till recently.

Was it brewed from LME in a can? If it's been in the can a while, it can get a metallic twang to the taste.

The worst beer I ever made was a hefeweizen from a kit. The LME was dark and tasted like the can. Since there was very little hops flavor to hide it, the flavor flaw was pretty obvious in the final product.

The LME in the kits I've bought from Midwest has always come in the 1/2 gallon milk jugs. Usually their ingredients are fairly fresh as turnover is high. Its kind of a coppery/bloody taste if that helps.

Are the bottles over-carbonated? Carbonic acid has a metallic bitter taste. Metallic flavours can also be the result of water that is too acidic, do you know anything about your water?

mysterio said:

Are the bottles over-carbonated? Carbonic acid has a metallic bitter taste. Metallic flavours can also be the result of water that is too acidic, do you know anything about your water?

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Now that you mention it this beer does seem to have some carb bite to it, which is odd because I only used 5 oz. of priming sugar for 5 gallons in the bottling process and haven't had any problems before. I have checked the PH of my water and its about 6. I do run my brew water through a water filter before I brew.

This is what John Palmer says about metallic off-flavors:

Metallic
Metallic flavors are usually caused by unprotected metals dissolving into the wort but can also be caused by the hydrolysis of lipids in poorly stored malts. Iron and aluminum can cause metallic flavors leaching into the wort during the boil. The small amount could be considered to be nutritional if it weren't for the bad taste. Nicks and cracks ceramic coated steel pots are a common cause as are high iron levels in well water. Stainless steel pots will not contribute any metallic flavors. Aluminum pots usually won't cause metallic flavors unless the brewing water is alkaline with a pH level greater than 9. Shiny new aluminum pots will sometimes turn black when boiling water due to chlorine and carbonates in the water.

The protective (grayish) oxides of aluminum can be enhanced by heating the clean pot in a dry oven at 250°F for about 6 hours.

I'm suspicious of the extract, because you noticed something "funny" right away. My Fat Tire clone (from AHS and then my own "kit") tasted good right away. Well, I'm not a FT fan, but there was nothing wrong with it and people loved it. In your case, it went from "not very good" to "very bad".

What kind of yeast did you use? I don't think that's an issue at all, but maybe worth a thought.

Yooper Chick said:

I'm suspicious of the extract, because you noticed something "funny" right away. My Fat Tire clone (from AHS and then my own "kit") tasted good right away. Well, I'm not a FT fan, but there was nothing wrong with it and people loved it. In your case, it went from "not very good" to "very bad".

What kind of yeast did you use? I don't think that's an issue at all, but maybe worth a thought.

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I did the midwest fat tire kit about 6 months ago and there was nothing wrong with it from an off flavor or metallic perspective (plus I have used plenty of extract from midwest with out a problem in the past)....well, short of the fact that they sell it with belgian ale yeast.

I just brewed that brew Monday......It'll be a while before im tasting it.

I made a couple batchs pretty metalic. Didn't have to dump them, just not so good. My best guess was the stainless false bottom I had made. I left it soaking in too much chlorine for a week. It had a white oxide on it. I tried phosphoric acid, still white oxide, so I tossed it and went to a braid. And a charcol filter, and umm, a CFC, and um, made good beer.

Yooper Chick said:

What kind of yeast did you use? I don't think that's an issue at all, but maybe worth a thought.

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Used a tube of WLP530 Abbey Ale yeast with a starter. Fermentation was a little slower than I expected off of a starter, but the temperature was a little cool in the room where I had my primary at the time. Once the temperature came up it took off as normal.

So this is the beer that just keeps on giving. Last night I'm digging in my closet and find I still have a 12 pack of my fat tire clone left. Being it wasn't a stellar beer to begin with I figure I'd just soak some brats in it and toss 'em on the grill. To my suprise I got a fountain of foam (gusher) when I opened it. And the 11 others as well.

Now what I don't understand is that this beer has been bottled since close to January. The other 36 bottles I'd opened were fine. No rings of gunk or anything on the inside of the bottle. I had noticed that the bottles seemed to have a carb bite, but didn't sound like there was any extra pressure bleeding off when the bottle opened.

Anybody have any ideas of what might be going on with this batch? Seems I've had trouble (taste and aroma off) with this fat tire clone and a belgium blonde that I did. I've brewed a Pale Ale, Oatmeal Stout, Light Ale, another Pale Ale that all turned out nice. I see some earlier posts here talking about water pH which I am going to look into. I have some pH strips that say my water is about 6.5-7, but I want a more detailed report of whats happening with my water now.

What was the FG at bottling time? Perhaps it wasn't attenuated all the way and that contributed to the higher carbing and the gushing over time?

It had attenuated to 1.012. Which falls right where its supposed to. I almost think it is some kind of infection or similar, but why so long to show its effects? All my bottles are stored and sanitized at random so I don't feel that it was just something that would have affected this last 12 pack. The beer just wasn't great, but the metallic flavor was the thing that really turned me away from this beer. No visible floaties or rings of crud around the top. Just a quick "hiss" like you'd normally hear opening a beer. I really wish I would have saved a couple bottles to send out to somebody for their thoughts.

casebrew said:

I made a couple batchs pretty metalic. Didn't have to dump them, just not so good. My best guess was the stainless false bottom I had made. I left it soaking in too much chlorine for a week. It had a white oxide on it. I tried phosphoric acid, still white oxide, so I tossed it and went to a braid. And a charcol filter, and umm, a CFC, and um, made good beer.

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Chlorine bleach eats Stainless Steel best not to use bleach on anything stainless left long enough it will eat right through it.