115th Hopbursted IIPA

Hey all,

Just finished brewing the 115th Dream Hopbursted IIPA from Northern Brewer. According to kit, OG should be around 1.085-1.09. My reading was around 1.11. Not too concerned, this is only my second brew so I'm assuming it was an error in reading / the water + wort wasn't properly mixed. I also left the little cotton ball in the hydrometer tube, not sure if that effects it. Either way, it's sitting in my ale pale right now, and I've got an airlock in it. I used StarSan in the airlock. The process seemed to go well, much better than my first time. However, it looks like the solution in the airlock is already off balance. Originally both levels were at the MAX line. Now the left side of the airlock is higher than the right side of the airlock. Not sure what this means. Is this baby gonna blow soon? I used two packets of dry yeast, both re-hydrated. I just began sanitizing some tubing, thinking that I'm going to switch from the airlock to the tube pretty soon, just as a precaution. Thoughts? Does it matter that the liquid in the airlock has already moved?

Thanks in advance from a noob!

Get some tubing and run from fermentor to a bottle of sanitized water (I've used a wine bottle filled with starsan and water)

Definitely install the blow-off tube, you have to let out the large amount of Co2 pressure created from such a strong beer.

Did you aerate really well? Make sure you do so that yeast has some fuel to do the job.

Yeast nutrient is not a bad idea for big beers like this too!

Hey NBC,

I aerated the crap outta that baby. Went back and forth between fermenter and brew kettle a few times (cleanly, of course). Then shook it around for 2-3 minutes in the fermenter. I'll go ahead and put that tube in tonight. Thanks!

Does it sound like I pitched enough yeast? 2 packets of Safale-05, both re-hydrated.

Assuming it was the 11.5 gram packets then yes!

A good tool is mr.malty.com

go to the bottom "yeast pitching calculators"

...then enter the info into the calculator, it breaks it all down for you.

That's an awesome tool, thanks a lot! Says I needed 1.8 of the 11.5g packets, so that's good.