Eep! Help QUICK! The rubber ring around my bubbler fell...

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...right into my freshly pitched wort.

It sunk to the bottom. I'm praying for no infection, I don't really have any other choice, don't think I should fish it out of there.

Anyway now I need something to make it airtight before the fermentation picks up! In case you don't know, it's a black rubber ring around a small hole in the bucket lid that you stick the bubbler into. What would you guys use?

I'm in a huge rush and any quick responses would be incredibly appreciated!

Thanks!
-Kelly

edit: Also, a half inch piece of tubing fits in there decently well, but it's far from air tight.
 
For now, you can sanitize some aluminum foil and put it loosely over the top of the fermenter. Just to keep crawlies and/or flies out.

Don't try to fish out the grommet, just leave it in there. It'll be fine.

Maybe see if you can get a length of slightly larger diameter tubing tomorrow that you can stick in there.
 
cover it with foil like rick said. you will get positive pressure once yeast starts working. while yeast is active you can make a trip to lhbs and get an extra ld, and use that gromett or find something at hardware store.

i have a 15 gallon fermenter that i pushed my 11.5 stopper through and into wort, i ended up doing same thing. i am planning on leaving it in there when i rack off beeer this weekend because i want to put new brew right on top of yeast cake.

rdwhahb
 
Welcome to the brotherhood of homebrewers....many members of this forum, including at least one of our mods made their very first post on this very subject...it is quite common, and one of the more mundane mistakes we have made.....don't worry about it....if you can stick you airlock in without it and jam it down fine, if not don't sweat it, many people don't use airlocks at all...

You can take Rick's advice and use tinfoil...some people don't even put lids ontheir beers using tinfoil or a pie tim instead. ( your beer is producing c02 which is protecting you beer from stuff any way.)

If you wann read about some of the mistakes that we all have made, and where our beer still manages to survive, check this out:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/wh...where-your-beer-still-turned-out-great-96780/

You wll see that our beer manages to survie DESPITE what we do to it.

So relax.....

:mug:

plus you can scroll down to the "similar thread" box below...and you will see how this is NOT the first time it has happened to a brewer.
 
Gah, I should have searched for this topic before making a thread. Will take that into consideration in the future. Thanks a lot for the quick (and detailed) replies guys, I'm extremely appreciative! :D
 
Gah, I should have searched for this topic before making a thread. Will take that into consideration in the future. Thanks a lot for the quick (and detailed) replies guys, I'm extremely appreciative! :D

That happened to me on my first non-beer machine beer! I stuck the airlock in, and plop! in the grommet went. No problem, though, I just got some duct tape and taped the airlock in place so it didn't fall over. I bought another $.35 grommet, and it never happened again.

After that, I started putting the airlock on the lid, then the lid on the bucket and then filled the airlock. I'm like RainMan, muttering to myself, "Airlock goes on the lid before the lid goes on the bucket" over and over on brewday!

It'll be fine, trust me. You'll find the grommet after you rack the beer.
 
rdwhahb11.jpg
 
in the future, add your airlock to the lid prior to putting the lid on, so that if it does pop out, it is not into the beer. There should be 0 chance of infection, because your airlock and the gromett should have both been sterilize before putting the lid on.
 
I used a hole saw to make that hole larger (1 1/4 inch) and now use a #7 rubber stopper instead of the grommet. Now I can also get my thief and autosiphon through the hole in the lid without taking it off.
 
This happened to be on my first brew, too. I was so freaked out that I sprayed my arm with sanitizer, then dunked my whole arm in the fermenting bucket and rooted around in the trub for the o-ring. Then when I tried to put the airlock in again, the ring fell in again. So once again I dunked my whole arm into the bucket to get it out.

Also my grain bag had broken earlier and I ended up boiling about a pound of grain with my wort (a huge no-no).

You know what? The beer turned out great. So no worries. Listen to Revvy!

But now I do use a rubber stopper instead of the o-ring.
 
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