ioveracker
New Member
I've been having a curious problem with my beer lately: all but one of my last 6 batches has developed a sour taste within a few weeks. The strange part is that I brew 10 gallon batches with my dad, and after primary we split it into two five gallon kegs, one of which stays with him and the other goes home with me. His half of our batches has not been going sour.
I'm familiar with lactobacillus infections and take great care to sanitize everything thoroughly. Before our last brewing session, I took apart every single keg I own and and cleaned each piece with a B-T-F chemical (I'm forgetting the name--it comes in a bottle designed similarly to that of iodophor but I believe it's an acidic solution) and I always sanitize with iodophor before putting beer into any keg. My lines and picnic faucets are always soaked in iodophor before tapping the kegs.
The only difference is storage: his kegs are always refrigerated, but my beer fridge died recently so I've been forced to keep my kegs unrefrigerated for the last several months. During the end of the summer and early fall, I kept my kegs in my pantry where the temperature is 68-70 degrees, and since temperatures have been dropping, I've kept my last two batches in the garage where temperatures range from 45 - 55 degrees. Without fail, every batch I've taken home and stored unrefrigerated has developed a sour taste within a few weeks (and it has been extra foamy, like it's infected). Three batches ago, however, I opted to put my batch of fresh-hopped IPA into three gallon kegs. My wife was gracious enough to let me use up half of our refrigerator in the house to keep the beer cold, and that batch did not develop a sour taste.
I'm thinking that the temperature has to be the issue since it's essentially the only variable, but would temperature alone cause the beer to turn sour or are the higher temperatures promoting growth in an inherent bacterial infection?
Thanks for the help,
Isaac
I'm familiar with lactobacillus infections and take great care to sanitize everything thoroughly. Before our last brewing session, I took apart every single keg I own and and cleaned each piece with a B-T-F chemical (I'm forgetting the name--it comes in a bottle designed similarly to that of iodophor but I believe it's an acidic solution) and I always sanitize with iodophor before putting beer into any keg. My lines and picnic faucets are always soaked in iodophor before tapping the kegs.
The only difference is storage: his kegs are always refrigerated, but my beer fridge died recently so I've been forced to keep my kegs unrefrigerated for the last several months. During the end of the summer and early fall, I kept my kegs in my pantry where the temperature is 68-70 degrees, and since temperatures have been dropping, I've kept my last two batches in the garage where temperatures range from 45 - 55 degrees. Without fail, every batch I've taken home and stored unrefrigerated has developed a sour taste within a few weeks (and it has been extra foamy, like it's infected). Three batches ago, however, I opted to put my batch of fresh-hopped IPA into three gallon kegs. My wife was gracious enough to let me use up half of our refrigerator in the house to keep the beer cold, and that batch did not develop a sour taste.
I'm thinking that the temperature has to be the issue since it's essentially the only variable, but would temperature alone cause the beer to turn sour or are the higher temperatures promoting growth in an inherent bacterial infection?
Thanks for the help,
Isaac