Acetaldehyde in EVERY all grain batch!

Every all grain batch I've brewed comes up with the green apple giveaway smell of Acetaldehyde. I've had a batch of EdWort's Haus Pale Ale sit for 4 months and it still has it. All the reading I have been doing on here and in my plethora of books is saying to do exactly what I am doing and it's not going away.

Now on that note, every extract batch I ever did never had any acetaldehyde (detectable anyway) Does anyone have any suggestions on how to solve this because it's getting very frustrating and I'm getting thirsty...

What yeast are you using and what were the temperatures of your fermentation?

What exactly is your process?

Rule #1: do not give up.

You can brew exceptionally good beer, we just need to figure out what's wrong.

Can you describe your process to us? Equipment, fermentation times and temps, anything you feel is worth explaining?

Equipment:
5 gallon round cooler mash tun.
6 gallon brew pot
6.5 gallon carboy
One step cleanser

Process:
Mash in @168
Mashed at 156 for one hour, sparged with 175 water, had to do a double sparge to get pre boil volume.
Boiled for one hour, cooled with immersion chiller to 75 degrees then pitched a packet of Danstar Nottingham Yeast.

Fermentation didn't start for nearly 2 days and only then it took off after I put the carboy in the closet at 80 degrees. Fermented for 1 week, checked my gravity (1.008) had apple smell and flavor. Dropped temp to 75 degrees and it is still sitting on the primary yeast cake.

Things I notice:

Sanitation, one step is a cleanser and you should also be using star san to sanitize. I know it may say one step but I have read a lot of posts where it seems it just doesn't sanitize the way it should

Temperatures: You should try to get the wort closer to 70 or less when pitching and 80 degrees is just too hot to ferment. Most ales prefer to ferment in the 62-68 degree range, you need to get better control over your fermentation temps and exercise more patience

Make a starter or re-hydrate your yeast, while 2 days is not a long time to wait for activity to take off you can speed things up with these simple steps. In addition, most likely activity has begun before two days but not enough CO2 was produced to activate your airlock. REMEMBER and airlock is a device, NOT A GAUGE and whether there is activity or not means absolutely nothing.

While raising the fermentation temperature to 80 sped up your process your yeast threw off tons of off flavors because it was out of its range. Yeast and fermentation are the MOST important aspects of brewing beer, if you can control those two elements you can brew any kind of beer you want successfully.

Cheers!

Alright, I'll try those tips in the next batch.

Now how do I get rid of the flavor besides sitting, sitting, and more sitting. Should I let them sit on the yeast at the 62-68 degree range for awhile longer? It's very disheartening when all my extract beers were good to go and I had the same process as before.

I had the same issues and believe the temperatures during fermentation were to blame. I started AG at the end of last summer and my dedicated fermenting closet (our pantry) had temperatures in excess of 75* year round. I have sinced moved my fermentation to a closet downstairs which maintains a nice 65*. Major difference!

racetech said:

Alright, I'll try those tips in the next batch.

Now how do I get rid of the flavor besides sitting, sitting, and more sitting. Should I let them sit on the yeast at the 62-68 degree range for awhile longer? It's very disheartening when all my extract beers were good to go and I had the same process as before.

Click to expand...

You can try and keep the beer in the primary for a while, like 3-4 weeks to give the yeast a chance to clean up its off flavors but be sure you locate it in the appropriate temperature range: 62-68F.

Also, for the future, remember that the actual temperature in the primary during active fermentation could be 5-10 degrees higher than the surrounding ambient temperature in the room.

Don't give up! This is all part of the learning curve and as you become more advanced there will be more head scratching to tackle

duboman said:

You can try and keep the beer in the primary for a while, like 3-4 weeks to give the yeast a chance to clean up its off flavors but be sure you locate it in the appropriate temperature range: 62-68F.

Also, for the future, remember that the actual temperature in the primary during active fermentation could be 5-10 degrees higher than the surrounding ambient temperature in the room.

Don't give up! This is all part of the learning curve and as you become more advanced there will be more head scratching to tackle

Click to expand...

Thanks, looks like I might have to lug two carboys down two flights of stairs to my basement to get the correct temp range. Wish I had some beer after that trip!

Something that you should do to get healthy fermentations is oxygenate your wort. I didn't see that as part of your process. I started out dumping wort between to buckets to get oxygen into the wort. That is back breaking work and not really a very effective technique. I bought an aeration kit that has an aeration stone, a wand, and a valve. You hook this up to a oxygen bottle that you get at a hardware store and it pumps pure oxygen into your wort. This is so much easier and much more effective at raising the oxygen levels in the wort.

This is where the equipment-building bug might bite you! I built a cheap fermentation chamber by taking the door off of an old dorm-fridge, the cube shaped one, and built a box around it out of pink foam. Just hot-glued it and duct taped it together. You can make it any size you want. Then I put a cheap temp controller from ebay on it for $20 bucks. Voila! No need to haul your beer down the stairs.

Yep, I echo what others have said.

I strongly suggest Star San instead of One Step - even if that's not the primary source of your off flavors.

Drop fermentation temp to closer to 70.

Oxygenate well.

I never rehydrate my yeast and have never had off-flavors. Don't make the process harder if you can avoid it and if you are [eventually] pleased with the results.

slarkin712 said:

Something that you should do to get healthy fermentations is oxygenate your wort. I didn't see that as part of your process. I started out dumping wort between to buckets to get oxygen into the wort. That is back breaking work and not really a very effective technique. I bought an aeration kit that has an aeration stone, a wand, and a valve. You hook this up to a oxygen bottle that you get at a hardware store and it pumps pure oxygen into your wort. This is so much easier and much more effective at raising the oxygen levels in the wort.

Click to expand...

Do you think an aquarium pump would work for oxygenating the beer? I have a number of those from old aquariums with stones and what not. funds are a little tight for getting pure O2 setup.

dbrewski said:

This is where the equipment-building bug might bite you! I built a cheap fermentation chamber by taking the door off of an old dorm-fridge, the cube shaped one, and built a box around it out of pink foam. Just hot-glued it and duct taped it together. You can make it any size you want. Then I put a cheap temp controller from ebay on it for $20 bucks. Voila! No need to haul your beer down the stairs.

Click to expand...

If my old fridge wasn't already being used in my garage (detached garage) I would probably do that. Luckily my basement is always in the 60's and I can keg and bottle down there making it easier on the back once everything is moved :cross:

I had cidery flavors in my beers due to improper pitch rates, old yeast, not making starters, not rehydrating yeast...everything except temperature was to blame.

Now I rehydrate, use yeast nutrients, always aerate the wort thoroughly, make starters for all liquid yeasts (even got a stir plate), and the cider is gone.

I always forget to make a starter until it's brew day and then it's too late. Rookie mistakes, I know.

I'm in a similar boat - last 8 batches (all-grain) have had Acetal. I still have not figured out why, but I think I'm getting closer. Things I have tried so far:

- different O2 levels (with stone as well as the old shake method)
- yeast starter (different sizes); dried yeast, liquid yeast
- decanting yeast starter before pitching

None of the things I mention above got rid of the acetal. Nor did the acetal ever go away after prolonged conditioning. I am now concentrating on fermentation temps. The one variable that did change when all this started happening is I got a new fridge for controlling fermentation temps. So everything points to too high or low temps during fermentation; or big swings. I do have a two zone thermostat, one zone controls the fridge and the other a heater in the fridge.

A couple notes about my set-up: the fridge is now in the basement where it stays around 65-66. And there is a lot of dead airspace in the fridge. What I *think* is happening is that by the time ambient records too high of a temp, the actual beer is probably another 4-5 degrees higher. So for example, the fridge kicks on when it reads 72 (trying to ferment at 69). But I wonder what the temp is of the actual wort? Probably closer to 76-77. So I'm going to try adding a small computer fan to keep the air circulating. I'm also working on a way to log the temps of both the ambient temp as well as the beer so that I can really decipher what's going on.

Another observation, when I first got the fridge it was summer (hot) and the fridge was in the garage. All the beers I brewed then did NOT have acetal. I'm wondering if the fridge turned on more often because it was so hot outside, keeping the temp swings down (eg. the ambient temp in the fridge fluctuated more rapidly due to the heat outside, so the beer may never have had a chance to get too hot). Maybe I'm reaching here, but thought I would mention it.

Hope this helps, and if you find a solution please let us know.

To caskconditioned: To avoid the big temp swings you need to have your temp probe taking the temp of the beer, not the ambient temp. The easiest way to do this is to tape the probe onto the side of your frementer and then insulate it by taping some bubble wrap or a foam beer cosy (sp?) over the probe. Tests have been done and show that this method gives you the beer temp within a degree.

To racetech: If you forget to make your started ahead of time all is not lost. Go ahead and make the starter when you first begin your brewday. Four or five hours later, especially if you have a stir plate or swirl it up often, it will have gotten started and be that much better than pitching straight from the vial or smack pack.

two things catch my eye, .....hot wimmens and cold beer.....no seriously, two things here do catch my eye.
The one step as a clenser/sanitizer...it is a good cleanser, just not the best sanitizer. I have started rinsing or boiling after using onestep.
The other and more important I think......fermentation temp. 80 F is too high as actual fermentation temps will be higher than ambient temperature. I am fighting the same issue and have decided that correct control of fermentation temperature is one of the keys to making great beer. In fact, I have decided not to brew anymore beer until I have some sort of controlled fermentation chamber. I have decided after much reading on the subject....it's that important to making the best beer we can.

I've been rinsing after using one step before kegging anything or bottling. I think I'm just going to have to dedicate my basement to fermenting as it's the only place in my house that stays at a somewhat consistent temperate. All the advice is really helpful and I've been taking notes so I'll be watching my fermentation temps, using a starter, and (ugh) waiting!

OneStep isn't a good sanitizer? That's disappointing. I've been using it exclusively on all my equipment from fermentor to keg to faucets for over a year with zero issues. No rinse, just a 2 minute soak, dump, fill with beer. I'm not arguing anything here, that's in another thread I'm sure.

Definitely control those ferm temps. I used my boil kettle full of water and 5 ice packs which I rotated before bed and before work each day. It worked, but not so well in a 80+ degree room. My kettle water (swamp cooler, essentially) would swing from 62 to 70 throughout the 'life' of each ice pack. The beers all turned out fine. The thermal inertia of fermenting wort is going to level out your high and low temps of a swamp cooler, so the average is more important to me. I my case, I averaged about 66. Kyle

One Step isn't sold as a sanitizer anymore (last I knew) because they didn't want to pay to have it listed that way.
It is a good cleanser, but takes a long wet-contact time to sanitize. And it doesn't 'no-rinse' well...I've seen it leave a white film just like oxy-clean on glass, and sometimes the granuales don't dissolve as well.

Star-san is my sanitizer of choice now...I did used to use one-step but it got expensive, especially compared to star san.

Brewing in the heat of a Texas summer, on lighter beers have gotten an almost bubble gum flavor before. I attribute it to high fermentation temps. Since i don't have the space for a ferm chamber, my last few batches i've done the swamp cooler thing and but my carboy in about an inch of water in the bathtub and wrap a wet towel around it. It has kept my ferm temp between 68 and 72. Much happier with the results now.

Hmm, never thought about the swamp cooler idea. That might work around summer time up here in Michigan when it can get pretty hot and humid.

Right now I have the carboys sitting at about 68 degrees and they're back to bubbling away so hopefully the yeast is eating up the rest of the Acetaldehyde. My blonde ale and the pale ale hopefully will turn out great after this.

IMO- this is temperature related. Ester production occurs in the higher temp range of brewing. I would suggest finding the coolest spot in your home if you don't have space to Putin a freezer or some other form of temp control. For example Rogue pacman is temp controlled ferm at 63 deg. Now if your do have space, pull the trigger and then you'll be set up for lagers too.

I also strongly suggest o2 addition as well. I bought from Williams brewing their regulator and O2 stone setup for oxygen bottles for torches(red bottle) and use it all the time. These are investments that will payout for years and are well worth it.

Be sure to rehydrate as instructed by Danstar:
http://www.danstaryeast.com/library/rehydration-and-usage-tips-ale-yeast

Or following Sean Terrill's advice:
http://seanterrill.com/2011/04/01/dry-yeast-viability/

I learned from Wayne1 that dry yeast does not need additional O2, it is packed with dried nutrient already. He knows his stuff, and respect his instruction.

However it would be beneficial when liquid yeast and a starter are being used.