How bad is this, really?

Tonight as I was auto-syphoning a finished batch from the fermenter to my keg I got about 2/3 of the way down when I noticed a small black ring around the inside of my auto-syphon hose (where the hose connects to the plastic auto-syphon wand). A closer look revealed mold of some sort. It was stuck and not really moving but it was there. Plenty of beer passed over this spot before I stopped, cut it off, resoaked and finished it off.

I did inspect for this before I put the AS into the bucket of idophor solution and it appeared to be ok but I didn't look that closely to it.

I should add that before syphoning the beer I emptied (with the AS) an entire 5 gallon keg full of idophor solution to another before I let it soak inside the solution for another 10 minutes until I was ready for it. If there was any loose bacteria I suppose it had been washed out during the first 5 gallon drain.

Anyways I've seen beer be both incredibly resilient but tempermental too. How bad is this, really?

Also, on the topic of equipment at what point do you guys retire old plastic brewing gear? I've got two year old buckets and bungs that looked discolored and I'm wondering how long it is until one of these things become more of a risk then they are worth.

if it was in fact actually mold, then I think it could be dangerous. If just a little bit of that mold came through with the beer that passed over it, then it could definitely spoil the enter batch

You will probably end up with an infection if you store the keg at room temperature. Sanitizers don't really work unless the surface is totally clean and free from junk. Well, I guess it is possible that you won't get an infection, but I wouldn't risk it. I would stick it in your kegerator immediately and drink it asap. At serving temps the bacteria should not be able to ruin your beer, at least not for a while.

toman8r said:

You will probably end up with an infection if you store the keg at room temperature. Sanitizers don't really work unless the surface is totally clean and free from junk. Well, I guess it is possible that you won't get an infection, but I wouldn't risk it. I would stick it in your kegerator immediately and drink it asap. At serving temps the bacteria should not be able to ruin your beer, at least not for a while.

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I moved it to the kegerator as soon as I was done in hopes that I could slow any activity.

Sad thing is beer gets better with age...probably not this one : (

Can mold survive in environments with no oxygen? I wonder.. If they can't, then blast that CO2!

Would campden tablets help?

moosetav said:

Would campden tablets help?

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I'm not even sure I know what that is? I hooked us the CO2 after the beer chlled overnight. Anything I can do to make the environment inhospitable to it would be nice.

Again the actual amount ppm of mold that got in there had to be unbelieveably small, I've probably eaten more by ingesting a slice of old cheese. Thing is I've never created this problem for myself so I don't know what to expect.

I thought I'd post a follow up to this post a month later since inevitably someone will search the archives for making a similar boo-boo. I know most of you said this batch would be ruined subject to the above described circumstances but I am pleased to report 4 weeks later you could not be more wrong. The beer gets better with each successive draw.

Got lucky? Probably, even the brewmaster at the LHBS said "Dump it". Glad I didn't. I can only suppose the surface tension of liquid where the hose met the autosyphon may have actually drawn the beer over the connection where the mold was rather than through it?

Whatever happened still getting lots of use out of this batch. It'll be gone for sure before we ever find out how it ages.

Thanks for responding!

That's awesome dusk, glad to see it worked out OK for you. I hate hearing that people have to dump a batch. Have you replaced that hose yet?

I have drunk stuff with mold floating on top of it....A little in a beer wouldnt be a big deal...LOL!

annasdadhockey said:

That's awesome dusk, glad to see it worked out OK for you. I hate hearing that people have to dump a batch. Have you replaced that hose yet?

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Yes, I learned a valuable lesson and got off easy. I bought a new hose and equipment. This brought up a good opportunity to discuss my sanitiation proceedures with the LHBS too so I brought in a few samples of beer that had "off" flavors in it and they diagnosed the flavor as coming from "wild yeast" or infections of some sort. We got into discussions about my equipment and they told me to replace my brew supplies every year (!). I had no idea the buckets, bungs and airlocks had a lifespan but they suggested changing it out every year or so. We'll see if this reduces future problems.

What do you think the mold was eating/growing on before you noticed it? What was the last thing you siphoned with it before the finished beer?

duskb said:

We got into discussions about my equipment and they told me to replace my brew supplies every year (!). I had no idea the buckets, bungs and airlocks had a lifespan but they suggested changing it out every year or so.

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You think that maybe the owner of your LHBS has a hidden agenda when he recommends that you replace all of you gear once a year?

withak said:

You think that maybe the owner of your LHBS has a hidden agenda when he recommends that you replace all of you gear once a year?

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You know I SERIOUSLY wondered about that. Since I have had such a poor track record with off flavors and failed batches I really didn't know what else to do so I figured try it. I didn't find much on the Wiki about when to retire gear or how old is too old for fermenters and such. Someone should start a thread on it.

Crazytwoknobs said:

What do you think the mold was eating/growing on before you noticed it? What was the last thing you siphoned with it before the finished beer?

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I think it was residual idophor water near the connection that never evaporated or dried before mold started in. That's the problem with those tubes-you can dry the outside but there's no easy way to get the insides fully dried so you have to let the air do it.

How do you guys clean and store the auto-syphon gear?

Just replace the plastic buckets with glass carboys and all you have to worry about replacing is a couple of bucks worth of hoses. Use the buckets to hold Sanitizer.

dave5155 said:

Just replace the plastic buckets with glass carboys and all you have to worry about replacing is a couple of bucks worth of hoses. Use the buckets to hold Sanitizer.

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That's what the brewstore suggested. Glass seems so hard to deal with cleaning wise which is why I strayed away from it. Plus I'm terrified of breaking glass...

Not a bad idea though.

I just bought a turkey baster as a siphon starter.

duskb said:

That's what the brewstore suggested. Glass seems so hard to deal with cleaning wise which is why I strayed away from it. Plus I'm terrified of breaking glass...

Not a bad idea though.

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As far as Cleaning Glass, It's not a problem at all. After I am done racking out of a Carboy, I rinse it with warm water, put a gallon of water into the carboy, and then I scrub all the visible crapoola off the insides. Dump, rinse, and dump again. Put a little bleach into the carboy, fill the carboy with water and put it into a corner, ready to be dumped and rinsed right before you need to use it again. If you ask me, the benefits of Glass far outwiegh those of plastic.

Crazytwoknobs said:

I just bought a turkey baster as a siphon starter.

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I use turkey basters for moving beer all the time but how do you use it to start a syphon?

The thing is, for how much we worry about infections, most micro-organisms are rather fastidious little guys. Something that is used to growing in a high oxygen sugar rich environment (the dried wort in the empty siphoning tube) would probably not be so happy in an anaerobic, alcohol filled relatively sugar depleted environment (beer). I think this is the reason that 1) there are not as many infections as you might be led to believe when you first get into brewing and 2) most of those infections are from a small number of bad guys (lacto, wild yeasts etc) that actually turn out 'spoiled' but drinkable sour or funky beer.

It is more an issue of control in the outcome than danger.

That said, I think the siphoning tube is where i've seen guys trying to ruin my beer, I always disconnect the tube from the cane and do a very close inspection of both before cleaning and sanitizing.

to start siphon with turkey baster you just compress it and then stick it on the end of the siphon tube, release and it sucks the beer toward that end. It works well.

Also, your beer is fine because of the alcohol content. It's difficult for bacteria to grow in that kid of environment. Once your beer is fermented it is pretty resilient to infections. More so than it gets credit for.

Dont dump it and certainly don't add tablets to it. Mold needs oxygen and the alcohol will probably help stop it. You will probably be fine. Try it out.

KCBrew said:

(snip)...most of those infections are from a small number of bad guys (lacto, wild yeasts etc) that actually turn out 'spoiled' but drinkable sour or funky beer.

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I can't seem to wrap my head around that because the brew store mentioned this first. What exactly does one do to get "wild yeast" into the mix? This was a brand new sealed WLP001 tube which I poured into a starter bottle. I'd like to think I'm pretty conscious about sanitation (soak everything in idophor for several minutes before using it) so I'm unsure how wild yeast could work their way into my situation, repeatedly, no less. I have had a few batches take on this sour flavor but for the life of me I'm unsure how it keeps happening.

I think I've ruled out souring during the fermentation process because on most sour batches I've sampled every beer while doing my FG check and it's been clean. It appears to be happening during the kegging/bottling process.

If you make alot of bread, or have unpasteurized yogurt that could be a source, if you leave fruit around your kitchen, that could be a source, especially farmer's market fruit.

The truth is, though, that yeast is quite ubiquitous. A standard method for making ginger beer is making a ginger/sugar mix and just leaving it on your counter until it is colonized by wild yeast and gets naturally carbonated. I would just do a thorough sanitization and hope for the best.

Then only infection I've ever had, were two sour beers out of 40 in my first batch. No idea where it came from