12 Hour drive with fermenter!?

Im going to (possibly) starting my first batch in a few days here. The problem lies in that in 3 weeks I need to move back to school, which is a 12 hour drive from me right now.

Will I be doing any damage to the fermenting beer if I drive it through 12 hours of vibrations, stopping, starting and all that steering involved with driving?

I can try to pad the carboy as much as possible while Im moving it but there is only so much I can do. The car itself doesnt have the greatest shocks either.

Or would I be better off trying to resist making my first batch and wait untill Ive moved to start my brew. Or even remove the fermenting brew early and wait longer on the bottles?

Well, I would think that you are going to be sloshing the beer around quite a bit, especially over 12 hours. This could lead to some oxidation which would have a negative impact on your beer. You woould also have to try to keep the beer from having a lot of temp changes. If it was me, I think I'd wait. But you cuold still brew it now and have good beer even with the travel. The other question is when are you leaving, if you have 2-3 weeks before you go, you should be able to get it bottled before you go. Hope this helps, good luck!

Now I see you are moving in 3 weeks, if you get on the brewing soon, and bottle right before you leave, I think you could get it done. You may be too busy with the move though. Just check S.G. for 3 days in a row before you bottle, if it is the same...bottle it, if not, wait. You don't want to bottle before fermentation is done.

I vote for 2.5 week in the primary then bottle before moving.

Awesome, thanks for the quick replys.

I will be brewing once my equipment comes in (shipped today from Northern Brewer). Sounds like Im going to brew it up (YAY!!!) and keep an eye on my gravity and if Im good for bottling Ill do that, if not Ill be careful transporting it.

Anyone know if beer in a fermenter counts as open alcohol!?

I would wait. On your first brew you want to take you time and not rush it. Why waste your time and money only to have a crappy product? I would wait, it will be worth it.

Anyone know if beer in a fermenter counts as open alcohol!?

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Only if there is a large straw in it! Seriously though, I have no clue.

I had a discussion with my Step-dad, who was a cop, and my mom, who is a lawyer, about transporting fermenting beer seeing if the airlock counted as "closed" and legal for transportation.

At first my step-dad said it would be illegal but no-one in a good mood would do anything about it. But then I pulled up this quote from Michigans website:


A person shall not transport or possess alcoholic liquor in a container that is open or uncapped or upon which the seal is broken within the passenger compartment of a vehicle upon a highway or other place open to the general public or generally accessible to motor vehicles, including an area designated for the parking of vehicles, within this state.
from: http://www.michigan.gov/msp/0,1607,7-123-1593_47093_25802-15874--,00.html


And I remembered the "seal" on a growler is simply a sticker on the screw cap. We discussed if the air-lock counted as a seal since it technicly does seal away from the beer. It could be a seal, but could easily be removed/replaced and alcohol consumed. But if a sticker were placed from the glass carboy over the stopper and airlock it could be counted as "sealed" I propose to take a picture of the seal (digital time stamp FTW) so if any suspicion does arise I can prove the seal has been on since the trip began (and liquid level has not changed)

NoNothing said:

I propose to take a picture of the seal (digital time stamp FTW) so if any suspicion does arise I can prove the seal has been on since the trip began (and liquid level has not changed)

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A time/date stamp can be easily manipulated. What you could do is take some real photos, mail them to yourself and don't open them until they are actually needed. That's what my wife & I did when we rented an apartment and when we were leaving the landlord tried to get us to pay for crap that was broken when we moved in. It was great, the judge seemed impressed and our landlord was so pissed :rockin:.

But in your instance, I'd either wait til you get to school or brew it up and bottle ASAP once fermentation is complete. If a cop wants to be a prick he could make you dump the whole thing from a carboy.

I am not necessarily trying to answer this question but more or less making a new one. How could the beer sloshing around in the carboy cause oxygenation. In order for it to oxygenate wouldnt there need to be oxygen present. As long as it had already atleast started fermentation there wouldnt be any oxygen and it would all be co2, so how could it get oxygenated?

A suggestion to someone who was moving a high gravity beer that was bulk aging was to fill the carboy with sanitized marbles. It would take up the headspace, and so long as fermentation is done, you can just put a carboy cap on it.

dataz722 said:

I am not necessarily trying to answer this question but more or less making a new one. How could the beer sloshing around in the carboy cause oxygenation. In order for it to oxygenate wouldnt there need to be oxygen present. As long as it had already atleast started fermentation there wouldnt be any oxygen and it would all be co2, so how could it get oxygenated?

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AFAIK, you're absolutely correct. It's still not good to slosh a beer around though.

Laurel said:

AFAIK, you're absolutely correct. It's still not good to slosh a beer around though.

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Why not slosh the beer around is what Im thinking. If its carb'd dont slosh, youll let Co2 out. But in a carboy its not carb'd yet and as dataz722 said, there should be no O2 in there to begin with.

Ill post in this thread what my final decision is. I need to get my equipment before I start anyway. If Ill be cutting it to close to when I leave that bottling for sure isnt an option Ill just wait.

Thanks for all the advice

Assuming the beer has finished fermenting, there could still be CO2 in the beer. Even if it is not carbed. This would gass off during the move creating a barrier over the beer. If at this point a cap was employed and not an airlock, there would be no problem. If an Airlock was put on, my only worry would be that the temp changes (Hot to cold) would cause problems.
Example:
During a normal brew day I usually cool down the wort to around 75deg F and pitch the yeast. I then submerge the carboy in a vat of water and put ice in to control the fermentation temp which is usually about 65deg F. The change in the temp from 75 to 65 usually sucks in most of the alcohol in the Airlock. I end up adding more after about 8 hours. So as long as OP is either staying in the same type climate or going from cold to hot, it should be fine.

The other issue I would consider is the beer being skunked by the light. I would make sure it is out of direct sunlight.

my 2c

Cheers

Preston

Well, I am going to be going from hot to cold .

I am getting a keg from a friend who brews as well and he gave the advice of using the keg to transport the beer and use it as a secondary. And when I arrive I can open the keg and (do my best) to get the beer out and into my bottling bucket and bottle. The sealed keg will throw out the open alcohol law and using it as a secondary means it will be in there well before I leave and not too long after I move. The only disadvantage I see is going from keg to bottles seems depressing.

If you're using 3/4 of a cup of corn sugar to carb, you may want to up it a smidge due to the CO2 lost out of solution in the carboy sloshing around.

Personally, rack it into a corny for transport or bottle after 3 weeks.

As for the law, it's going to take a real jacka** to waste any time busting you for a fermenter that is obviously not meant for portable consumption. But assuming you find "that guy"...

I would argue that your beverage is non-consumable and therefore not subject to laws governing alcoholic beverages and motor vehicles. Given that the yeast cake will be really well re-suspended during travel, that's absolutely true.

As for being instructed to dump it, I would simply refuse. There's no law that says you must destroy your remaining beverages (i.e. property) when being arrested for open container. That said, when you refuse you will probably be arrested. If so, be sure to demand a blood test (it is more accurate and typically HIGHER than a breathalyzer). It'll be 0.00 and that makes it pretty tough to argue that you were sucking down a 5gallon bottle of beer. Now, if he saves the contents for evidence, you've got proof that it was non-consumable. If he dumps it, particularly on camera, he now has no evidence that the contents of that container was an alcoholic beverage.

Any officers care to comment?

What kind of beer are you brewing? If it isn't too big or complex, you could bottle shortly before you leave.

You're fine. If you can't bottle, a little sloshing won't hurt it too bad. Might require some further settling is all. Of course, if you can get it done, then you ought to try to bottle it before you head out.

I personally wouldn't worry about a police officer making a big deal out of it. Just explain what you are doing, and worst case they make you dump it. It's up to you to argue or let it go. I'd imagine most of them would understand and let you be on your way since it's not really an open container (plus, if you put it in the trunk, they wouls need a search warrant to check it out.)

Maybe use a balloon to keep the sloshing inside? An airlock might come loose, and a cap might blow off once it gets agitated.