Brewing Bavarian Wheat Issue

So I brewed a bavarian wheat last night and put it in the carboy around 8- 8:30 pm I woke up this morning for work and My Air lock was on the ground and beer had been foaming everywhere. Is it typical for this much activity so early on? Also and am I screwed because I have no Idea how long my airlock has been off?

deadguyry said:

So I brewed a bavarian wheat last night and put it in the carboy around 8- 8:30 pm I woke up this morning for work and My Air lock was on the ground and beer had been foaming everywhere. Is it typical for this much activity so early on? Also and am I screwed because I have no Idea how long my airlock has been off?

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Clean it up and put it back and you'll be fine. The co2 and foam coming out most likely kept anything bad out. You can hook up a blow off tube to prevent this from happening again.

Thanks I have seen a few other homebrews done I have just never seen one so active so quickly.

Yeah you should be fine. For some reason hefeweizen yeasts tend to go NUTS like that. Same thing happened to me on my last wheat beer!

One thing you can do is rig a "blowoff tube". There's different ways but what worked for me was to get some 1/2" inner diameter tubing. I put the airlock on but left the top and little floaty part off. Then I put the tube over the stem inside the airlock and put the other end in a bowl of sanitizer solution. That way crap just goes up and out instead of clogging the airlock and eventually blowing up.

So i put a a blow off hose on it last night and forgot to check it this morning. Well my wife called me and told me it flew off and 1/4 of my beer is now on the floor. What should I do.

deadguyry said:

So i put a a blow off hose on it last night and forgot to check it this morning. Well my wife called me and told me it flew off and 1/4 of my beer is now on the floor. What should I do.

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Not much you can do at this point. Is the Blow off and air lock getting clogged, than popping off from pressure? If so you may need a bigger blow off tube. Also check the bottom of the airlock sometimes they have a plastic cross across the inlet that needs to be removed.

the tube was 1 and 1/4 big so its big enough will this effect my beer other then losing a few bottles of it

Can I ask, cause I plan to do a hefeweizen next, how much top space did you have in your fermenter? I've read a number of people say you should leave more room than usual for hefeweizens cause of this. Of course that would mean either a smaller than usual batch or a bigger fermenter. Wondering if I'm going to have the same issue, though I'm going to have a pretty good amount of room above the wort.


Rev.

If you do five gallons in a six gallon bucket and blow off tube you should be fine. I would think. I have one going now and it has been no problem once I switched to the blow off tube.

Man it has been crazy there was foam and beer all over the floor on the wall and ceiling its been a learning experience.

Man I had no idea about them before I brewed i put the full 5 gallons I would not suggest it at all I have atleast lost 1.5 gallons of beer its crazy how active it is.

deadguyry said:

Man I had no idea about them before I brewed i put the full 5 gallons I would not suggest it at all I have atleast lost 1.5 gallons of beer its crazy how active it is.

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What size was the bucket/carboy you were using? Sounds like it was too small for 5 gallons.

It is a 6 gallon

Personally i like bigger fermentors so you have some space for the krausen/party in there. I use and LOVE AHS fermentors. 8 gallons leave plenty of space and i have always just used a airlock without any issues. http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?cPath=178_53_147&products_id=261

In my experience Wheat yeasts take off like a rocketship. Whenever there is a beerplosion on here is seems it was a wheat yeast that was to blame. So with just a 6 gallon bucket/carboy i would ALWAYS use a blowoff tube.

In the future as you upgrade i would go bigger fermentor and do like i did and retire the 6 gallon carboy to making apfelwein.

Just my

What size blow off tube are people using for their buckets? Drilling a whole large enough for a carboy size hose, then using a rubber stopper/airlock when it dies down?

How do you keep your blow off hose in mine flew out mine is a 1.25

Use the three piece airlock, take off the cap and floater. Take the tube and cut a slit at one end then stick that end in boiling water till it becomes soft. Take that end and stick on the airlock hole. The tube should attach to the airlock once it cools.