Air Lock and boil time

Hey, My first question would be conserning the air lock, I have a batch of Cider going and it still have bubbles on the top of the wort and the air lock is perkulating about every 30 sec. or so. It has been about 10 days and I want to take a Hydrometer reading or would like to start to find out when to put it in the secondary, but should I wait till the air lock is inactive or is it ok to do it now.
The second question would be why is their such a long boil time for the extract and other additives andwhat does it do?
Hope this make's sence :rockin:

I have not made cider but I would imagine just like beer you are fine to wait for the airlock activity to stop.

If the second question is about beer brewing, the hour is to get the best use of the hops. I have seen posts where people state they are not doing a full hour boil but I always have.

You don't NEED to wait til the bubbling stops to take a hydro reading. And you also don't need to be in a hurry to rack a beer to secondary. After fermentation is complete the yeast's job isn't done...it cleans up after itself all of the byproducts that were produced during fermentation. I leave mine for a month in primary, then bottle.

Thank's, If I do take a hydo reading while the air lock is active and then put it back on will it still be active or will it kill the process. and as long as the air lock is active does that mean that the furmentation process is still going strong, and when it stops does that mean that it's done fermenting...

taelmore said:

Thank's, If I do take a hydo reading while the air lock is active and then put it back on will it still be active or will it kill the process. and as long as the air lock is active does that mean that the furmentation process is still going strong, and when it stops does that mean that it's done fermenting...

Click to expand...

Airlock activity means nothing, and should not be used as a gauge of it, it is meant to be nothing more than a blowoff valve to keep from painiting your cealing due to excess co2 blowing the lid/bung off the fermenter...nothing more. Half of my brews if not more, DON'T have any airlock activity whatsoever.

Opening it to take a reading may interrupt the bubbling process (becasue the gas is venting), but won't do anything to your fermentation...

THe airlock is just a cheap bit of plastic and should never be thought of as a precise gauge of anything.

Read my blog, I talk about it in there.

http://blogs.homebrewtalk.com/Revvy/Think_evaluation_before_action/

Thanks for the help Revvy!