No bubbles for 3 days... should i take the lid off and check for krausen?

Hey all,

I have plastic bucket fermenter ("Ale Pail") and I haven't seen any bubbles coming from the fermentation lock in 3 days. Would it be okay to take of the lid and check for any signs of fermentation?

airlock bubbling, lack of airlock bubbling, stopped airlock bubbling, fast airlock bubbling, slow airlcok bubbling, heavy metal airlcok bubbling, or disco airlock bubbling really is not an indicator of what is happening to your beer, really isn't important, and it is NOT an accurate gauge of fermentation.

If your airlock was bubbling and stopped---It doesn't mean fermentation has stopped.

If you airlock isn't bubbling, it doesn't mean your fermentation hasn't started....

If your airlock starts bubbling, it really doesn't matter.

If your airlock NEVER bubbles, it doesn't mean anything is wrong or right.

Your airlock is not a fermentation gauge, it is a VALVE to release excess co2.

So get out of the habit of thinking that an airlock bubble it telling you anything.

Fermentation is not always "dynamic," just because you don't SEE anything happening, doesn't mean that anything's wrong, and also doesn't mean that the yeast are still not working dilligantly away, doing what they've been doing for over 4,000 years....


The only way to truly know what is going on in your fermenter is with your hydrometer. Like I said here in my blog, which I encourage you to read, Think evaluation before action you sure as HELL wouldn't want a doctor to start cutting on you unless he used the proper diagnostic instuments like x-rays first, right? You wouldn't want him to just take a look in your eyes briefly and say "I'm cutting into your chest first thing in the morning." You would want them to use the right diagnostic tools before the slice and dice, right? You'd cry malpractice, I would hope, if they didn't say they were sending you for an MRI and other things before going in....

IF it's been 72 hours take a look, and if you don't see a krauzen or signs that one was there, take a gravity reading...

But don't use airlocks as a "gauge" of what is happenning in the bucket.

there's no harm in checking as long as you use good sanitation. You should use your hydrometer and take a reading.

UPDATE - So I took off the lid and there's no foam

Also, I accidentally put my bottle of sanitizer on the hydrometer and now it's in a million little pieces. And my homebrew store isn't open until tuesday.

Man, I was hoping for a smooth-sailing first batch...

GinAndCoffee said:

UPDATE - So I took off the lid and there's no foam

Also, I accidentally put my bottle of sanitizer on the hydrometer and now it's in a million little pieces. And my homebrew store isn't open until tuesday.

Man, I was hoping for a smooth-sailing first batch...

Click to expand...

Close it up....push down on the lid to void out any o2, and go to the LHBS tomorrow and get (2) hydrometers (always good to have a spare) and a packet of US-05 dry yeast just in case.

Check back tomorrow night.

GinAndCoffee said:

Hey all,

I have plastic bucket fermenter ("Ale Pail") and I haven't seen any bubbles coming from the fermentation lock in 3 days. Would it be okay to take of the lid and check for any signs of fermentation?

Click to expand...

Wait - so you had bubbles, and now they have been stopped for 3 days? OR, you pitched 3 days ago, and never saw any bubbles? If the former, you may not see the karusen now, as it has fallen. If the latter, it could still be the former. You need to check the gravity. It is the only way you will be able to tell what (if anything) has happened.

Yeah a hydrometer is the only thing that will give you actual hard evidence of whether fermentation has occured, but if you know your buckets have at least a somewhat decent seal it is kind of ignorant to say that the release of excess CO2 from your airlock tells you abosolutely nothing. I am sick of hearing that. No you should not completely rely on bubbles from your airlock, but it can give you an idea of what is going on. Fermentation creates CO2, CO2 has to go somewhere and out of the airlock/blowoff tube is the only place it can go once pressure starts building up (assuming your fermenter lid even creates at least a somewhat decent seal - or whatever device you may be using to seal a carboy)

NCBeernut said:

I am sick of hearing that. No you should not completely rely on bubbles from your airlock, but it can give you an idea of what is going on. Fermentation creates CO2, CO2 has to go somewhere and out of the airlock/blowoff tube is the only place it can go once pressure starts building up (assuming your fermenter lid even creates at least a somewhat decent seal - or whatever device you may be using to seal a carboy)

Click to expand...

You may be sick of hearing it, but it is the truth....you cannot rely on it in good faith; co2 can come out of the grommet, a bad seal on the bucket, and bad seal on a carboy bung...or there could be simply not enough excess co2 coming out of the airlock to bubble...Or the co2 is sitting in small bubbles heavily on the center part of the 3-piece airlock (That's why I now use an s style)...Or in the case of lagers, because it co2 is sitting really heavily on the beer.

An airlock should be thought of as only the thing the vents out excess gas, to keep your beer off the ceiling....And the good news is, if co2 is getting out somewhere else, then nothing else is getting in, so it's no big deal whether or not is bubbles...heck some folks use tinfoil, or a piece of plexi-glass on their fermenters, not using them at all.

It's that simple. And if it never bubbled for one person...and you can see tons of threads where people (including myself) who have had perfect fermentation without bubbles, then it is not 100% reliable.

Too many new brewers put too much faith in the bubbles. In fact there are several threads one here where people have krausens but because they have this idea that an airlock bubble is a fermentation gauge, if there is no bubbles they think something's wrong...


Like this thread....

DtownRiot said:

I have pitched my yeast into a 2 1/2 gallon batch of apfelwein about 2 weeks ago. The airlock has not bubbled once since then. It was pitched into a 7 gallon ale pail. I was wondering if there is too much headspace in my fermenter to move the airlock, it isn't even half full. I've used this fermenter about 7 times with no problems. I don't know what the deal is. I broke my hydrometer so I don't have readings unfortunately. It smells like sulfur inside the bucket, and the top of the wort is all bubbles. I don't think it's infected, but something is definitely wrong here. Any ideas as of to what may be happening? It was a full packet of yeast intended for a five gallon batch.

Click to expand...

He had Krausen.....and yet he ignored the obvious because of the superfluous.

I've said it over and over....50% of my beers, in 9 different types of fermenters have failed to produce a bubble...


As the guy that has answered about 16,000 supposed problem posts about beer (the rest are tap room and other mindless posts ) MOST of those so called "problems" with beers were not really problems, it was problems with the airlock or not waiting 72 hours.

You have to realize when dealing the hundreds of "Is my beer ruined/my airlock is not bubbling" from newby brewers, that EITHER there are thousands and thousands of yeasts not working....OR the airlock is a flawed way of gauging what is happenennig for those reasons mentioned above.

SO the only way for the scared NEW BREWER to know what it going on is to WAIT 72 hours to account for lag time....and then to use their hydrometer if they don't think anything is going on....USUALLY it never gets that far because in most of the incidents when the NEW BREWER pops open their fermenter they see krausen forming, or indeed they get a decreasing in gravity from their hydro readings.

So many new brewers even think their fermentation has suddenly stopped, because they open their bucket for some reason, like to look at it, and then they put the lid back on and suddenly no bubbles, so they panic...again because they make too big of a correlation to the bubbling of the airlock and actually fermentation...

All you really need to do is look at the follow up to those threads...how after reading mine or other peoples answers echoing mine, they feel better.

And more often then not, they come back and say "You guys were right...I was just antsy. My hydro now says this, or I see krausen."

If I didn't keep getting THAT feedback, over and over and over on a near daily basis, both on the threads and in PMs, that I was doing exactly what the nervous brewer needed to hear, that there was nothing wrong with their beer, then do you think I would still put up with the endless debate and occasional trolling that this brings up from some people?

Don't open the lid. Be patient. It is probably the hardest part of this hobby. As it has been said already, "Yeast is a living organism" and as such they are not always going to behave the same way. Just look to your own body as an example. Whenever you encounter a virus or bacteria that you have been exposed to before your body creates antibodies and fights it off. One time you might get the sniffles. Another might cause you to feel nauseous and dizzy. The time in which it takes you to create the antibodies and fight off the infection varies as well. It depends on a multitude of variables. The same applies for your yeast. This batch may not like 65F instead they prefer 67F or 63F and if you aren't at that temp well then you might not get an overly active fermentation.

The advice you've been given so far is both accurate and valid. Yes, airlock activity is an indication that there is, in fact, something happening and that gases are being given off. However, just because that airlock has stopped does not mean that fermentation is complete. Not by a long shot. There are very good reasons why you leave the beer in the fermenter for 2-3 weeks (and 12-19 days of that waiting will most likely have no airlock activity). This is where your hydrometer becomes your most trusted tool. Without it you won't know when fermentation is complete.

For example, I recently bottled an amber ale using Wyeast #1007. According to Wyeast Labs the proper temp range for this yeast is 55-68F. Using a swamp cooler I was able to maintain 58-60 for 2 weeks. Normally at the 2 week mark I take the standard gravity readings for 3 straight days to make sure fermentation was complete. Mind you there hasn't been airlock activity for nearly 11 or 12 days now. First 2 days the gravity was the same (it was just higher than the projected FG). Came out the third day and the gravity had fallen. So, I let it go another week. Gravity finally stopped just a few points off my projected FG. Now, had I relied soley on the airlock I would have made bottle bombs. Had I juts waited 2 weeks and then blindly bottled I would have not had a finished fermentation and would have bottled something less than desirable.

Use your senses. Trust the science. Use common sense. And if you haven't read any brewing books do yourself a favor and pick one up. The insight they can give you will assuage most newbie jitters you might have. And above all else have patience, padawan.