Blow off tube?

What is with this blow off tube thing? I have read people say they are actually losing beer because there is so much Krausen that it is blowing out! I've just had the pale ale or a better bottle and nothing even close. I just brewed two days ago and it is in a better bottle fermenting away. Looks like a snow globe with an inch of krausen but nothing to compare. Am I doing something wrong? What's the deal? I want blow off too!!!

If you don't leave much headspace in the fermentor, you can certainly lose beer to blow off. I usually end up with 5.25 - 5.5 gal in a 6 gallon fermentor and almost always lose at least a little to blow off. This can be largely recovered if you go to the trouble of setting up a Burton Union system. I wish I had done this for the barleywine I recently brewed, as I actually lost about a gallon to blow off.

Factors leading to a more active fermentation and thus a greater chance of blowoff include better aeration, higher starting gravity, and higher pitching rates.

kevmoron said:

Factors leading to a more active fermentation and thus a greater chance of blowoff include better aeration, higher starting gravity, and higher pitching rates.

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Very true, the type of yeast is also a factor, for example I almost always get blowoff with 001 but almost never with 002.

AKbrewer said:

Very true, the type of yeast is also a factor, for example I almost always get blowoff with 001 but almost never with 002.

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Absolutely. The craziest blowoff I ever had, aside from the barleywine I mentioned, was a hefeweizen. The OG was only 1.050 but that sucker went nuts.

+1 on the Hefe yeast. First time I used WYeast 3068, my 6 gallon fermentor with only 4 gallons in it nearly shot the airlock off.

Braufguss said:

+1 on the Hefe yeast. First time I used WYeast 3068, my 6 gallon fermentor with only 4 gallons in it nearly shot the airlock off.

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I used 3068 for my Dunkelweizen and thankfully I had my airlock on tight enough. It cracked the airlock and was spraying every few seconds. I was able to rig up a blow off with what I had on hand. My OG was about 1.047 but it went crazy. It was fun to watch and smells good now after the sulfer smell died down.

kevmoron said:

Factors leading to a more active fermentation and thus a greater chance of blowoff include better aeration, higher starting gravity, and higher pitching rates.

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I had all 3 in my last batch of wort to go into my fermenter. The next morning I had krausen spewed all in my bowl of sanitizer. Luckily I used a blow-off.

My first 3, a bitter, a stout, and a brown ale didn't get more than 1-2 inches of krausen, not even close to blowing off. The 4th was a Graff, and that sucker was oozing out the airlock when I got home! I had a blow off tube for my glass carboy, but the Graff was in a Better Bottle, so my tube didn't fit! Luckily my siphon tube fit over the airlock hole, and it worked out fine, but I was panicked at the time.
Why would you ever want your beer to blow off? The only thing it's good for is losing beer.