Krausen Explosion with Blow Off attached

Hey guys and gals, new to the forum and this is my first batch. I made a Brewer's Best IPA that was going along great it started to really get going last night. The krausen was getting into the airlock so I attached a blowoff. This morning I hear a *pop* and in my other bedroom's closet I find that it exploded and krausen was coming out like crazy. I put the carboy in the tub and let it spew out some krausen (mistake?) while i cleaned the mess. I cleaned up the carboy when I was done and put a new airlock and blow off which is bubbling like crazy as I type this. I have a 6.5 gal carboy and thought there was ample room for the 5 gal batch I made. I feel like it is just going to happen again pretty soon with how vigorous the bubbling is. Any suggestions? Thanks everyone!

Congrats on what appears to be a very healthy fermentation! You're doing everything correctly in an effort to manage the mess. I always use a blowoff tube to start off with. I will switch to an airlock once fermentation starts to slow.

Another thing you can do is check the bottom of your airlock. Many come with a little + of plastic on the bottom. If you have that, cut it off. It can cause a blockage leading to a blowoff.

If you really think its going to blow off again, you could sanitize some aluminum foil and use it to loosely cover the opening, at least until the fermentation activity dies down a little and you can put the airlock or blowoff tube back on.

Temperature control, aye?

In the mean time, the best thing to do is to clean up the mess and wait it out. No harm done, except to your closet perhaps. Next time, in addition to cooling things down, consider either a bigger blow-off tube (so it won't get clogged) or some Fermcap-S to keep the krausen level down.

But, all's good for now

Gee, hope it didn't ruin your good shoes in the closet.

JohnnyO said:

Congrats on what appears to be a very healthy fermentation! You're doing everything correctly in an effort to manage the mess. I always use a blowoff tube to start off with. I will switch to an airlock once fermentation starts to slow.

Another thing you can do is check the bottom of your airlock. Many come with a little + of plastic on the bottom. If you have that, cut it off. It can cause a blockage leading to a blowoff.

Click to expand...

Thanks, I cut that off and stuck the airlock back on.

Right now, it's just sitting in the tub...can I just keep it there?

As far as temperature control we keep our house at about 68 deg but i noticed the temp on the carboy was between 71-73 according to the temp strip on the side. What are the best ways to regulate temperature?

Thanks for you help and please bear with my naivety!

You can use the tub as a "swamp cooler" add water and maybe some ice. I use a large plastic storage box, plastic milk jugs or soda bottles to freeze water in then change a bottle
once or twice a day to keep the temps in the mid 60's.

Do a search on "swamp cooler"

I have it in the tub with some cold water, hopefully that'll help get the temp down. Thanks kh!

I guess this is another possibly question possibly related, but when i transfered to the wort to the primary I left the hop sediment which some people say is good while others say try to leave most of that behind. I see a lot of it at the top of the carboy, could that be why I'm having so much krausen? Is it ok to leave the sediment in the primary? I assumed it would all settle but like I said I can see a lot of the hop sediment in the krausen. Thanks!

The trub will settle to the bottom just fine once the primary fermentation stops churning everything up. No worries.

If you put a damp t-shirt over the carboy it will lower the temp of the carboy a few degrees as the water evaporates off of it.
I find it helps regulate the fermentation temperature during the warmer months.
Just check on it from time to time, measure the temperature in the carboy and mist the t-shirt down when it dries if you need to.

I'm assuming once the main fermentation is complete I won't have to be caring for it like a child anymore? I've been worried sick since it woke me up this morning! Haha

Hello all - beginner here (on my 15th batch since October) doing all-grain 2 gallon batches on my stove.

I made a nice 63% wheat malt weissbier on Sunday which started primary fermentation about 12 hours later. After 24 hours the kreusen had crept all the way out the blow-off tube and the other end was bubbling more vigorously than I've seen in the past - "cool", I thought!

So I went to bed last night (Monday night) and this morning (Tuesday) the bung and blow-off tube were blown clean off and kreusen was draped all over the outside of my little demi-john (my two Better Bottles are currently in use) ... I made sure there were no blockages in the tube or bung and replaced them in the fermenter.

My big worry here is that the beer may have been infected by bacteria or wild yeast during the time that the fermenter was open to the air. Should I be worried?

Here's a photo of the whole thing right after I put the bung/blow-off back in:


Kreusen Explosion! by frigante, on Flickr

An update: the weisse in question (dubbed "Sprengenweisse" due to its explosive nature) turned out fantastic! I've got two bottles left that a close friend of mine has made me promise to reserve for him.

I brewed the same recipe about 9 days ago (no explosions) and will be bottling tomorrow.

I highly recommend two modest late-additions of Citra hops - their tropical fruit aromas and flavours compliment the classic banana-flavoured esters that characterize the WLP300 (and other weizen yeasts) strain.

For a 2 1/4 gallon batch, I used 10 grams (a little more than 1/3 oz) of 13% AA Citra pellets at 10 minutes and at knockout. I used 4 grams of the same at 60 minutes for modest bittering.

The grist consists of 63% white wheat malt and 23% 2-row - my first batch had Maris Otter and the second had Canadian 2-row and German Pilsner malts. I mash this for 20 minutes at 133° F, then heat to 153° F for the sacch rest for 70 minutes.

Pitch at 64° F and ferment at 68° F until about 70% attenuation is achieved - about 3 - 4 days, then cool to 62 - 65° F and allow fermentation to gently finish for the next 6 - 7 days before bottling or kegging, then cold-condition at 55° F for 7 - 14 days after carbonating (about 6 days at room temp).

The cold conditioning really helps control bottle carbonation - I go for about 3.2 vols which can get crazy after a month in the bottle at warm temps. Cold conditioning slows the yeast metabolism and lets it settle nicely to the bottom just like the classic hefeweizens from Munich.


Cheers!

My airlock was filling with goo repeatedly. Woke up to a bunch of goo all over the bucket. No way to attach a blowoff tube... Until I remembered the racking cane that I never used (auto siphon was a purchase before the first batch) and I managed to get the airlock connected to the racking cane, to the tubing... Have to use a 4 pack of Avery IPA to hold it in place (because nothing else will do)

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