Two quick questions on my first brew...

Good afternoon. I'm new to the forums and have two questions for anyone who is willing to help. I am on my first homebrew ever. It is a clone brew of Brooklyn Brown Ale. I cooked everything up on Sunday afternoon and it has been fermenting since.

I came home from work on Monday to the airlock overflowing onto the lid with brown liquid (yeast and beer Im assuming). So I took the airlock apart, I covered the hole with a sanitized cup the whole time, and put it back together with some vodka up halfway to sanitize. I went back to check on it within an hour and it was overflowing again. So I cleaned again and again it was overflowing within hours. I looked online and it says that this is good (I hope thats true) and that the yeast is extremely active. So I went ahead and made my own airlock using the siphon tube jammed into the main piece of the airlock. So now everything is flowing steadily into a big bucket of sanitized water. Does anyone know if there is any problem with me doing this? Will this cause any problems? I dont think it will I just want some experienced opinions. Here is a pic of what I did:



Secondly, how often, if any, should I open the lid on the fermenting bucket? Should it ever be opened? When I go to do a gravity test do I take a sample and measure that way or drop the bobbing hydrometer directly into the wort?

Thank you for your help in advance!

I'd say you're ok.

As for your 2nd question, do NOT drop the hydrometer in. Keep the lid on unless you're taking a reading, racking, bottling or kegging. I good option is to sanitize a turkey baster and draw a sample out that way. Keep in mind to have the bubble pressed in when you dip it in so you don't blow O2 into the fermenting wort. Take your reading and seal it back up.

P.S. if you want to watch the fermentation get a glass carboy

Also, welcome to HBT

Yup...Welcome, And nice call on the Blow off! Pretty cool right?

Don't you dare pop that lid....the boogie man will get you! Leave it till it's done. I'm sure you're fine with your cup and such...you've obviously got positive pressure in that thing.

Thank you all for the quick response. I appreciate the input.

Sounds like a perfectly normal blowoff, you you handled it properly.

Leave the bucket closed until you're ready to either rack to secondary or bottle. There's really no need for a hydrometer reading before that, for me it's a minimum of 10 days before I start thinking about moving the beer to secondary, and I'll check the gravity to make sure it's finished before I move it. If you're planning to skip the secondary, leave it 3 weeks and bottle.

ifishsum said:

Leave the bucket closed until you're ready to either rack to secondary or bottle. There's really no need for a hydrometer reading before that, for me it's a minimum of 10 days before I start thinking about moving the beer to secondary, and I'll check the gravity to make sure it's finished before I move it. If you're planning to skip the secondary, leave it 3 weeks and bottle.

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I talked to two people in my local homebrew store and wanted some opinions on this topic actually. I have a two white plastic bucket setup; no carboy yet, but I'm thinking about it.

The first guy I talked to said with this system it would be ok to siphon the wort from the primary into the secondary and then immediately into bottles, and let them finish in the bottles. I then talked to a woman who told me, with regard to my setup, that I should move the primary to the secondary, let it go a week or two in the secondary, then move back into the (cleaned) primary and bottle from there.

What are everyones thoughts/recommendations on which process to follow?

thakoolaidkid said:

I talked to two people in my local homebrew store and wanted some opinions on this topic actually. I have a two white plastic bucket setup; no carboy yet, but I'm thinking about it.

The first guy I talked to said with this system it would be ok to siphon the wort from the primary into the secondary and then immediately into bottles, and let them finish in the bottles. I then talked to a woman who told me, with regard to my setup, that I should move the primary to the secondary, let it go a week or two in the secondary, then move back into the (cleaned) primary and bottle from there.

What are everyones thoughts/recommendations on which process to follow?

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Well, they are both wrong, in my opinion. Why rack from the primary, to the secondary, then bottle? The point of the secondary is to give the beer time to clear a bit before bottling. To rack it twice to bottle it is just silly. If you're not using a secondary to let the bit clear for a couple of weeks, then rack into a bottling bucket and bottle.

The second suggestion makes sense, if you don't have a bottling bucket, I guess. I'd let it sit right where it is for 3 weeks, then rack into a sanitized bottling bucket, and bottle.

Make sure that everything that touches your beer isn't just cleaned, but sanitized as well. That includes the tubing, hydrometer, bottling wand, etc.

Read howtobrew.com- it's the free version of John Palmer's excellent book. It has pictures of each process, and shows the hows and whys of what you're doing.

Welcome to our obsession!

Nice job! I like the improvised blow-off setup. You are well on your way!

As I like to say, if something doesn't go wrong with a batch, THAT is when I start to worry!!

YooperBrew said:

Make sure that everything that touches your beer isn't just cleaned, but sanitized as well. That includes the tubing, hydrometer, bottling wand, etc.

Read howtobrew.com- it's the free version of John Palmer's excellent book. It has pictures of each process, and shows the hows and whys of what you're doing.

Welcome to our obsession!

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Again, I am amazed by the quickness and thoroughness of the answers on this board, so I thank you all.

If anything I think I have been oversanitizing. I clean everything first with antibacterial soap, then move onto Iodophor sanitizer, and let it airdry from there.

And I already feel the obsession and I'm only 3.5 days deep.

Saccharomyces said:

Nice job! I like the improvised blow-off setup. You are well on your way!

As I like to say, if something doesn't go wrong with a batch, THAT is when I start to worry!!

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haha, thanks. Yeah, I guess what I did is called a blow off. I had no idea it was so common.

I just realized I forgot to take an OG reading of the wort before fermentation began. Will I still be able to get a clear picture of where I'm standing if I start taking readings now? Or should I just wait till my 7-10 days are up to do it?

You can get a rough idea from an online calculator. I like tastybrew.com's version...