tempature fluctuations

I have no place in my entire home where the temp stays the same for long periods of time. I use a wood stove to heat most of the winter and central air for the summer. my basement is heated but only when the furnace is being used to heat the living space witch is not often. most times like today my living space is between 65 and 75 f . and the basement will run from 48 to 75 f . for the moment my brew temp has stayed around 70f what to do?

RDWHAHB and buy a minifridge, temp controller, and maybe a fermwrap.

Welcome Spam. Glad to see another RIer on this forum. There are quite a few on here.

I have the same problem. Living where we do, we have summer days over 90 and winter days under 20 so we need something to really control the temps. Yeah you can use your AC or heat but that will get expensive just to maintain the beer temp. Definitely look into a fermentation chamber that can cool as well as heat. I'm in the process of designing one that uses a mini fridge to cool the box and a ceramic reptile lamp to heat it during the winter.

For now, don't worry too much. Try to keep it as close to 70 as you can. If it goes down to 63 or up to 75, dont worry. After a few batches, you will figure out the best way to do it. I will sometimes put blankets around the bucket to keep it warmer. Fermwrap is another good idea for the winter. Summer you can use a water bath if you have room. Just do some searching on temp control.

I went to walmart and bought one of those plastic tubs with the rope handles for $4.97. I placed my primary bucket inside this plastic tub. I get a shirt soaked with cold water, wring it out, and drape it over ~3/4 of the bucket along the sides (it sticks pretty well) - I do this once in the morning and once in the evening. Then, I froze 2 small tupperware containers filled with water, and I put one of them in the tub (next to the bucket) every morning, and rotate them out each day.

This has kept my bucket temp ~ 62-66 deg F.

ok thanks. how much can the temp swing per day? I could make a closet and put a electric heat strip inside for winter and a fan for summer but i think my temps would still be a tad to warm in summer and fluctuate a bit in winter.....is that a big deal? I just cant spend much money on heating/cooling wort,,times are tight right now ya know.....

Get a bucket from Walmart as Collins suggested. Keep it in your basement, on the concrete floor. Fill to about 3/4 up your fermenter with water; no need for wet T-shirts. That should keep the beer at the same temperature as the concrete floor.

You can use an oven type probe thermometer to see what the water temperature is (the beer will be the same temperature).

In summer it may get up to 70 F, so adjust accordingly; make British or Belgian ales. In winter mine gets down just below 60 F, so I either make pseudo lagers with PacMan, or use a fish tank heater in the water bath to warm it up to whatever temperature I want. If you do heat it in winter I would recommend putting some insulation board under it to reduce the effects of the concrete floor.

spam, is your main question what will happen to the taste if it swings so many degrees?

thanks for the tips and YES that is one of my main questions as well....

You will get off flavors from fermentation temps that are either too high or too low if kept there for a while. If you go up to 73 for an hour and bring it back down, you will be ok. You just don't want to keep it at a too high or too low of a temp for days especially in the beginning.