Did I mess up my beer?

[laxplaya25]

I just brewed my first all grain brew which was a English Pale Ale. I am not able to afford a chest freezer so I thought I'd just set my Air conditioner to 70 (since it's summer) and keep my spiedel in the closet to bubble away. For the first week it was awesome, just bubbling away. But at the start of the 2nd week we experienced a cold break where temperatures in the house dropped to 59F. I wasn't in the house to put on the heat and it sat in 59-62F degree temps for 2 days. After I came back I made sure to check on it periodically to make sure the ambient temp is around 70F. There hasn't been any activity in the airlock for the past 2 days and I only have another 4 days left in primary. Have I messed up? Will activity resume if I keep it in primary longer? Thanks in advance.

 

[FatDragon]

I just brewed my first all grain brew which was a English Pale Ale. I am not able to afford a chest freezer so I thought I'd just set my Air conditioner to 70 (since it's summer) and keep my spiedel in the closet to bubble away. For the first week it was awesome, just bubbling away. But at the start of the 2nd week we experienced a cold break where temperatures in the house dropped to 59F. I wasn't in the house to put on the heat and it sat in 59-62F degree temps for 2 days. After I came back I made sure to check on it periodically to make sure the ambient temp is around 70F. There hasn't been any activity in the airlock for the past 2 days and I only have another 4 days left in primary. Have I messed up? Will activity resume if I keep it in primary longer? Thanks in advance.

Ambient temps of 70 for a week will finish most ales pretty quickly. If the beer wasn' done, it might have stalled when the temperature dropped, but in all likelihood it had already fermented as far as it was going to go by then. Give it another couple days, maybe take a couple gravity readings a day or two apart to see where it's at and if it moves, but it should be done and pretty close to ready to bottle or keg.

 

[laxplaya25]

Thanks Dragon. That sounds logical. I'll grab a few gravity readings and get onto saving for the chest freezer. From what I've read, I'll definitely need it for force carbing.

 

[ol-hazza]

You will be fine, beer is pretty resilient and as much as we encourage controlling temperatures some big swings can be survived. Also if you are going to have a temperature spike you want it to be a cold one over a hot one.