Ferm chamber malfunction... ruined my brew?

[petrolSpice]

My ferm chamber is a chest freezer, ferm wrap heater around the carboy, temperature probe inside a thermowell in the beer, and an STC1000 controller.

My honey orange blonde ale has been fermenting for 2 days at 65F with WLP008 east coast ale yeast. The fermentation was just barely starting to slow down as of last night.

This morning I come out to the garage and the STC1000 said the temperature is 98F!!! So naturally the chest freezer is on full tilt trying to cool it down. I check the beer temp with a thermopen and it's actually at 45F. Turns out the temp probe malfunctioned somehow. I quickly changed the temp probe and it's now warning back up to 65F with the ferm wrap.

Fermentation was completely stopped however there was still a layer of krausen, but no airlock activity. Did I cut the fermentation short? Should I plan on pitching more yeast once it warms back up?

I'll wait a few days to see what happens but curious to what others have done in the situation.

 

[kh54s10]

It should be fine. At 45 degrees the yeast will have stopped their work. But when you warm it back up they will begin again.

Though it is not great to have big temperature swings at least the direction it went was better than if it got hot.

You should not need any more yeast.

 

[oceanic_brew]

My temp control crapped out on me about 30 points into a 1.100 barely wine.

Using a Wyeast 1968 (my go to) I started the fermentation off a little too high at 70, and set my temp control to 62. Normally I set to 62, pitch, and do a diacetyl clean up during the end but I was rushed. Checked the temp the next day and the controlling kept it in cool cycle and dropped to 50.

I warmed it back up, agitated, and the thing finished in 5 days. Thanks to pitching on a yeast cake from a previous 1.068 batch.

1968 can be a pretty finicky yeast that likes to floc out early when stressed but I've had good luck and this brew tastes amazing.

What was your yeast? Just curious.

 

[petrolSpice]

Got home after work and it's happily fermenting away once again, phew! Hopefully it attenuates well.