Refreshing Light Lager Brew Potentially Gone Wrong

[Dexter9]

Hi all,
On my 2nd attempt to brew beer I decided to brew a refreshing light lager with the ingredient kit supplied by geterbrewed. My first attempt at brewing beer was poor due to a severe lack of carbonation within the beer. Although I feel the flavour was fine.
Due to the beer I have chosen being a lager, I have decided to place the fermentation chamber in an old fridge. The only problem being I cannot accurately monitor the temperature of the beer itself. I have a thermostat stuck to the side of the fermentation tank which reads a constant 5 degrees C. I was instructed to ferment the beer at 10 degrees C. For the first few hours of fermentation I fear I may have fermented the beer at an even lower temperature,(possibly below freezing ) ) have I caused any damage by doing this? Also, the specific gravity at the start(sparging) did not meet the specific gravity that it was meant to be. My understanding of this is that the beer will not be as alcoholic. Is there any way to correct this. I think it is 0.015 off.

Many thanks in advance

Andrew

 

[seatazzz]

Need a bit more information. What was your recipe, process, what was your projected OG? Off by .015 isn't bad. As for your fermentation temperature...first off, kudos to you for trying a lager this early in your brewing career. I haven't done one yet. If you can adjust the temperature of your fermentation chamber, go ahead and do so. The only issue you have right now is your yeast has probably gone dormant from the low temperature. Raise it up and they should wake up and start doing their job. You probably haven't risked an infection because they need warmth to get going. Report back with your recipe and process, and greater minds than mine will respond.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Set the temperature dial in your refrigerator to its highest temperature setting. What is really needed here is a controller that cuts the power to your refrigerator when the desired fermentation temperature is reached, and initiates power again when the fermentation temperature rises a bit.

As stated above, you have probably done no serious harm so far.

 

[Dexter9]

Sorry for the late reply,

I received limited instructions with this ingredient kit. The information is as follows:-
Premium Grains; Lager Malt + flaked rice
Hops; Hallertau
4.3*% abv
Whirlfloc tablet inluded
Full instructions included
Grain Bill is 3.77kg
9.5 Litres of strike water at 72.5 degrees
Mashing for 90 minutes at 65 degrees
Sparging 18.5 Litres
Boil size of 28 Litres
Hop additions at 60 mins- 5.5 IBU's
Fermentis S 23 Lager Yeast
OG 1040
FG 1007

I was also told to mash at 65 degrees C for 90 mins. I had to interpret that there was only a single mash stage. My starting OG was 1.025. I have now managed to keep the fermentation chamber at a constant 10 degrees C. I have inspected the fermentation chamber and the yeast seems to be doing very well now. I brewed last sunday, is there any way I can adjust the fermentation temps to have the beer ready in 4 weeks time?

Thanks

Andrew

 

[kh54s10]

You are not set up for true lagering temperatures. You need to take the temperature down to just above freezing for a couple of weeks after fermentation is done. I would just let it go at the 10 c for a few weeks and take it as is. It will be pretty good.

To truely lager you should get a temperature controller and a freezer. The controller will power the freezer on and off to control the temperature of the beer. You need to have the probe insulated from the ambient temperature by putting a folded up rag or something over the probe which is against the side of the fermenter. Better than that is a thermowell which is in the beer with the probe inside it.

 

[kh54s10]

That OG is pretty low... Try to figure out why. Most common is that the grain is not well crushed. Another possibility is that you are mashing at the wrong temperature due to an inaccurate thermometer.

 

[Dexter9]

I presume its because it was my first attempt at crushing and had no choice but to try and use a blender . Using a grainfather system so would like to think it is accurate. Is there any way that i can try and correct the gravity, I think I have read somehwere about adding more sugar in at secondary fermentation? I have the beer in a fridge which seems to be capable of cooling to a temperature above freezing. I am using a temperature controller with the probe inside the fermentation tank. When the temperature rises above 10.3 the fridge will turn on. Thanks for the replies!