temp control

[beermonster1985]

i have a new job and brewday for me will be saturday, however the new job involves staying away mon-fri so i will not be able to keep the water surrounding the fermenter cold with icepacks everyday, any ideas for keeping it the same temp for a week with out me being there????????????

 

[Brew-boy]

A wife or buddy to look after it or a temp control fridge or freezer.

 

[beermonster1985]

no one there the wife works away too, fridge not too cold for fermentation???

 

[Brew-boy]

Read back where I said temp control, Heating and cooling in one device.

 

[smizak]

Is it in a cellar or some place where it will not get excessively warm? Is it an ale?

If you are able to keep it in your desired temp range for the first two days or so you can probably just let it free rise on it's own with no problems. I pretty much do that with all of my beers. Ester precursor production is mostly done in the growth phase of the yeast cycle, so as long as the beer isn't overly hot(read:fusels) you might be able to get away with it.

This is all style and yeast dependent of course. I wouldn't recommend this with a light lager or something delicate. I find that US-05/1056/001 tend to be very forgiving as long as you control the temperature from pitching until about high krausen.