I tried the search, but didn't find anything related to my question, so I hope some experts will explain to me what is going in in my carboy. Here is the deal. Two days ago, I brewed a batch of the AHS version of Samuel Adams Boston Ale. Half pound of Crystal malt 10L, 6 lbs Extra light pale ale malt extract. One oz of Kent Golding and 1/2 oz of Fuggle for 60 min, another 1/2 oz of Fuggle at 45 min, and one oz of Saaz at 55 min. It was my second batch, the first one turned out great (it was all extract with Cascade hops). What I decided to change this time was to better aerate the chilled word. I attached an aquarium pump with hose and a plastic diffusion stone, and got real nice bubbles for about 45 minutes. Then I added dry east, and set an airlock. About ten hours later fermentation was very active - a couple inches of foam, and a non-stop bubbling in the airlock. However, by the end of the first 24 hours, it slowed down, the foam dropped, and this morning (about 30 hours) I only see about one bubble per minute. My question is why it is so slow so early? My first batch was not that active at the beginning, but but slowed down only after a week. Thanks for any ideas!
Very slow activity on the second day.
- Thread starter bredstein
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Sounds fine. Wait a few more days and take an FG reading.
Airlock bubbling means nothing.
A beer may ferment perfectly fine without a single blip in the airlock. Or airlocks can start or stop or start and stop again, for a ton of other reasons, like temp changes, getting nudged by the cat or the vacuum cleaner, changes in barometric pressure, but your beer could still be fermenting fine.
Or the co2 is coming out the lid, or the grommet or the stopper. Nothing wrong with that, if co2 is getting out, nothing nasty is getting in.
Airlock activity is irrevelent. Just gravity points on a hydrometer.
Airlock bubbling (or lack) and fermentation are not the same thing. You have to separate that from your mindset. Airlock bubbling can be a sign of fermentation, but not a good one, because the airlock will often blip or not blip for various other reasons...so it is a tenuous connection at best.
Fermentation is not always "dynamic," just because you don't SEE anything happening, doesn't mean that any-thing's wrong,, and also doesn't mean that the yeast are still not working diligently away, doing what they've been doing for over 4,000 years.
Airlocks will slow down...but that doesn't mean anything is different inside the fermenter.
Your beer is perfectly fine...
A beer may ferment perfectly fine without a single blip in the airlock. Or airlocks can start or stop or start and stop again, for a ton of other reasons, like temp changes, getting nudged by the cat or the vacuum cleaner, changes in barometric pressure, but your beer could still be fermenting fine.
Or the co2 is coming out the lid, or the grommet or the stopper. Nothing wrong with that, if co2 is getting out, nothing nasty is getting in.
Airlock activity is irrevelent. Just gravity points on a hydrometer.
Airlock bubbling (or lack) and fermentation are not the same thing. You have to separate that from your mindset. Airlock bubbling can be a sign of fermentation, but not a good one, because the airlock will often blip or not blip for various other reasons...so it is a tenuous connection at best.
Fermentation is not always "dynamic," just because you don't SEE anything happening, doesn't mean that any-thing's wrong,, and also doesn't mean that the yeast are still not working diligently away, doing what they've been doing for over 4,000 years.
Airlocks will slow down...but that doesn't mean anything is different inside the fermenter.
Your beer is perfectly fine...
Thanks for a peace of mind! I was really worried this morning... But now I am confused - how can it be that airlock activity is irrelevant? It seems to me that hydrometer and airlock are just two sides of the same coin: yeast consume sugars (density of beer decreases, so the points get lower), and produce alcohol and gas (which escapes the carboy through an airlock). How can it be possible that yeast are doing their job (eat sugars) without making carbon monoxide?
I said it above.
A beer may ferment perfectly fine without a single blip in the airlock. Or airlocks can start or stop or start and stop again, for a ton of other reasons, like temp changes, getting nudged by the cat or the vacuum cleaner, changes in barometric pressure, but your beer could still be fermenting fine.
airlocks tell you the WHAT is happening, that co2 is or isn't getting out of the fermenter....but they aren't telling you the WHY. If it's fermenting or not, or off gassing or not. If it's done or not....
I've said it over and over and trolls like to try to get me, or even accuse me of lying (which I don't get why I would lie about something like this) but over the years of LOTS of batches of ALL SIZES and BOTH carboys and buckets, better bottles or glass, carboy caps or bungs, new buckets old buckets, s-types and 3 piece, I get about 50% airlock failure rate (but 100% success rate of fermentation) and it's any number if things, usually simply a non tight seal in the bucket or carboy or grommet....but to me the reason doesn't matter....the point is just trying to glance at an airlock and know what the beer is doing, just is NOT accurate.
My belief is that 1 occurrance is an anamoly, 2 may be a coincidence, BUT 3 or more occurance is an epidemic...and that's the case for folks relying on airlocks all the time, to me if 1 brewer comes on saying his airlock is not bubbling, AND he takes a reading and finds fermentation is going fine, that's an anamoly...
But DAILY on here there are at least 10 threads stating the exact thing...so MAYBE there is something to this idea that airlocks can be faulty. AND if they have the potential to be faulty, then how can we trust them to tell us what's going on?
You can quibble about it all you want, or deal in semantics, but we deal in sheer volume of users on here, and daily we have airlocks not bubbling, and many of them where a gravity reading indicates that fermentation is happening beautifully.
And yes, in an IDEAL situation (like let's say fermenting in a keg with a tight seal and no leak from around the airlock) the airlock SHOULD bubble 100% of the time (providing there's not too much headspace.) If more co2 is created than can be contained in the spavce of the fermenter, THEN an airlock should bubble....because an airlock is a valve.
But MOST of us don't have IDEAL situations, and rarely is a plastic or glass fermenter airtight- it really isn't supposed to be anyway...SO we aren't in the best situation to have IDEAL 100% accuracy of an airlock...
So that's why it's a good idea NOT to relie on or stress out about what it is or isn't doing. Just realize that airlocks bubble or they don't, they start, they stop, they bubble fast, they bubble slow, and they bubble or don't whether fermentation happens or not.
Like I said, the only accurate thing that will tell you what your beer is or isn't doing, is taking gravity readings.
I did two different batches on Saturday afternoon and used identical fermentors and airlocks. My IPA required a blowoff tube and had crazy fermentation for 2 days. The wheat had very little activity in the airlock, but had a similar build up of Kraussen. interesting proof to me that the airlock cannot be relied upon to gauge fermentation.
While not as encyclopedic as the response above, I would share with you that in my experience, the rate, intensity, and speed of fermentation can vary significantly from batch to batch. I recently brewed up a batch of English Mild that was quick and barely raised a krausen, compared to a higher-gravity IPA that had a long and intense fermentation.
Short response: don't worry, it's normal for yeast to do their work in various and less-predictable ways.
Short response: don't worry, it's normal for yeast to do their work in various and less-predictable ways.
I forgot to tell about another minor difference between my two batches: for the first I used an airlock with a plastic insert, while for the second it was a one piece airlock. Can it be that the latter requires more pressure to force the gas through the water? In a two piece design the gas just has to lift this little cap. I'm just speculating; would be nice to hear from an expert.
All right, I am doing a single fermentation, and this coming Tuesday it will be two weeks since I brewed this batch. The instruction sheet which came with this Samuel Adams Boston Ale clone says that the final gravity has to be 1.012. Well, today I measured gravity, and after temperature adjustment I got exactly 1.012. However, my airlock produces about one bubble every 7-10 minutes. No need to remind what has been already said: fermentation can go without bubbling, and , probably, the other way around as well. I am just wondering how common it is to have any airlock activity after twelve days of fermentation. And yes, I tasted the beer, and it is pretty good! My wife liked it also. I wish this tiny plastic tube that came with hydrometer, and which I used for measuring, hold a little bit more 
The brew could just be off gassing dissolved co2. Check it again in 2-3 days to make sure it's done. I just bottled an English bitter that went down to 1.009. It should be fine,just check it again in a couple days to make sure it's done.
