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I've got one batch in a swamp cooler, and it's holding pretty steady at 66 degrees. I will take a look when I get home tonight and see if the bucket needs to go in there as well.

Mid 60s. The bucket thermo said 72 (if I remember right) when I left this morning. It is expected to be in the 80s for the next few days here, and my house is terrible at maintaining a constant temp. The only safe place to ferment, in my opinion, is downstairs at this point.

I'm happy to say that I brewed my third batch last night, and it's in the basement (hopefully) fermenting as we speak. It's a Sierra Nevada-like (not clone) pale, which is going by Pioneer Pale Ale. I'm an Oregonian, so the name makes sense due to that, plus it's my first pale so there's another...

Alright, sounds about like what I expected. I rinsed off the chiller (it was clean to begin with) and threw it in after I dissolved the extracts. The wort was still around 180, so it wasn't like I put the chiller into cold wort. Thanks guys.

Tonight I was feeling a little rambunctious, so I brewed a Sierra Nevada clone. Things went pretty well, especially after my mishaps this weekend with the summer ale. Anyway, the recipe called for 1 cup of LME to start the boil, and the rest of the LME and the DME after the boil. That seemed...

I agree about the temps. The thing about that recipe that struck me as odd was the fact that you didn't use a chiller to cool the wort. I could tell it was still too warm to pitch the yeast, but I went for it anyway and now I'm dealing with this. I built myself a chiller on Sunday, so this...

Cool, thanks for the reply. I used t-58, and I also found the spec sheet and saw the temp ranges. So I believe that I was right to think that I had pitched too high, and let it start to ferment too high. So here's the (new) plan: give it a month in the primary in the basement, bottle, and...

Not to be a pest, but I'm hoping someone with experience will see this. Based on the photo, would you say the fermentation is right for this style of beer, or did I screw the pooch? Thanks!

I thought that too but the cheapest on at Midwest was a SS for $50. I paid less than that and got copper, so I'm happy about that. It was pretty fun to make as well!

Hopefully this picture helps explain what I'm concerned about. You can see there's nothing on top of the liquid, just some remnants of the krausen up above. Reason to be concerned, or totally normal for a fast, hot fermentation?

I'm concerned that things got out of hand with the temperature. The house is still nearly 80 degrees, and the fermenter wasn't much cooler. I lugged the whole setup downstairs, which is where it sits now. The temp is just under 70, so things are stabilizing. However, the krausen is essentially...

Oh and just to add, I took a pot of water from 220 to 80 in 8 minutes flat. I feel like that's great efficiency! I'm not sure if it'll be the same with wort though. For all I know, the wort may take longer to cool. Oh, and I was really stirring it, and I can't remember if you are supposed to...

I ended up building it myself. For all the parts I needed (20' 3/8" copper tubing, 20' vinyl tubing, hose clamps, hose adapter, and faucet adapter), it came to about $40. I wanted to get one ASAP, so this made the most sense. I took the picture next to my kettle to show that it's high enough...

Shut up Beavis!

Temp is about 64 in the basement. Which, now that I've said that, makes me wonder why I didn't put the fermenter down there in the first place. I put it in a shallow ice bath to cool it down an hour ago. When I get home I'll move it downstairs. I'm a little concerned that the fermentation...

In a strange turn of events, it was really sunny and hot yesterday (in the 80s, which hasn't happened all year here in Vancouver, WA), so the room it's in is still really warm. I've been trying to cool it down by putting ice packs around the fermenter and using a fan in the room, but it's still...

Good call. I added some more and made sure the tubing was below the surface. A few more drops of sanitizer is cheap insurance!

I threw something together. I had some tubing that I use with my siphon, which happened to fit through the bung hole. I sanitized the tubing, and ran it from the bung to a jug with an inch or so of Star San in the bottom. Do I need to cap the jug to keep it free of debris, or should this work?

I've never seen fermentation like this. Granted, this is only my second beer ever, so I don't have a ton of experience. Is this alright? It's bubbling at a crazy pace and the airlock is full of wort. The bubble on top is from all the foam that's building atop the airlock.

Just brewed a batch of this today. I think it all went really well, and I'm looking forward to a killer beer!