2nd batch, recently learned things, a question

[issact]

My first batch I made with my buddy, and he has a certain way of doing things. I made a blonde mead, currently maturing in grolsch bottles. He likes to make it sparkling, so that's what I did. Hopefully they won't explode on me, hah.

For my second batch, I started it on the 31st of March and used nutrients this time around, around half what the bottle suggested. After learning a few things around reddit and lurking these forums, I decided today to aerate for the first time and add another dose of nutrients.

My question is about this... Did I do any harm just now, given the ferment is now 9 days old? I never took a gravity reading, I have no hydrometer. A refractometer is coming in the mail this week.

 

[BrewInspector]

Do not aerate fermented wort. It is now beer and you may (PROBABLY) have oxygenated it. Bad thing. It will be ok to continue but it would have been better without the extra O2.

Primary fermentation is already complete. Yeast are cleaning up some of the products made from the more active fermentation that happened in the first 3 or 4 days.

Remember that refractometer's are not used for gravity readings once alcohol is present. They are no longer accurate with alcohol in the sample. There are conversion tables to get an approximation if you use one.

 

[issact]

You're scaring me! Is it about doing it too late in fermentation?

I will say that the airlock was still bubbling every 3 seconds, if that matters.

https://www.reddit.com/r/mead/wiki/process/aeration_degassing

 

[JimRausch]

Do not aerate fermented wort. It is now beer and you may (PROBABLY) have oxygenated it. Bad thing. It will be ok to continue but it would have been better without the extra O2.

True with beer, but he's talking about mead. I'm not an expert, but mead is a much slower fermenter than beer, and it's common to stir it to degas daily and add extra nutrients a couple days into fermentation. Hoping by 'aeration' he means stirring, not bubbling O2 through it. And OP- buy a hydrometer, in fact buy two(they break). They're a lot cheaper than that $75 refractometer and much more useful- ie. you can use them pre fermentation ,and post fermentation. As Brewinspector says, a refractometer is best used only for prefermentation.

 

[BrewInspector]

Oops my bad. Didn't realize the topic I was in while using tapatalk.. disregard my post and listen to the knowledgeable mead advisors.

 

[issact]

Stirring is what I did, yes.
I got the refractometer for 21 bucks off amazon- Are those calculators that compensate for readings w/ alcohol inaccurate? What I was planning on doing (because I never got the initial gravity,) was reading when ready for bottling, boiling a 1 cup sample down to 1/2 cup, filling with water, then reading again for the difference.

I'm pretty new to this in general, but I hear it's possible to use a refractometer even when there's alcohol in the must, you just have to compensate it somehow right?

 

[bernardsmith]

Hi issact, - and welcome.
Two quick points. Yes, you can use a refractometer in the presence of alcohol but a) you need to know what the starting gravity was and b) there are calculators online that take into account the alcohol since the refractometer is calibrated using water as the medium that bends (refracts ) light and not alcohol. Referactometers are really better suited to measure the sugar content in fruit -(you need to use only a drop or two of the juice) rather than the alcohol content of a fermenting carboy.

The second point is that you can add nutrients after the fermentation has started but when the alcohol content gets close to 9% the yeast can no longer make use of the nutrients and so you are basically feeding volunteer bacteria and the like.. Not always a great idea . That, and some nutrients (containing DAP, for example) will then contribute to off flavors in your mead so a) avoid DAP and b) avoid DAP if you don't know the ABV of the wine or mead you have chosen to feed.

 

[issact]

Do you think I'm anywhere near 9% in 6 gallons after 9 days?

 

[bernardsmith]

Only your hydrometer can know that... If you provide your ingredient list then we can guess-timate the starting gravity and if you locate a refractometer calculator you can assess the gravity (or brix) today and so calculate the current ABV.

 

[rekoob]

As stated above, we need a bit more information but my guess is you have a ways to go as far as fermentation, that's a lot of sugars.

Keep us posted.

 

[issact]

15lb Costco clover honey
5 gallons water
1 packet EC-1118
1tsp DAP, 2tsp Fermax

Add to that the stirred aeration and another 1tsp DAP, 2tsp Fermax yesterday, which I regret at the moment.

Was going to add some plum flavor after racking, but it's the brewer's best flavor stuff.

It's been over 24 hours and I haven't seen the airlock bubble yet, though it may have without my notice obviously. Just whenever I stare at it, y'know, it's dead.
Up late and bothered, I pushed down on all sides of the lid. I didn't feel anything click, and I was pretty sure if was tight on there but... Well, it's bubbling about every second, now.

 

[bernardsmith]

15lb Costco clover honey
5 gallons water
1 packet EC-1118
1tsp DAP, 2tsp Fermax

Add to that the stirred aeration and another 1tsp DAP, 2tsp Fermax yesterday, which I regret at the moment.

Was going to add some plum flavor after racking, but it's the brewer's best flavor stuff.

It's been over 24 hours and I haven't seen the airlock bubble yet, though it may have without my notice obviously. Just whenever I stare at it, y'know, it's dead.
Up late and bothered, I pushed down on all sides of the lid. I didn't feel anything click, and I was pretty sure if was tight on there but... Well, it's bubbling about every second, now.

That is precisely one reason why counting bubbles is not very useful - the quality of the seal between lid and rim, between bung and lid, between bung and airlock is not always good.

 

[issact]

Quick update-

2 weeks later and I'm back from vacation, fermenting seems dead. The smell was concerning, it has a very faint rotton egg smell, but not too strong. I looked up how to deal with this and people suggest splash racking, but I wasn't so sure about that because there's no new CO2 being produced. It really doesn't smell too awful bad, I hope it ages okay.

Just racked it normally, and used an approximate starting gravity of 1.101 (~24 Brix) to use this tool: https://www.northernbrewer.com/learn/resources/refractometer-calculator/

At an ending Brix of 7.5 the calculator puts my mead at ~15%. I don't doubt it, because it tastes dry and boozy as hell!

Need advice. Do I let it rack a while before backsweetening? Do I backsweeten it now? Should I use potassium metabisulfite/potassium sorbate before doing so? Is that faint eggy smell a concern or do you think aging will clear it up at this point?

 

[bernardsmith]

A faint eggy smell is the smell of stressed yeast and yeast under stress return the favor by producing hydrogen sulfide and that stresses the mead maker. The cause of yeast producing hydrogen sulfide is typically a lack of nutrient.
The faint eggy smell can become a smell more like burnt matches (mercaptans) and mercaptans are not easy to remove.
You can try whipping air into the mead to remove the smell. you can try racking so that the mead runs down the inner wall of the target carboy. That results in more of the mead being exposed to the air. You can try racking the mead through copper scrubbing wool (that encourages the sulfur to bind with the copper to produce copper sulfate (a toxin in large quantities but here the quantities should be minute).