Airlock Overflow

[rigby27]

So this is my first batch. I am attempting to brew a pale ale. I brewed the wort on Friday and saw that fermentation had started on Saturday in my 6.5 gallon bucket. Everything looked good and i left town for a couple days. Came back Monday afternoon and the airlock had overflown and beer had leaked from the top of the airlock onto the bucket cover. The airlock was filled with a stale beer and it was still bubbling a little bit. I decided to take out the airlock, sanitize it and put it back in. I'm worried my beer will be contaminated now. Is there anything else I can do at this point?

 

[BendBrewer]

Why would you think it is contaminated?

 

[Revvy]

Yeah, you can relax. It happens to all of us.

Your beer is pretty stern stuff, hardier than most new brewers realize;

Read the stories in here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/wh...where-your-beer-still-turned-out-great-96780/

But you might want to consider rigging up an airlock blowoff tube...take your bottling wand hose or other suitable one, put a small slit in it...Heat it for a few minutes in hot water to soften, then do this.

One thing that I do to all my airlocks is saw or break off the little criss/cross of plastic on the bottom of them.

 

[Revvy]

Why would you think it is contaminated?

'cause he's a nervous new brewer on his first batch, he thinks that if he looks at it wrong it's going to roll over and die.

 

[Bmorebrew]

I believe the acronym here is RDWHAHB. If there is one thing I've picked up from these forums, its this bit of advice. Besides, if your airlock was sanitized or filled with sanitizing solution especially, anything that made it back in should be fine. Not speaking with absolute authority here, just playing the odds. Good odds at that.

 

[Bensiff]

You should be fine. Use a blow off hose in the future and you won't have to worry about over flows like this. In the meantime if you cleaned everything up and re-sanitized the air-lock you will be fine. Hell even if you didn't re-sanitze it the chances of infection aren't very high since the yeast have taken over.

 

[BendBrewer]

Who coined the phrase that bacteria aren't ninjas?

 

[rigby27]

Thanks everyone for your words of encouragement and advice. I will definitely rig a blow off tube next time.

 

[frankr]

But you might want to consider rigging up an airlock blowoff tube...take your bottling wand hose or other suitable one, put a small slit in it...Heat it for a few minutes in hot water to soften, then do this.


One thing that I do to all my airlocks is saw or break off the little criss/cross of plastic on the bottom of them.

This is exactly what I have done since the Mt. Vesuvius incident of '08. I had to touch up the ceiling before selling that house.