Ale Fermentation temp arguement

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ewpert

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My friend and I were having a debate this morning regarding proper ale fermentation temperatures. I argued that the "68-72 degree" range that is the basic "textbook" range for ales is the actual temperature of the environment that the beer sits in. My friend argues that those numbers represent the temperature of the wort/beer itself during fermenation, and that the wort/beer temp is 5 degrees higher than the environment due to the fermentation, that the ale should be fermented in a room/environment of 63-67 degrees.

Can anyone shed some light? 63 degree environment seems like it would be a slow fermentation.
 
Your friend is correct. If the room temp is 72° the internal temp could rise as high as 80°. That's not a good temperature for most yeasts, excluding some Belgian strains.
 
Your friend is correct. If the room temp is 72° the internal temp could rise as high as 80°. That's not a good temperature for most yeasts, excluding some Belgian strains.

+1 ^^^^^

Your friend is absolutely right on this one. All ferm temps given for yeast strains are for the wort, not ambient.
 
I like to do my Ales with US-05 and keep the wort temperature at 65° f

for the first 72 hours or so and finish at around 68° f

gives me a nice clean tasting beer

all the best

S_M

so your friend is correct :)
 
Thanks everyone! I moved my wort into a cooler room in my basement. Although i've never detected off-flavors from fermenting down here at 68 degrees (room temp), I'll be curious to see the difference by moving it to a room that's 5 degrees cooler.
 
If you are planning to continue brewing (especially in the summer) you will want to look into ways of contolling wort temperature without having to depend on the ambient temperature in the room.

There are several ways to do this (swamp coolers, wet t-shirt :), heat belts/wraps...) but unfortunately the easiest way is (usually) the most expensive. You'll want a fridge of some sort, a heat source of some sort and a controller to activate one or the other based on need.

Personally I have a chest freezer, a heat belt and an STC-1000 based dual stage temperature contoller. Put your fermenter in the freezer with the heat belt and temperature probe attached to it. Plug the freezer and heat belt into the temperature controller. Plug the temperature controller into the wall and program it for the temperature and differential you want. Done. Year round hands free temperature control.

My setup was a little expensive since I bought everything new but it's still a pretty basic rig. Plenty of guys/gals on here are running systems that are a lot more sophisticated.

Like I said above there are cheaper ways of maintaining temperature but those often require monitoring and maintenence (changing out ice packs for instance). I had the room and the money so the investment was worth it to me.
 
I like to do my Ales with US-05 and keep the wort temperature at 65° f

for the first 72 hours or so and finish at around 68° f

gives me a nice clean tasting beer

all the best

S_M

so your friend is correct :)

I have to agree with this here. I've been leaving my ales to ferment a little on the cold side (64-66 depending on the yeast) until fermentation is finished, then moving them to a warmer location (70-72) for them to finish cleaning up the beer.
 
I tend to think the temperature difference could vary quite a bit. If the ambient air is fairly stagnant, as in a chamber or a typical room there may be many degrees difference.

However, if there is a fan continuously moving air over the surface of the fermenter then the difference may be only a couple or few degrees. (A blast freezer relies on this to get a product to the proper temperature quickly.

If you were also using a stainless fermenter I would guess that you could keep the liquid very close to the air temp.

Tom
 
I have read, and find from my experience, that the heat generated varies with the stage of fermentation. A fermometer or other device to read the actual beer temperature is really helpful. I don't know if others agree, but I actually find the most heat generated during the lag phase.
 
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