another swamp chiller question...

[Righlander]

So i brewed my pale ale. It's in the primary and the primary is in the ghetto rigged swamp chiller. Ok, the water in the swamp chiller is like 59f but, the outside stick on therm on the glass carboy reads 70f. What's the deal? I wish i had a floating therm. Course It's only been in there like 2 hours. Does it take a while to chill a bit?

 

[BargainFittings]

It will take awhile for it to chill down. Most likely it will cool down within the first 24 hours.

 

[Zymurgrafi]

So i brewed my pale ale. It's in the primary and the primary is in the ghetto rigged swamp chiller. Ok, the water in the swamp chiller is like 59f but, the outside stick on therm on the glass carboy reads 70f. What's the deal? I wish i had a floating therm. Course It's only been in there like 2 hours. Does it take a while to chill a bit?

It will take a while if you did not cool the wort enough to begin with. Large amounts of liquid take a while to change temperature (which is a good thing and why setting your carboy in a water bath to help buffer temp fluctuations) so two will have to reach equilibrium. It also depends on how much of your carboy is submerged.

Another thing to consider is, once fermentation gets going it will likely be much warmer in the carboy than the water bath as the fermentation process will be giving off heat. It is an exothermic process as the yeast are eating. So it is necessary to have the water bath around it cooler than you want the fermentation temperature to be.

Add some ice to the water bath to cool it faster. Add only a little at a time and watch the temp so you don't go too low.

 

[Righlander]

Ok, I just woke up and now It's reading 66f on the out side. Although when i woke up in the middle of the night i went to look at it and the airlock stopper wasn't secured in there right it was just sitting there like it almost popped out so i pushed it back in there nice and tight. i'm not going to worry about that though. it wasn't actually exposed to air, it just wasn't on there tight enough.

 

[Righlander]

BOOM! It appears fermentation has just started (just started bubbling from airlock) and the stick on temp reads 64f. Hope all goes well

 

[desertbronze]

As noted, pay attention to the carboy temp. Add ice bottles as needed to control the carboy temp.

 

[Righlander]

It's been holding at 64f. the stick on therm reads 64f on the primary. The water the primary It's sitting in reads 60f from the probe thermometer i have in it.