Brew DAy Blunder

[redwood]

After the stove exploded, we ran to home depot to get a turkey fryer to keep from losing our first ever batch of pilsner. We were about to hit a boil when the stove exploded so when we got back, there was already some serious protein coagulation underway.

After the boil, we had already prepared two growlers made with two vials of White Labs yeast. We ended up tossing 1.5 gal of starter wort and yeast into our worst since we couldn't see how low the yeast cake was. Don't worry, a flask is on the list. Our fermenting chamber is a mini fridge with bent down freezer plate that is Ranco Controlled. We had it set for 52 F, and this morning and it still read 56 as if it was still cooling. I didn't find this comforting and checked the thermometer on the fermenter and it was off the scale on the cold side!

Wort was not frozen, but was low 40's, I moved the Ranco probe to the be between back of fermentor and the freezer plate and the temp dropped into the 40's.

don't know how cold it actually got, but we are worried they have gone dormant. I set the Ranco to 65 to hope to wake them up. Should we get another vial and pitch it? Will the existing yeast wake up and go to work again?

The fermentor went in yesterday, this morning (about 15 hours later) is when I checked and found the cold problem. Not sure where to place the Ranco Probe now, as it was near the front, and there seems to be a huge temperature issue between the front and back.

Any thoughts?

 

[EROK]

Tape the probe to the carboy with duct tape and then insulate the probe from the outside air. Some of us use bubble wrap, thick towels folded up over the probe, the idea is to have the probe register the temp of the glass carboy with no air hitting it. It is said to be within 1 degree of the fermentation temp if you do it like this. Remember that the fermentation temps the first two days can be 5- 10 degrees warmer than the air outside the fermentor. Good Luck !

 

[LandoLincoln]

I'm a little confused here. Your stove exploded...and then you went to Home Depot to get a turkey fryer to continue beer making? Now THAT is dedication. Did you at least call the fire department on the way to the store?

 

[redwood]

Tape the probe to the carboy with duct tape and then insulate the probe from the outside air. Some of us use bubble wrap, thick towels folded up over the probe, the idea is to have the probe register the temp of the glass carboy with no air hitting it. It is said to be within 1 degree of the fermentation temp if you do it like this. Remember that the fermentation temps the first two days can be 5- 10 degrees warmer than the air outside the fermentor. Good Luck !

Great! We did this last night and it looks good. Probably switch to bubble wrap incase the towel gets in contact with the plate, gets wet, and starts to freeze.

I'm a little confused here. Your stove exploded...and then you went to Home Depot to get a turkey fryer to continue beer making? Now THAT is dedication. Did you at least call the fire department on the way to the store?

Essentially. The GF called the gas company, we got our instructions to not turn anything on or off, make sure the stove was off, and that a gas man was on his way. After we had word over the phone that we were good to keep on living, I raced to Home Depot, bought the thing and came home and we kept going.

Turns out whoever cleaned the stove previously, used product that clogged the jets, gas pooled under the burner until finally it ignited. Gas guy said we were lucky. Apparently it's called delayed ignition due to clogged pores. So after all was said and done me and the GF went out and had a celebratory beer for not dying and getting our beer into the fermentor.

 

[Germelli1]

Awesome story! You should incorperate it in the name of the brew if you havn't named it already! Thank for sharing and I am glad you are around to be able to share!