bubbling stopped too early ?

[Tomtanner]

Hey guys I'm a bit concerned about my current batch. Bubbling my air lock has already subsided after 36 hours. I followed the rules while brewing except for two things:

1. I broke my thermometer so I am not sure of the temperature of my wort when I pitched the yeast.

2. I used dry yeast for the first time. I rehydrated the yeast prior to pitching it. I doubled up the amount of yeast because I had a lot of fermentables. When I added the yeast there was a clump or two left in the jar that I used to hydrate the yeast.

Bubbling started at around 17 hours. At 24 hours it was bubbling furiously. 36 nothing.

 

[tchuklobrau]

LOL cant believe i finally get to say this. you should be just fine most likely you are just past the vigorus stage of fermentation. Your hydrometer is the only way to gauge if fermentation is done however. not the bubbles in your airlock.

 

[Aschecte]

As stated above your hydrometer is the only way to see where you are at in your fermentation cycle. also other factors may be in play here what does your fermentometer read on the carboy / buckett if you have one maybe you are not in the range for the yeast and two how much is alot of fermentables? you may have ( this is a slight chance) overpitched and the yeast had a field day and did it in 36 hours and your airlock activity slowed but fermentation is not complete. This was wordy but bottom line get the hydrometer out and take a reading. You are most likely fine beer is stronger than we give it credit for !!

 

[Tomtanner]

I used about 20 oz of steeping grains and 9 lbs of light DME

 

[JohnTheBrewist]

One thing I don't like about airlocks, is that people tend to look at them and rely on them. Airlock activity has very little to do with what your beer is doing. Your beer is fine. Forget about it, don't even look at at it for at least another 2 weeks and then take a gravity reading. You did take an initial reading, right?

 

[Barnzy02]

I wouldn't worry about it at all. Like has been said already and will probably be said again.

Your airlock is not reliable in terms of letting you know that there is/isn't active fermentation. Your best bet is to let it sit for another week or two and then take a few gravity readings a couple days apart.

Trust in your hyrdometer, it will let you know when your fermentation is finished.

 

[Tomtanner]

How can I check with a hydrometer during primary fermentation? Im paranoid about opening the fermenter before racking....

 

[Barnzy02]

I wouldn't even worry about it for the first 10 days. As long as it's in the right temp range it'll be fine. After that I wouldn't take any reading until the Krausen drops.

 

[Revvy]

In homebrewing there is so much that we advise folks not to do, yet the one thing that EVERY book, podcast, magazine and website talks about is gravity readings....

How do you think we get them?

Do you think the advice to take them is a vast conspiracy by us old timers to ruin millions of new brewer's batches, so that they flee the hobby and give it a bad rap? Or so they make crappy beer and we kick your asses in contests?

With simple sanitization practices openning the fermenter to take a reading is perfectly safe.


Airlock activity is irrevelent. Just gravity points on a hydrometer.
Airlock bubbling (or lack) and fermentation are not the same thing. You have to separate that from your mindset. Airlock bubbling can be a sign of fermentation, but not a good one, because the airlock will often blip or not blip for various other reasons...so it is a tenuous connection at best.

If your airlock was bubbling and stopped---It doesn't mean fermentation has stopped.

If you airlock isn't bubbling, it doesn't mean your fermentation hasn't started....

If your airlock starts bubbling, it really doesn't matter.

If your airlock NEVER bubbles, it doesn't mean anything is wrong or right.

Your airlock is not a fermentation gauge, it is a VALVE to release excess co2. If it bubbles it is because it needs to, if it doesn't, it just means it doesn't need too...


Your HYDROMETER is the only BEST indicator of fermentation activity. Nothing else is accurate or consistent...

Unless you take a gravity reading you don't know what's really going on, not by airlock bubbling or by krausen formation. Neither of those signs are effective, they don't tell you exactly where on the fermentation process you are.

The amount of krausen can vary for whatever reason, it can come quick and depart quickly or it can linger long after fermentation is complete, and it all be normal.

And airlocks sometimes bubble or they don't. And airlock is a valve, a vent to release excess co2...NOT a fermentation gauge. It's important to make that distinction, or you'll be panicking everytime a an airlock doesn't bubble, or stops bubbling.

Fermentation is not always "dynamic," just because you don't SEE anything happening, doesn't mean that any-thing's wrong,, and also doesn't mean that the yeast are still not working diligently away, doing what they've been doing for over 4,000 years.

That's why you need to take a gravity reading to know how your fermentation is going, NOT go by airlocks, or size of krausen, or a calendar, the horoscope or the phases of the moon (those things in my mind are equally accurate).

The most important tool you can use is a hydrometer. It's the only way you will truly know when your beer is ready...airlock bubbles and other things are faulty.

The only way to truly know what is going on in your fermenter is with your hydrometer. Like I said here in my blog, which I encourage you to read, Think evaluation before action you sure as HELL wouldn't want a doctor to start cutting on you unless he used the proper diagnostic instuments like x-rays first, right? You wouldn't want him to just take a look in your eyes briefly and say "I'm cutting into your chest first thing in the morning." You would want them to use the right diagnostic tools before the slice and dice, right? You'd cry malpractice, I would hope, if they didn't say they were sending you for an MRI and other things before going in....

Fast fermentations/slow fermentations/big krausens/small krausens/bubbles starting and stopping, in the long run is really irrevelent....just that you have fermentation. Yeast don't normal normally die/stop fermenting/get tired, that's a premise new brewers believe, but it's not the truth. Yeast have been doing this for 4,000 years, and know how to ferment the beer, they WANT to ferment the beer, it's their entire purpose in life is to eat sugar, peer alcohol and fart co2 (along with some major screwing during the reproductive phase) especially modern 21st century yeast.

All those other things are really just superficial to the purpose at hand, if your yeast took off, unless you let the temp go down near 50, your yeast is still working happily away, despite what the supreficial signs like airlock may indicate.

 

[Malintent]

How can I check with a hydrometer during primary fermentation? Im paranoid about opening the fermenter before racking....

Fear not! Simply ensure your beer thief (turkey baster) is sterilized, don't spit into your fermentor while it is open, and don;t pour the 4 oz or so of beer you measure back in (drink it and see how it is coming).

Oh, and if the krausen is still thick on top then I see no reason to disturb it.. wait until the beer clears before your first measurement... and then always take a second measurement a few days later. If it is the same, then it is done with primary fermentation.

Secondary fermentation is a completely different story.

 

[Tomtanner]

Wow great straight forward advice. Thank you very much!

 

[Tomtanner]

Also the initial reading was 1.070. I see someone asked earlier. Btw I love this app thanks for all the great advice guys!

 

[McGreen]

The temptation to rely on the airlock really comes from homebrewing kit instructions and the books that are put out on homebrewing. What I've found from this site is the airlock really is a mediocre indicator of what is going on. Time and letting the yeast do its magic is the key. Rarely does yeast and time not make a powerful combo in this process.

Personally, I'm such a noob I don't even use my hydrometer yet. Just trying to get process down before my head explodes with the science of it! Cheers!

 

[TheDawg28]

Soooo what your saying is the airlock is not a sign of fermentation? LOL Had to say it.

 

[Revvy]

The temptation to rely on the airlock really comes from homebrewing kit instructions and the books that are put out on homebrewing. What I've found from this site is the airlock really is a mediocre indicator of what is going on. Time and letting the yeast do its magic is the key. Rarely does yeast and time not make a powerful combo in this process.

Personally, I'm such a noob I don't even use my hydrometer yet. Just trying to get process down before my head explodes with the science of it! Cheers!

And that's primarily because "back in the day" they were heavy and made of glass, and sat fairly tightly on the fermenters. And they were usually s-type, which tend to bubble more easily since they don't have a stupid little center piece to try to lift. So they simply worked better.

But like any POS cheap thing made offshore and of plastic- they don't always work as they should.

Add to the fact that folks who wrote most books are just repeating 30 year old info written by papazian who were writing in the era of glass, they just keep repeating the whole thing rote...even though Most authors and experienced brewers nowadays probably do what a lot of us do and pitch and walk away, not paying attention to anything but a hydro reading (if they feel they need one.)

But they've really failed to let their work- their books or even kit instructions reflect the truth....That most of them don't work too well these days.

Hell I betch papzian still has his glass airlocks from the 70's and prolly hasn't noticed that the plastic ones don't work too well.

And it wasn't really until you get to places like this, websites where you literally recieve hundreds if not thousand of posts a week,,,hundreds a day that you start to spot all these folks whose airlocks aren't or are bubbling or stopping or starting for whatever reason, yeast lag, atmospherinc changes, slow down in fermentation, the cat hitting it, openning them, bad seals, and yet gravity readings indicate all is well (when you get the scared newbs to ACTUALLY take a reading.)

You start to realise that relying on airlock activity is really flawed. My believe is that 1 occurrance is an anamoly, 2 may be a coincidence, BUT 3 or more occurance is an epidemic...and that's the case for folks relying on airlocks all the time, to me if 1 brewer comes on saying his airlock is not bubbling, AND he takes a reading and finds fermentation is going fine, that's an anamoly...

But DAILY on here there are at least 10 threads stating the exact thing...so MAYBE there is something to this idea that airlocks can be faulty. AND if they have the potential to be faulty, then how can we trust them to tell us what's going on?

I've said it over and over and trolls like to try to get me, or even accuse me of lying (which I don't get why I would lie about something like this) but over the years of LOTS of batches of ALL SIZES and BOTH carboys and buckets, better bottles or glass, carboy caps or bungs, new buckets old buckets, s-types and 3 piece, I get about 50% airlock failure rate (but 100% success rate of fermentation) and it's any number if things, usually simply a non tight seal in the bucket or carboy or grommet....but to me the reason doesn't matter....the point is just trying to glance at an airlock and know what the beer is doing, just is NOT accurate.

Besides airlocks tell you the WHAT is happening, that co2 is or isn't getting out of the fermenter....but they aren't telling you the WHY. If it's fermenting or not, or off gassing or not. If it's done or not....

And yes, in an IDEAL situation (like let's say fermenting in a keg with a tight seal and no leak from around the airlock) the airlock SHOULD bubble 100% of the time (providing there's not too much headspace.) If co2 more co2 is created than can be contained in the spave of the fermenter, THEN an airlock should bubble....because an airlock is a valve.

But MOST of us don't have IDEAL situations, and rarely is a plastic or glass fermenter airtight- it really isn't supposed to be anyway...SO we aren't in the best situation to have IDEAL 100% accuracy of an airlock...

So that's why it's a good idea NOT to relie on or stress out about what it is or isn't doing.

 

[Aschecte]

1+ yeah !!!!! like revvy said !!!!!