Burnin' Rubber

[SwissRico]

So I have a christmas brown ale that has an off-smell of burning rubber. I've seen some mention of autolysis ...but this was only in the primary for a little over 2 weeks.

It was a simple Partial OG 1.052 FG 1.016, Fuggles, + Cinnamon, vanilla and ginger, and the brew went well with no visible infections.

Anyone experienced this before? if so what is it ? Will it go away if I leave the bottles for 2 or 3 months? This has been sitting in bottles now for about 6 weeks.

cheers

 

[aeviaanah]

Possibly chlorine or chloromine in your brew water? If so, Was this treated for?

 

[SwissRico]

I don't have that problem. I have the same stuff they put in the Evian bottles...

 

[SwissRico]

And I think I would have noticed on previous brews

 

[daksin]

Is it in bottles now, or still in the fermenter? Burnt rubber definitely sounds like autolysis. Did you throw the bottle in the freezer to cool it down real quick? If you freeze the beer, the yeast in the bottle will lyse and you'll get the same flavor. I've done that a couple of times.

 

[SwissRico]

It's been in the bottle for 6 weeks, was in the fermenter for 2.5weeks with Saf S04 yeast. And nope I didn't freeze it

 

[ElJefeBrews]

What water did you use for this brew? Sounds like possible chlorophenols. If that's what it is then there's no getting rid of it

 

[SwissRico]

Tap water. But my Chloro levels in my region are on average 10mg/L... You can't tell the difference between the tap water and the water from the office cooler.

This is the first time I've had this problem, after many brews...

 

[Bellybuster]

Chlorophenols show like licking a tire. I've been through it before and was going to dump my beer but decided to stash it away. It mellowed over time to almost undetectable.
My tap water at the time was also very low levels of chlorine and had been used many times before without ever showing signs of off flavours. I started carbon filtering my water after that and never saw it again.

 

[Bellybuster]

After doing some reading 10mg/L is quite high. Here our water is treated at a maximum of 4mg/L and you can smell it. I would never use it without filtering out the chlorine

 

[ElJefeBrews]

There's your problem. You need to get the choloro's out of your water. If it's chlorine then a carbon filter will remove them. If chloramines then get some campden tablets.

 

[SwissRico]

I've called in some local knowledge from local home brewers and a brewery. Seems that very little adjustments are being made. I'm leaning toward cleaning residue ...