Cider fermenting

[Sjlaing9]

Hi all,

i am brewing cider for the first time and wanted to check that it is doing ok. It smells a little funky. Is that normal for day 5? I used a northern brewer cider kit. My original gravity was 1.052 and when I checked it yesterday it was 1.004. Today it was 1.014, is that normal? Just looking for confirmation that it’s doing well!

Thanks

 

[Dr_Jeff]

Sounds like you misread the hydrometer either yesterday or today.
Unless you added additional fermentables, it can't go up from one day to the next.

 

[Sjlaing9]

Sounds fair enough. Thank you! Does 1.014 sound normal for day 5 of cider fermentation?

 

[hotbeer]

The more often you check, the more chance you have of contaminating it. I don't know how much contamination is an issue for cider though. But for beer, I don't check till either it's been almost a full two week in the fermenter or that the beer looks entirely dead of activity.

Wort for beer will ferment down to almost it's FG very quickly and then take days or weeks to get that last little bit to make it's FG.

 

[mashpaddled]

Did you degas the second sample at all? Gravity shouldn't go up unless you're adding something to the cider like more sugar. CO2 trapped in solution from fermentation can buoy the hydrometer and give you a higher reading. All you need to do is give the hydrometer a spin in the testing jar and see if the gravity settles lower. If it does, repeat until it doesn't change.

 

[brewSJ]

If the smell is rotten eggs, yes, a little bit of that is normal at the end of fermentation (or least it is for me). It happens when the yeast are running out of sugar.

 

[Dr_Jeff]

Rotten egg smell is often caused by the lack of nutrients during fermentation as the yeast become stressed.