Conditioning underwater

[scottneidert]

Question
Has anyone ever tried this
I have a large tropical fish tank, and I keep it at 75 deg no problem year around. My thought was, get a plastic tub that would fit a small batch of bottled beer, and put a fish tank heater in it, and a small filter (w/o a actual filter in it) to keep the water moving and stirred up, and submerge the batch into the water. That way they can all be kept right on at 75 deg, even though my house is only about 66 in the winter. Any thoughts on this??? Thanks.

 

[Revvy]

I've thought about it, but don't really have a setup to do it...You should try it out and report back....

 

[maskednegator]

I used a fish tank heater to keep a saison at 85 F. It was a small heater, too, like 50W.

 

[BarleyWater]

I ferment all of my ales at 66º or lower, so your room temp is perfect and it will carbonate just fine at that temp.

 

[BBBF]

I'm thinking about using an aquarium and putting a batch outside to lager this winter.

 

[malkore]

that should work fine. either an airstone or a pump/powerhead to keep the water moving will keep it from going stagnant. you might even add a dash of bleach for insurance.

 

[cheezydemon3]

Sounds like way too much trouble.

 

[Revvy]

Sounds like way too much trouble.

I don't. I have a similar situation in the winter. My loft has 15 foot ceilings with heating ducts in the ceiling, and in the winter it costs too much to keep it in the 70's. In fact when I leave for the day I turn the heat down to about 61 and when I'm home I tend to only raise it to the mid 60's and use a ceramic heater in my bedroom. The only really warm room is the tiny enclosed kitchen, but there's not storage space for bottles.

So basically if I want my bottles to carb in 3 weeks, I'm hosed. I cover the milk crates with thermal blankets and leave them in my closet, and hope they carb at some point.

So to me if this manages to pull the temp of the bottles up to 70 or above, I'm all for it.

Other's have had the same issue and talked about it as well, including grinder, but noone's actually done it yet.

Obviously your situation is different and it appears to be "too much trouble," but to me, to be able to have beer carbed at a decent pace, like I get the rest of the year....It's hardly any trouble at all.

 

[maskednegator]

Sounds like way too much trouble.

Filling a bucket and plugging something into a wall socket sounds like too much trouble?

 

[Hardleft]

The caps will rust if you get them wet, but it sounds like a good idea to me.

 

[Revvy]

The caps will rust if you get them wet, but it sounds like a good idea to me.

You don't have to submerge them totally....just up to the shoulder should do it.

 

[jackson_d]

i have thought about doing this with my primary buckets.... never attempted though. i did price out tank heaters at petsmart...

makes sense to me, give it a shot and let us know...

:rockin:

 

[Bullshivit-brew]

You know I make bows also and to cure the resin you make a hot box. You use pink fome board. (what they put on the out side of houses for insulation) and make a box then hook up a theremastat that runs a lite bulb in the box for heat. I wounder if some thing like this would work? Would have to use a low watt small bulb as to not over heat but they are cheap to make. I like your idea though it sounds like it would work great year around.

 

[Revvy]

You know I make bows also and to cure the resin you make a hot box. You use pink fome board. (what they put on the out side of houses for insulation) and make a box then hook up a theremastat that runs a lite bulb in the box for heat. I wounder if some thing like this would work? Would have to use a low watt small bulb as to not over heat but they are cheap to make. I like your idea though it sounds like it would work great year around.

The lightbulb is the weak link...uv from it could skunk the beer....that's why as much as we'd like to we don't use chicken coop heaters....

 

[scottneidert]

I think I might have to give it a shot. I will use a plastic tub (not clear) and a wisper 10 filter. I will probably use a 15 Watt Heater and set the Thermostat at 75 to carbonate. I will have to cut a small rectangle in the side to fit the filter in, but I should be able to block out the light with duct tape. The set up would cost (if you did not already have the filter and heater like I do) about 40 bucks tops, and would use close to 6 bucks a month in electricity, but probably less. And I was thinking about the caps rusting, good Ideal about just keeping them out of the water. I will give this a shot and report back, It might be awhile, I am in the process of moving, so I have not started any new batches in a few months, I did not want to be in the middle of anything when moving. Thanks for the feedback!

 

[Okie]

why not take 2 tubs.... fill the bottom tub with a little water and mount the water heater on the bottom.... set temp then put the other tub in the 1st tub and insert beer bottles....test it 1st and incubate..... basically thats what u need is an incubator
be sure the water level is atleast halfway up the 2nd tub and maybe insert 2 bricks as a spacer for the heater itself.....and then u put a lid on it.....
bottles dry and warm.... not too much trouble done it b4

 

[jjones17]

Question
Has anyone ever tried this
I have a large tropical fish tank, and I keep it at 75 deg no problem year around. My thought was, get a plastic tub that would fit a small batch of bottled beer, and put a fish tank heater in it, and a small filter (w/o a actual filter in it) to keep the water moving and stirred up, and submerge the batch into the water. That way they can all be kept right on at 75 deg, even though my house is only about 66 in the winter. Any thoughts on this??? Thanks.

May I ask why one would want to do this? Like another poster said... carbing/conditioning at 66 will be great on its own..

All the power to ya, just trying to save you some time if I can?

 

[scottneidert]

I am just going to faster carbonation during the winter months

 

[Okie]

submerging bottles in water isnt really necessary..... just build a small simple 2 tub incubator.... full control over temps and bottles will stay dry.... happy brewing 2 u

 

[Bullshivit-brew]

Well there you go Revvy blowing a hole in my idea LOL I dont think it would be that hard to cover the bottles to block the light you could just cover with tin foil. With the water idea how warm could you make it? Could you get it warm enuff for a saison to be fermented in?

 

[MonkeyWrench]

Here's how I fixed my low temp house (1896 Victorian that we keep at 55* when not home):

Pink foam ferm box with a thermostat and light bulb. The light bulb is wrapped in aluminum foil and aluminum foil lines the pink foam on either side of the light bulb as well as some on the bottles closest to the bulb to keep them from getting too hot. If you can see, there is a 120mm PC fan laying on a couple of the bottles keeping air moving and even temp throughout.

Version 2.0 will have a rear compartment like the Son ferm box. Then I can either use the rear compartment for heat and blow that into the main compartment, or cool with ice and blow that in with a flip of a switch of the T-stat. This will also keep the light bulb in it's own chamber and the UV issue will be null.

Sorry for the grainy pic.

 

[Bullshivit-brew]

Hey I am not crazy What do you have ran to the lite just a dimmer switch?

 

[MonkeyWrench]

Hey I am not crazy What do you have ran to the lite just a dimmer switch?

That's a line voltage thermostat. Used on things like base board heaters and those Cadet style wall heaters. Though, a dimmer might just work fine. Don't know why I didn't think of that. I am using a 60w bulb and it works fine. With a dimmer, you could probably go 40 watt and keep it on medium to low and keep a nice temp inside the box at all times. My thermostat cycles on/off, so I do get air temp swings, but the product stays consistent.

I have all the stuff to use a digital thermostat for a furnace. Those use 12volts so I have a transformer and 120v/12v relay that will be fine for operating a light bulb.

I may never get around to that because this actually works just fine. I don't pay attention to the temp inside the box or what the thermostat says, I just turn it up a little it I need to heat my beer, or down if I need to cool it. Maybe I'll use the digital one on version 2.0 or even a PID

I do have an infrared thermometer that I checked the temp of everything. Nothing gets too hot and I'm not worried about it when I'm not home.

 

[justbrewit]

What if instead of using a light bulb, you used a ceramic heating bulb for reptiles? I have one on my snakes cage and it puts out plenty of heat. Just my thoughts

 

[jwwdvm]

I do the plastic tub with water and a fish tank heater so I can ferment and condition in my garage. I can hold the temp rock steady while the garage temp swings from 35 to 55 F in winter. Works great for me.

 

[jbanta]

for the "tub of water" idea you can take a peice of styrofoam that is cut to the dimension of the tub at the height of the neck of the bottle... Cut holes into the foam that will allow the neck to stick up through it. This way you keep the bottles upright so the caps don't rust, as well as insulate the top of the water so you don't have heat loss - meaning the heater won't work as hard. The foam will also keep the bottles in the upright if you have a pump pushing water around.

 

[Revvy]

What if instead of using a light bulb, you used a ceramic heating bulb for reptiles? I have one on my snakes cage and it puts out plenty of heat. Just my thoughts

Does this give off any uv?????? Any light at all? If they don't throw off light than you may be my hero.:rockin:

One think I have considered was using one of my rubbermade bins, like from my swamp cooler and build a slightly smaller pink foam box inside, and then between the two wrap the exterior of the pink box with those rope lights....I use some of them in my halloween setups and they do produce a little bit of heat....so I am wondering if heating up the airspace between the rubbermade and the pink box would kick the temps up into the 70's,

 

[Revvy]

May I ask why one would want to do this? Like another poster said... carbing/conditioning at 66 will be great on its own..

All the power to ya, just trying to save you some time if I can?

Well my experience has been that I can have an entire winter in my loft witout any of my precious homebrew...since if it's 61 in my loft rather than 3 weeks at 70 it may take two months for it to carb....and suddenly the first week of spring when the ambient goes up a wee bit suddenly all my beers are carbed....5-10 degrees may not mean much to you and me, but to those little yeastie beasties trying to carb up our beer, it could be a heck of a temp gap.

 

[iamfoamy]

I have a similar problem with conditioning temperature in my basement, so I am thinking of using a technique that gardeners use to raise the temperature of their indoor seedlings. You can use "soil heating cable". Google it and you'll see that it comes in different lengths, and has a thermostat too. You can lay some out in a tub, and cover it with some soil. Then put the bottles on top of that. I'll be trying it soon, and I'll let you know how it works.

 

[Revvy]

I have a similar problem with conditioning temperature in my basement, so I am thinking of using a technique that gardeners use to raise the temperature of their indoor seedlings. You can use "soil heating cable". Google it and you'll see that it comes in different lengths, and has a thermostat too. You can lay some out in a tub, and cover it with some soil. Then put the bottles on top of that. I'll be trying it soon, and I'll let you know how it works.

Oh cool (warm actually), keep us posted!

 

[chefmike]

The ceramic heaters emit infrared range... which would work. They screw in to light bulb sockets and will heat objects. I would have it pointing at a pizza stone or something and let that heat the space instead of pointing it at the bottles, which would get hot (the caps... not sure the glass would at all).

A heating pad also works. I used one back when I lived in Colorado... I just set it to come on 15 minutes every couple of hours. It was in the crate under the bottles, in contact with the glass. Carbed up no problem.

 

[Hardleft]

If you use a light bulb, cant you just throw a box or a blanket over the beer?


On a different note, does anyone know how bottle carbing at 85 degrees affects the beer?

 

[FlyingHumanoid]

The Tub in Tub incubator with the fish tank heater as Okie suggested has been tried and tested before. Not for keeping beer at an approximate constant temperature, that I know of, but for other endeavors. It's cheap and works wonders. Also hydrogen peroxide should work just as well as bleach in the water. Might actually be safer alternative to actual bleach.

 

[iamfoamy]

Oh cool (warm actually), keep us posted!

I experimented with a 6-foot long soil heating cable (Gro Quick) buried in a layer of sand inside a 10" x 20" cooler. I placed 25 bottles upright on the sand and I've found that it is able to keep the bottles in the 70 to 74-degree range when my basement is 60-degrees. It has a built-in thermostat that turns on when the soil goes below 74. It only uses about 20 watts when on. I'm on day 4, and so far so good.

 

[Revvy]

I experimented with a 6-foot long soil heating cable (Gro Quick) buried in a layer of sand inside a 10" x 20" cooler. I placed 25 bottles upright on the sand and I've found that it is able to keep the bottles in the 70 to 74-degree range when my basement is 60-degrees. It has a built-in thermostat that turns on when the soil goes below 74. It only uses about 20 watts when on. I'm on day 4, and so far so good.

Oh that's too awesome!!! Take some pic of your setup!!

 

[iamfoamy]

Here is a picture of bottles being warmed in a cooler using a soil heating cable. I hope I attached it correctly.

 

[Revvy]

Here is a picture of bottles being warmed in a cooler using a soil heating cable. I hope I attached it correctly.

Looks great!!!

 

[RunBikeBrew]

Question
Has anyone ever tried this
I have a large tropical fish tank, and I keep it at 75 deg no problem year around. My thought was, get a plastic tub that would fit a small batch of bottled beer, and put a fish tank heater in it, and a small filter (w/o a actual filter in it) to keep the water moving and stirred up, and submerge the batch into the water. That way they can all be kept right on at 75 deg, even though my house is only about 66 in the winter. Any thoughts on this??? Thanks.

This is precisely the setup I use for bottle conditioning. My basement is in the low 50's in the winter and I condition around 75F. Keep the water level below the caps (rust), put a splash of bleach in the water, and don't put it directly on a concrete floor (use a few layers of cardboard).

 

[springer]

instead of submerging the bottles why not use the fish tank heater in a gallon of water inside a cooler . I did something like this with a Saison beer I had it in the garage on the second floor in August thought it would stay nice and warm. Then we had a real cold snap low 40's at night instead of a cooler I used the old chest freezer and the warm water bottle.

 

[The0Bob]

I've got a 50 watt aquarium heater keeping 4 cases at a constant 70 degrees F in my guest bathroom's tub. Works great in the winter in Colorado.