First brew in the books...

[nhindian]

Well, it was going good until the chilling.. Was making Northern Brewer's Caribou Slobber.

Brew Day #1
8/15/2013

6:24PM - Collect and heat 2.75 gallons of water.
6:31 - Crack open a Yuengling.
6:40 - Begin steeping at 148 deg
6:44 - Turn off heat at 158 deg
7:08 - Remove grain bag, allow to drip dry, no squeeze. Turn heat to boil
7:28 - Water is boiling. Add 1oz Goldings. Begin 60min timer.
7:44 - Add 1oz Liberty. While waiting for 15min left, sanitize carboy, bottle bucket, auto-siphon, beer thief, bung, airlock, thermometer, hydrometer, and funnel. Boil water for yeast hydration in microwave.
8:14 - Add 1oz Willamette hops
8:18 - Put immersion chiller in Starsan
8:28 - Finish boil. Turn off heat and add 1 lb Amber DME and 6 lbs Amber LME. Stir.
8:35 - Add chiller.

Then disaster. I tested the chiller last night on a plain water boil and it worked fine. This time, when I turned the hose on, the clamps came loose and water sprayed everywhere. I tried to tighten the best I could, but there were little sprays of water jetting into the wort. Damn it.

9:03 - Rehydrate yeast.
9:15 - Wort hits around 85 deg. Start to aerate between kettle and bottling bucket 7 times.
9:20 - Take OG. Somewhere a little above 1.040 I think. Was kind of hard to read the hydrometer and I've never done it before. Target was 1.052...

9:30 - Add yeast, pour into carboy.
9:48 - Clean up, give carboy one last shake, and put it in a dark corner.


I am probably going to go the swamp cooler route... Is my beer completely screwed?

 

[gdbrewer]

Congrats on your first brew! Btw, you don't have to worry about sanitizing your chiller. Just make sure it's clean and free of any debris. Drop it into your pot for the last 15 minutes of the boil and that will take care of the sanitization.

As far as your brew, I bet it will be just fine and taste great even though your og is a little low. If it were mine, I would ride it out.

 

[Smokeater233]

How many gallons of beer did you have into the carboy in the end? It's possible you had a little too much water hence the lower OG. But like gdbrewer said - leave it alone. It will still come out a great beer.

While boiling does indeed remove oxygen from the wort, you do NOT need to aerate that much. Doing so, though generally unlikely, provides the opportunity for you to introduce unwanted bacteria. If you are pouring from your pot into the carboy, presumably you are using a funnel. The wort passing through the funnel should be good enough to oxygenate plenty. You can further help this along by pitching your yeast and then shaking up your carboy a bit, but my earlier suggestion should work just fine.

Congrats on your first homebrew and while Yuengling is a great beer, make sure your next brew session is complete with sips from your own beer!

 

[nhindian]

How many gallons of beer did you have into the carboy in the end? It's possible you had a little too much water hence the lower OG. But like gdbrewer said - leave it alone. It will still come out a great beer.

While boiling does indeed remove oxygen from the wort, you do NOT need to aerate that much. Doing so, though generally unlikely, provides the opportunity for you to introduce unwanted bacteria. If you are pouring from your pot into the carboy, presumably you are using a funnel. The wort passing through the funnel should be good enough to oxygenate plenty. You can further help this along by pitching your yeast and then shaking up your carboy a bit, but my earlier suggestion should work just fine.

Congrats on your first homebrew and while Yuengling is a great beer, make sure your next brew session is complete with sips from your own beer!

Thanks! I didn't measure how much actually got in the carboy since I didn't mark any gallon lines beforehand. Doh. Yeah, Palmer suggested going back and forth from pot to bucket a few times, so I figured I'd really aerate it since I didn't make a yeast starter and only had one packet.

It's bubbling away quite nicely now, so that's encouraging!

I have to get myself a temp controller for my spare fridge or rig up a swamp cooler this afternoon. I have the A/C going now but don't want to leave it on for 2 weeks straight!

And I don't think I'll have some homebrew ready by the time I brew again :rockin:

 

[RM-MN]

Thanks! I didn't measure how much actually got in the carboy since I didn't mark any gallon lines beforehand. Doh. Yeah, Palmer suggested going back and forth from pot to bucket a few times, so I figured I'd really aerate it since I didn't make a yeast starter and only had one packet.

It's bubbling away quite nicely now, so that's encouraging!

I have to get myself a temp controller for my spare fridge or rig up a swamp cooler this afternoon. I have the A/C going now but don't want to leave it on for 2 weeks straight!

And I don't think I'll have some homebrew ready by the time I brew again :rockin:

You don't need the A/C going full blast for 2 weeks. The critical time for beer is the first 3 or 4 days while the yeast are eating fast and furious. Once the ferment slows down, the wort can be allowed to get warmer without ill effects. Try to keep it in the 60's for those first few days though, the beer will come out much cleaner tasting.

 

[nhindian]

Well my fermentation has seemed to slow already and the krausen fell a little. This seems very fast from what I read. I think it may be warmer temperature...

If I get a temp controller today and toss it in, will it reactivate the yeast or am I pretty much done for?

 

[cheesehed007]

Some yeast work faster then others. I don't think getting a controller going will re activate the yeast, but I've been wrong before. While the visible activity has slowed the yeast is still hard at work cleaning things up. Congrats on your first brew! Cheers.

 

[unionrdr]

All the shaking & pouring back & forth in the world won't "overaerate" the wort. Only o2 injection will get the something like 8ppm that's optimal according to the white labs guys. I don't think as long as things were sanitized that a ton of nasties will get in.
I pour mine through a fine mesh strainer into the fermenter to get more gunk out & aerate it. Pour in the chilled spring water from high up to aerate more & mix the wort & top off. Stir roughly for 5 minutes to mix it well & aerate a lil more. Then test & pitch.
The initial fermentation's rapid bubbling will slow down or stop when it's done. The beer will now slowly,uneventfully creep down to FG. Leave it be. When it's at a stable FG,give it another 3-7 days to settle out clear or slightly misty.

 

[nhindian]

All the shaking & pouring back & forth in the world won't "overaerate" the wort. Only o2 injection will get the something like 8ppm that's optimal according to the white labs guys. I don't think as long as things were sanitized that a ton of nasties will get in.
I pour mine through a fine mesh strainer into the fermenter to get more gunk out & aerate it. Pour in the chilled spring water from high up to aerate more & mix the wort & top off. Stir roughly for 5 minutes to mix it well & aerate a lil more. Then test & pitch.
The initial fermentation's rapid bubbling will slow down or stop when it's done. The beer will now slowly,uneventfully creep down to FG. Leave it be. When it's at a stable FG,give it another 3-7 days to settle out clear or slightly misty.

Yeah I wasn't really worried about overaerating it.

Am kind of worried that I am not seeing much activity anymore..

 

[Dralzz]

Yeah I wasn't really worried about overaerating it.

Am kind of worried that I am not seeing much activity anymore..

Why are you worried about not seeing activity? Your beer has been fermenting for two days. It may be past the active portion and slowing down. Give it a few days and check the gravity.

 

[TangoHotel]

Fastest fermentation I had was a day and a half of huge violent fermentation. On the second day, it stopped bubbling entirely. Checked the gravity and it was just about where I wanted it. Waited 2 days and tried again and it didn't budge. I let it sit for the last week, and I'll be bottling that one tonight or tomorrow.

You'll be fine if it isn't bubbling much. Take a gravity reading and have a beer.

Congrats on your first brew!

 

[nhindian]

I guess I was just surprised that it dropped off so quickly, especially the krausen! I will stop worrying about it...

Also, I know now that the OG is way off since I didn't measure it at 60 deg..

 

[Smokeater233]

I guess I was just surprised that it dropped off so quickly, especially the krausen! I will stop worrying about it...

Also, I know now that the OG is way off since I didn't measure it at 60 deg..

I had a warm ferment for my first beer. It burned through its violent fermentation in just over 24 hours. Took three more days for the krausen to fall completely. I moved my carboy (why - I don't recall) to a different location, and then hours later it suddenly sprung to action again...likely the product of me inadvertently rousing some active yeast back into suspension.

The beauty of fermentation is not just the science, but the excitement and fear it instills in us. Patience is a virtue that is well taught in the homebrewing process. That's why we all subscribe to the idea of RDWHAHB. Let it be for at least a week and then test it to see if you have approached your FG. If it has, leave it for a bit more. If it hasn't, leave it for a bit more. Your beer is going to turn out great - you just have to come back here after you've had your first beer to tell us all about the experience (and to prove us right that all went well)!

 

[unionrdr]

I guess I was just surprised that it dropped off so quickly, especially the krausen! I will stop worrying about it...

Also, I know now that the OG is way off since I didn't measure it at 60 deg..

The OG won't be "way off" just because you didn't test at 60F. my Cooper's glass hydrometer checks at like 65-66F. I've seen a couple different temps depending on manufacturer. Here's a hydrometer temp corector to use; http://www.brewheads.com/gravcorrect.php

 

[nhindian]

It's been two weeks and just took my first gravity reading. Was about 1.019 ~ 1.020. Looks like this will be a fairly low abv beer! I think the leaky chiller really watered this down, but it didn't taste awful. Smells pretty good but a little phenolic, probably due to the higher ferm temperature.

I can't wait to brew again and do it right this time! Got a temp control on the way and fixed the chiller...

 

[Babybatch]

Good on ya mate! Glad to here that you're enjoying the process. It sounds like you made sure to have some extra equipment on hand outside of the basic NB brew kit. I've been doing the same and I'm awfully close to doing my virgin brew NB kit as well. The one item that I'm holding out for is the wort chiller. I'm planning on making my own. Is that what you did? So was it the clamps that failed on yours?

 

[nhindian]

Yeah I made my own chiller and didn't tighten the clamps hard enough.

I tested it the day before and it was perfectly fine, but of course when i went to do it for real, it went berserk. I took a screwdriver to it pretty hard though afterwards so i will test it again this weekend before brewing!