First Infection... maybe

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stevenryals

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dont have a pic.. but thin white film formed during a 2 wk primary... had some big bubbles, about 1" in diameter on top of the beer (solid white) and not much of the normal kraussen gunk on the walls of the primary...

racked off to secondary.. within a day.. a white film about 1/16th of an inch had formed on the top of the beer (which was in the neck of the carboy)..


thoughts?
 
Pretty close to impossible to say without pictures, but I am going to hazard a guess that you don't have a pellicle forming after only 2 weeks.

It sounds more like bubbles just coming out of solution from all the racking and such.
 
Sounds like an infection to me. Did it look anything like this?

infected1.jpg


That's my flanders red last year, purposely infected with roeselare blend. Sounds like what you're talking about...
 
like that, the film was the same, but the bubbles were different.. i've got it in a keg now.. the attenuation was low.. dropped from about 1.052 down to 1.018-1.020.. ??
 
And throw out all of your racking tubes. Don't serve that out of your kegerator if you don't want to disassemble everything that touched the beer or subsequent brews to get infected.
 
seriously.. throw it out? buy new stuff? what about the bucket? ? ?

no way to fix it eh?
 
Carboy's I am switching over to all Carboys now... I've had 2 brews go because of infections... both happened in the secondary in BUCKETS. My Cleaining process is great though...

1. Oxy clean soak and scrub
2. Star san soak
3. Rinse
4. Add Iodophor in 1 g solution and coat all pieces of bucket...

Still got infections...

Good bye plastic!
 
taste it first to make sure, may not be horrible.
aren't Lactobacillus and/or pediococcus bugs purposely used sometimes??
I'm not very well versed in the bug beer world.
 
Sorry to hijack the thread, but I didn't see the need of starting a new one about the same issue. I am totally paranoid so opened up my Bavarian Hefe which has been fermenting for a week. Is this a start of an infection too? Or is the stuff floating on top usual?

infection.jpg
 
Sorry to hijack the thread, but I didn't see the need of starting a new one about the same issue. I am totally paranoid so opened up my Bavarian Hefe which has been fermenting for a week. Is this a start of an infection too? Or is the stuff floating on top usual?

infection.jpg

that looks pretty normal
 
Thanks for the feedback. I have made a whole bunch of minor errors on this beer. I will be amazed if it turns out barely drinkable. Anyhow it has been a great learning tool.
 
richie.. that beer is completely screwed.. don't throw it away, i'm working on an antidote.. so you can just send it my way (you pay shipping) and I'll work on it from there..
thanks.. i'll let you know how it tastes ;)
 
f**king @($*%&@(#$*&@)&!#%() now my brown ale has the white film on it in the secondary!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! @$*%**(@*(@#*(*(@*(#(@#&&!@&$&!

I COULD NOT BE ANY MORE PISSED OFF RIGHT NOW!!
 
here's pics.. anyone know what it is?

3597135039_d03fded3e0.jpg

and a little closer:


3597942924_363ec1c22d.jpg


I think it may be mold.. but not sure..
 
Looks like mold to me.

Any strange smell or taste to it? It doesn't really look like brett or pedio but I'm no expert.

If it smells and tastes ok, rack from under it and leave the moldy stuff behind. If it tastes sour, then it might be a lacto or pedio infection.
 
yea, I scooped a bit up with a strainer just to give myself a nice clean path in there for my auto siphon without getting it on the tip.. got it in the keg.. we'll see how it tastes.. it finised well though.. so that's good.. 1.049 down to 1.010.. and it smelled decent..

what would cause mold to get in there?
 
no, simplyk couldnt do it lol.. the thought of the mold kinda made my stomache turn a little..

but the brown ale that had this **** on it turned out fairly decent.. had some last night.. not fully carbed, but kinda tastey..
 
My amber looked like that, too. I racked from underneath the mold and bottled it. It has been in bottles near two months now and while it's not great, it is certainly drinkable enough that my wife is going through it like crazy. I can detect a slight off taste but my wife and friends who have tried it say it's fine.

Good luck.
 
no, simplyk couldnt do it lol.. the thought of the mold kinda made my stomache turn a little..

but the brown ale that had this **** on it turned out fairly decent.. had some last night.. not fully carbed, but kinda tastey..

This is the second beer that this happened to? If it is, then you've definitely got a problem, more than likely in your plastic equipment. You can throw away all plastic, and bleach bomb anything that isn't plastic.
 
Another pic of infection? Or is this yeast? It seems to look like dry, white clumps... so it could be the yeast.

Using Wyeast Forbidden Fruit if that makes any difference.
infection%20001.JPG


That's about 4 days into the primary. Noticed the clumps yesterday.
 
actually the 3rd, using 3 different primaries.. the only thing I can link between all of them after the boil would be the chiller (which was boiled in there for about 5 minutes or so, strainer and the little wood peg that I put the olive oil on.. ??
 
the little wood peg

This could be the source of the contamination. Something could be lurking deep in the wood fibers. A thin wire is impermeable and can be dipped or flamed to sterilize.

I assume you are using the olive oil to provide sterols to the yeast?
 
This could be the source of the contamination. Something could be lurking deep in the wood fibers. A thin wire is impermeable and can be dipped or flamed to sterilize.

I assume you are using the olive oil to provide sterols to the yeast?
and it shall be placed in the rubbish bin promptly the little barsteward!!

what type of material should I use as the delivery mechanism for the olive oil? and yes, it's for my little friends, the Yeast Family...
 
buy a stainless steel racking cane. you can use that to do your olive oil thing too.
 
What about the siphon tubing? I assume that is plastic. Make sure you get all new plastic items.

Is your strainer stainless steel? Mine is, and sanitizes well. Also, maybe skip the olive oil for the yeast next time, and see if just shaking the carboy will work. I think there are some unusual variables here, so it's probably best to get rid of all of them.
 
I'm tempted to go stainless steel everything.. buy conicals and all.. but i'm not that rich..
 
If I were you I'd wait until you get rid of your mold source before introducing new, more expensive things like conicals into your process anyway.
 
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