Frustrated Mightily

[turkeygecko]

How do you chill? That is often overlooked as a source of infection. If you use an immersion chiller, boil it, and make sure none of the water running through drips into your kettle.

If you use a counterflow or plate, run boiling water through it.

 

[ncbrewer]

Bacteria and wild yeast on grain can be a problem. I think I've read that during milling, and even handling after, dust gets in the air and can contaminate anything around. This can happen even if you've cleaned and sanitized the equipment.

 

[crazz82]

Just out curiosity, how do know it's an infection in the fermenter? Are there signs of infection before bottling?

 

[brewcat]

Yeah I know, but there's literally nothing left for me to clean. Everything that can come apart comes apart and gets soaked. I thought maybe I wasn't cleaning thoroughly enough so I got more serious with long oxyclean soaks. My bottling bucket is immaculate.

One thing I'm going to test next is my chilling process. It does take forever and I pick up the lid a lot to stir. Gonna try to tweak it and maybe by an improved chiller.

Interesting note, the first infected batches of each round of this were brewed on the same date a year apart. Makes me wonder if it's something environmental and seasonal Im getting outside. I do live near a swamp...

Who knows? The good news is it no longer depresses me, its almost funny now.

You'll cool faster with the lid off.

 

[razyrsharpe]

thanks for all the help on this guys. there are a lot of great suggestions and i will try many of them.

to answer a couple of your questions, i do not use an immersion chiller, i use a swamp cooler with large pieces of ice surrounding the kettle. as far as buying a new bucket, that would solve the problem for a batch or two, but ultimately i would have to deal with it all over again. i want to solve it with the setup i have now. the only upgrade i can see to my fermenters are to upgrade to stainless steel, which i don't have the ability to afford. i have had no problem with 8 prior batches of all grain recipes until this occurred. so it is something i can fix. i will fix it.

i have replaced all tubing. i have bleach bombed everything. i like the advice to soak everything for days/weeks in sanitizer solution prior to use. i have now done this. the only thing left to do is to break down the valves on the 2 bottling buckets i have so i can thoroughly clean the pieces.

my LHBS owner, JP, gave me a sample of PBW to use and i plan to use that also. i never have before and am willing to give it a try. if i have any more questions i will not hesitate to post them. there is too much knowledge and experience on this board not to. those critters will not get the best of me.

 

[tennesseean_87]

thanks for all the help on this guys. there are a lot of great suggestions and i will try many of them.

to answer a couple of your questions, i do not use an immersion chiller, i use a swamp cooler with large pieces of ice surrounding the kettle. as far as buying a new bucket, that would solve the problem for a batch or two, but ultimately i would have to deal with it all over again. i want to solve it with the setup i have now. the only upgrade i can see to my fermenters are to upgrade to stainless steel, which i don't have the ability to afford. i have had no problem with 8 prior batches of all grain recipes until this occurred. so it is something i can fix. i will fix it.

i have replaced all tubing. i have bleach bombed everything. i like the advice to soak everything for days/weeks in sanitizer solution prior to use. i have now done this. the only thing left to do is to break down the valves on the 2 bottling buckets i have so i can thoroughly clean the pieces.

my LHBS owner, JP, gave me a sample of PBW to use and i plan to use that also. i never have before and am willing to give it a try. if i have any more questions i will not hesitate to post them. there is too much knowledge and experience on this board not to. those critters will not get the best of me.

Good luck. I've been where you are and hope you're rid of the bug. The reason people say to replace buckets is that the bug may be living in a scratch in the bucket itself. Replacing the bucket would be a permanent solution unless you scratch and then infect the new buckets.

I had a loose lid on a fermenter that allowed a fruit fly in. I had a batch of porter vinegar with maggots crawling all over the trub ring. I bleached the snot out of the bucket, but the following two batches in that bucket got a little sour to them.

FWIW, I've used string tied around scraps of rag to clean out the inside of tubing that got a bit gunky and I was scared wouldn't sanitize properly. You can easily suck the string through the tube, then pull the rag through. I've got some really old tubing that works fine.

 

[BamaPhil]

You'll cool faster with the lid off.

True, but then it's exposed to the air longer. Damned if I do, damned if I dont.

 

[rawlus]

Probably have done 100+ batches over the years, never had an infection and I'm not hyper vigilant about cleaning... Although..
I don't use bleach ever, I clean with PBW and sanitize with star San
I don't use plastic buckets ever, I started with glass carboys, went to better bottles and now use a stainless conical
I change tubing every 6 months or so give or take, it's cheap.
I change autosiphon every year or two, depending on how it's showing its age.
I take cleaning and sanitizing pretty seriously, but not obsessively so. I don't store equipment in solutions or anything, I clean it before I store it and I clean and sanitize before I use it and that's worked for many many years...
I suspect bottling can be a suspect in your infection issues, in addition to very used plastic buckets.... Bottles can be hard to keep clean Over time unless you take care to wash well after each emptying.
I think yeast pitch rate can also play a role, meaning under pitching can open the opportunity for other bugs to take control....

Hoe you figure it out. Tubing, buckets, bottles, PBW, carboys are all inexpensive to replace or use... If budget doesn't permit, I'd just hold off brewing until it does....

 

[brewcat]

True, but then it's exposed to the air longer. Damned if I do, damned if I dont.

Doesn't matter. You'll want to oxygenate your wort for the yeast anyway. The yeast will eat up any O2.

 

[BamaPhil]

My issue has disappeared as mysteriously as it showed up. My latest batch shows no sign of it.

I didn't buy any new equipment between the last infected beer and this recent clean one. It seems the slow process of buying new plastic, doubling down on cleaning, and bleaching everything reduced it to nothing.

One thing I've been more dedicated to is giving all my equipment an overnight soak in oxyclean, whether I used it or not. e.g. my beer thief and bottling wand get soaked on brew day even though they're bottling day items.

I'm also going to keep bleaching everything every 3 months or so just to be on the safe side.

 

[ncbrewer]

My issue has disappeared as mysteriously as it showed up. My latest batch shows no sign of it.

Terrific - Glad to hear that.