How long for Butyric Acid to show itself?

[Matteo57]

Hi there,

How long does Butyric acid usually take to get to the threshold for most people to be able to smell and taste it?
I have a Solera barrel going of sour beer in a 60g oak barrel. I brewed some beer and used us.05 to ferment it and then was going to transfer into the barrel after fermentation was complete.
When cleaning up after brew day, I noticed that there was a bunch of crap left in the counter flow chiller that somehow I had missed when cleaning it last time. I did run boiling wort through the chiller for 10-15 minutes before transferring and even oxyclean and 160F water for 20ish minutes before I started brewing that day.
Anyways, I want to make sure that I don't transfer something that might start showing butyric acid in it at some point, so wondering when I might want to wait until to see if the beer is showing signs of it or not before transferring it.
Thanks in advance for any insight and assistance in this!

Matt

 

[Funky Frank]

I don’t think you need to worry. If I understand what you’re saying, you may have added a little byproduct from spoilage critters but not the critters themselves so what’s there is all that is going to be there (minus maybe a little from Lacto?). Does it smell like vomit now? The threshold for taste is somewhere around 2000 ppb. Some strains of Brett are shown to convert it into ethyl butyrate which has a pineapple taste. So Just diversity your Brett strains and I think you’ll be fine.

 

[RPh_Guy]

Just want to reinforce a couple things.

When cleaning up after brew day, I noticed that there was a bunch of crap left in the counter flow chiller that somehow I had missed when cleaning it last time. I did run boiling wort through the chiller for 10-15 minutes before transferring and even oxyclean and 160F water for 20ish minutes before I started brewing that day.

How do you know it was left over from last time??

I fully agree with Frank that boiling circulation will take care of any contaminating microbes regardless of whether it was entirely clean beforehand.

FYI
Butyric acid will only be produced during the very early stages of a spontaneous or contaminated fermentation because the microbes that produce it are sensitive to alcohol.
As Frank mentioned, Brett can metabolize it into something delicious anyway.

http://www.milkthefunk.com/wiki/Butyric_Acid

In summary: no worries.
Cheers!

 

[Matteo57]

Just want to reinforce a couple things.


How do you know it was left over from last time??

I fully agree with Frank that boiling circulation will take care of any contaminating microbes regardless of whether it was entirely clean beforehand.

FYI
Butyric acid will only be produced during the very early stages of a spontaneous or contaminated fermentation because the microbes that produce it are sensitive to alcohol.
As Frank mentioned, Brett can metabolize it into something delicious anyway.

http://www.milkthefunk.com/wiki/Butyric_Acid

In summary: no worries.
Cheers!

But if it's heavily butyric then brett won't convert all, it will convert at low levels. I haven't smelled it yet or tasted, I brewed it 3 weeks ago, so I was trying to figure out when I should try it to see. I haven't seen anything that states how quickly you will be able to pick it up or how fast it will develop to an extent that you will be able to smell/taste it.

I am pretty positive it was from the previous brew day, it looked like it had been in there for awhile. I guess i'm not positive, but the way it looked, i'm pretty sure it had been in there for awhile. Haven't brewed for a couple months, so.... a couple months of growth. ha

How long would you have to run boiling water through a chiller to completely kill all nasties?

Thanks a bunch!

 

[RPh_Guy]

In boiling water microbes die within seconds.

I haven't seen anything that states how quickly you will be able to pick it up or how fast it will develop to an extent that you will be able to smell/taste it.

As I mentioned, BA would only present very early in fermentation.

I think you're worried for no reason. Just taste it. I'm sure it will be fine.

 

[goodolarchie]

Just curious about your solera process - what's the pH of the remaining beer in the barrel, and how much sweet wort were you adding? You'd be surprised at how well guarded from bad bugs your barrels will be once they are south of 3.5pH... at that point it's more of an oxygen and brett-driven off-flavors like ethyl acetate. These metabolic dead-ends that will haunt you more than the infections you might run into at 4.0 or 4.5 pH.