How long is too long?

[DocSweat]

First of all, this is my second "noob" question on this forum and I just wanted to say thank you to everybody. I have never seen a group of people on the internet who are as willing to help without scrutiny.

Anyways, I am on my first brew, and it has been fermenting very actively (krausen overflowing) for about 2.5 days now. I have seen all of the threads about how long it can take fermentation to start and how it seems to end to early, but I havent seen anything saying how long is too long. Is there anythinv to worry about?

 

[dawgmatic]

Not at all. Just give it a week or two to hangout with the yeasties. They'll passout when the party's over.

 

[tektonjp]

You can either lose beer to repeatedly sampling with your hydrometer along the way or just let it be for 3 weeks and count it done. By the end of three weeks, the yeast will have cleaned up after themselves, dived to the bottom of the tank, and left you with clear beer. 3 weeks.

 

[RM-MN]

I have yet to see any of my beers overflow the fermenter but I keep the fermenter where it is pretty cool so the yeast doesn't get into a runaway situation. Keeping them near the bottom of their preferred range slows the ferment so the yeast don't generate as much heat which means that they don't throw off as much off flavors and no fusel alcohols. I don't need as long in the fermenter then to take care of these flavors. With that said, the beer I made that tasted the smoothest on first sampling was in the fermenter for 9 weeks. That was more than necessary for sure but it didn't hurt any.