Keep the fermenter out of the light?

[Infinitrium]

Is it necessary to keep my fermenter vessel out of light entirely? I've had a black garbage bag over it to keep as much light out of it as possible but then I got to wondering if that's even needed.

 

[TyTanium]

Depends what type of light.

Sunlight? Yes, keep it away or keep it well covered
Fluorescent? Keep it covered, not as powerful as the sun obviously, but can still skunk given enough time
Incandescent? Don't worry about it. I still cover mine though for stray sunlight.

 

[Infinitrium]

I've got my fermenter vessel on my kitchen counter, a few feet away from a window that gets a lot of light during the day. Is the black garbage bad enough to keep the light out?

 

[jbaysurfer]

I keep em covered. Incandescent light emits UV too, and UV reaction from hops is what causes skunking. Maybe I overkill it, but I've had a beer skunked in my chest freezer/ferm chamber when I neglected to recover the carboy (with dryhops in it) and the incandescent light that I was using as a heater came on.

FWIW, I've had other people on here tell me that they didn't think my beer could've been skunked by that light, but I keep em covered anyway.

 

[atom]

what kind of vessel?

it seems like there are much better places to keep it than a kitchen counter...

 

[Infinitrium]

It's the fermenter vessel that came with the Coopers DIY kit.

 

[Jayhem]

basement closets make great fermentation rooms if they temp is right.

 

[homebrewdad]

Keep it covered for sure.

 

[DroolingNeoBrewery]

I keep both my fermentors in a cabinet that has black plastic over the openings, that I then close the cabinet doors over, and clamp shut. This A: keeps out light and B: keeps the temp from bouncing around when the furnace kicks in and heats the room up.

 

[boscobeans]

It's the fermenter vessel that came with the Coopers DIY kit.

My Cooper's kit came in a display box packed in a plain outer cardboard shipping box.
I use the outer plain box to cover the entire fermenter. The setup is in a cool room that has large windows and the outer box keeps the whole thing in the dark for the entire fermentation.

bosco

 

[HibsMax]

I guess this is a case of just doing it anyway - especially if there is no harm in covering the fermentation vessel. I would think the only risk is that you insulate it so much that you end up with too high a temperature, but I think that risk is pretty small.

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

Keep it out of direct sunlight and keep it from long, close exposures to flourescent light. Otherwise, meh.