Mead without an airlock?

[Joshlc]

Hi everyone,

I started my first batch of Meade yesterday, I have left it in a plastic bucket with a sealed lid but no airlock. Do I need to release the CO2 if so how often and does it matter if oxygen gets into the mixture?

Many thanks,

Josh

 

[videojunkie1208]

Can you describe your process / recipe?

Making Mead is a lot of fun, and I want to help make sure your first batch is good (or as good as it can be) ... so you want to make much more!

 

[Seamonkey84]

During the first part of primary, your ok to just cover it with a good towel. You’ll want to have some way of venting the co2 produced. If your bucket doesn’t have a leak at all, it’ll eventually explode.

 

[myndflyte]

Does your lid have a hole in it where an airlock could fit? Because if it's completely solid and you sealed in completely, it'll eventually pop the lid. If anything, seal the lid most of the way but leave a little bit unsealed. That'll be good enough to vent CO2 and keep most bad things out.

 

[CKuhns]

Well...

Technically no it does not need an airlock. in-fact "wild" ferments don't need one at all. CO2 will "blanket" the liquid and with no air movement will continue to do so as long as CO2 is being generated.

However, after fishing one of the grandkids Lego and Nerf gun bullet out of the bucket I decided a lid or bung and airlock was a good idea.

Regardless of if you choose to use an airlock or not IMO there are a couple of things to consider:
1. What's the likelihood of something "accidentally" falling into the fermentation vessel?
2. What's the likelihood an ant, fruit fly or other critter could fly or crawl in there?
3. Are you confident you can monitor the ferment well enough to place an airlock at about the 1/3 or 1/2 sugar break? (Or whenever your ferment slows.)

I still would recommend you cover it with something. - A clean dish towel with a large rubber band to hold it in place, A drilled bung or a lid with a hole all work just fine.

 

[Joshlc]

Can you describe your process / recipe?

Making Mead is a lot of fun, and I want to help make sure your first batch is good (or as good as it can be) ... so you want to make much more!

Hi, thanks for getting back to me. I used 2.4kg of heather honey with litres of water and champagne yeast. I've got very basic equipment so I was planning on leaving it in the bucket (covered but not completely sealed - thanks everyone) for around a month before siphoning it into bottles. Hoping some of it will be ready a month after that. How does that sound?

Thanks for your help!

 

[videojunkie1208]

For starters, I would spend some time perusing the mead forums on this site, there is a ton of info on yeast nutrition and recipes, etc.

My Metric/English conversion is a bit rusty, but a good rule of thumb for a traditional mead made with Champaign yeast would be about 3-3.5 lbs per gallon (1.4 - 1.6 Kg to 3.7 L of water). so you've got enough honey for a 7-8 Litre batch (if you have more water than this don't worry, it will just reduce your ABV and that's ok.)

It sounds like you didn't add any nutrients, and to yeast, honey is a desert. so we're going to have to get some nutrients into your mix otherwise they won't go far. do you have access to a homebrew store? or Amazon? My personal preference is a combination of two nutrients called Go Ferm and Fermaid O, and I use a staggered nutrient addition schedule called TONSA (TONSA 2.0, etc.) But there are several other nutrients available that will all help you get healthy yeast to make your alcohol. (because let's be honest here, that's the goal...) without proper nutrition, you're going to get a lot of off flavors, and may get a stalled fermentation where the yeast run out of vital nutrients.

Ultimately you're going to need an airlock of some type (I prefer the 3 piece ones over the S shaped ones) and a hole in the lid of your bucket to which to attach it. fortunately those are cheap.

The other tool you're going to want to invest in is a hydrometer and the tall beaker(?) that makes it easy to use. this will allow you to measure your specific gravity (SG) to know when your fermentation is done. it's too late to take an Original Gravity (OG) but you can take a Final Gravity (FG) and given your ingredients you can use one of several calculators to get a pretty good idea of what your ABV is.

As far as timing, I find with good nutrition, I can complete primary fermentation on a high gravity mead (SG 1.1.30+) in about 4-6 weeks. When the SG reaches about 1.010 or so I will rack it into a new clean vessel and let it sit for several months to age and mellow before bottling.

Good luck... you've taken your first steps into fun world of learning how to brew one of the oldest fermented beverages.

 

[videojunkie1208]

Some helpful links to Amazon:

Airlock: 3ct. - 3 Piece Airlock with #6.5 Stopper - Set of 3 (Cylinder Airlock):Amazon:Industrial & Scientific

Hydrometer: https://www.amazon.com/Brewers-Elit...jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

Go Ferm: https://www.amazon.com/Go-Ferm-Prot...hild=1&keywords=go+ferm&qid=1590157413&sr=8-1

Fermaid O: Fermaid O (1 pound) (Amazon was sold out!)

 

[Joshlc]

For starters, I would spend some time perusing the mead forums on this site, there is a ton of info on yeast nutrition and recipes, etc.

My Metric/English conversion is a bit rusty, but a good rule of thumb for a traditional mead made with Champaign yeast would be about 3-3.5 lbs per gallon (1.4 - 1.6 Kg to 3.7 L of water). so you've got enough honey for a 7-8 Litre batch (if you have more water than this don't worry, it will just reduce your ABV and that's ok.)

It sounds like you didn't add any nutrients, and to yeast, honey is a desert. so we're going to have to get some nutrients into your mix otherwise they won't go far. do you have access to a homebrew store? or Amazon? My personal preference is a combination of two nutrients called Go Ferm and Fermaid O, and I use a staggered nutrient addition schedule called TONSA (TONSA 2.0, etc.) But there are several other nutrients available that will all help you get healthy yeast to make your alcohol. (because let's be honest here, that's the goal...) without proper nutrition, you're going to get a lot of off flavors, and may get a stalled fermentation where the yeast run out of vital nutrients.

Ultimately you're going to need an airlock of some type (I prefer the 3 piece ones over the S shaped ones) and a hole in the lid of your bucket to which to attach it. fortunately those are cheap.

The other tool you're going to want to invest in is a hydrometer and the tall beaker(?) that makes it easy to use. this will allow you to measure your specific gravity (SG) to know when your fermentation is done. it's too late to take an Original Gravity (OG) but you can take a Final Gravity (FG) and given your ingredients you can use one of several calculators to get a pretty good idea of what your ABV is.

As far as timing, I find with good nutrition, I can complete primary fermentation on a high gravity mead (SG 1.1.30+) in about 4-6 weeks. When the SG reaches about 1.010 or so I will rack it into a new clean vessel and let it sit for several months to age and mellow before bottling.

Good luck... you've taken your first steps into fun world of learning how to brew one of the oldest fermented beverages.

Hi, thanks, I really appreciate your support. I missed off how many litres in the original post. I have 2.4kg of honey with 12 litres of water, I guess that's too much by your calculations!

How necessary are nutrients? They weren't listed in any of the recipes I looked at. Can I add them at a later date?

I will certainly invest in a hydrometer and to be honest some better kit, I got an incredibly basic starter kit and I'd imagine I'll pay the price for it.

Cheers,

Josh

 

[Seamonkey84]

Nutrients aren’t absolutely necessary, but it will take longer to ferment, need longer to age, and there’s a higher chance of it stalling if it was a high gravity batch. Also, don’t add nutrients once it’s past 9-10%abv (Another reason you need to have a hydrometer to take the starting gravity) as the yeast can’t use it anymore.

 

[Joshlc]

Nutrients aren’t absolutely necessary, but it will take longer to ferment, need longer to age, and there’s a higher chance of it stalling if it was a high gravity batch. Also, don’t add nutrients once it’s past 9-10%abv (Another reason you need to have a hydrometer to take the starting gravity) as the yeast can’t use it anymore.

Ok cheers. If I were to buy nutrients now would it be too late to add to the mead? Or is it fine as long as the abv is below 9 - 10%?

Also, if I transferred the mead to a different container, with airlock, in say a week would that be ok?

 

[videojunkie1208]

This is one of my favorite recipe builder sites:

https://mcarterbrown.com/mead/mead2.html
Looks like your initial gravity should have been around 1.060. Even when you get to 0.995 (and with champagne yeast - you will) , you'll only be around 8% ABV. So this will be a relatively light mead. Again, not a problem, just a reality.

At this point, I think I would add some nutrients to it as soon as you can.

Transferring it to a different vessel raises additional complications, as you will want to siphon from the top of your bucket to the bottom of the new container as your fermentation will be nearly complete. You're going to want to take a sample and measure your gravity. If it's below 1.000 your mead is done fermenting.