Ooops, fooled by lager.

[venquessa]

So... 12 days fermenting at 12C and the bubbles started to slow a lot. Great I thought, my secondaries arrive in 2 days I'll take it out of the fridge for a bit of a room temp rest before racking to secondary and lagering.

Sounds reasonable?

I thought it did. Fermentation was rapidly slowing so it must be about 80% complete.

Did I take a sample... nope. It's a 2 gl batch, I don't like to take too many samples. I was just trusting the bubbles.

Doh! I left it out at room temp last night, this morning, it looks like someone is stirring it with a stick and it has filled it's airlocks with foam and overfoamed down the sides of the demijohns.

Not only is it a mess, but I expect it will have caused non-lager like off flavours due to the intensity of the ferment.

I think the lesson is, always take a sample before assuming it's nearly done!

 

[DannyD]

what was the gravity then?, could it not just be Co2 that was absorbed at lower temp escaping now?

 

[venquessa]

OG was 1.050. CO2... hmm... It looks like an active ferment, there are chunks of trub spinning around in it like it's being boiled.

 

[DannyD]

jip thats a lager for you. I had increase in activity when I toke myne out for D rest.....What yeast have you used?

 

[venquessa]

I used 12g of rehydrated Mauribrew Lager Yeast (Aussie lager yeast), they were out of stock of Saflager and WYeast packs are £7.50 over here, so just too costly.

EDIT: It has taught me something... the home brew shop I bought the demi's from sold them with corks not caps and grommets. They claim it creates a better seal. I call bull droppings. There are several places around the cork where bubbles are coming out of the cork! So clearly they don't seal very well at all if the corks aren't CO2 proof!

 

[DannyD]

What I know about cork is dangarous, but should one not let them swell in water, or turn the bottle up-side-down for them to swell?

 

[RM-MN]

Here in the US all I've seen are white rubber stoppers. They seal very well.