Post your infection

[northern-monkey]

this doesn't look that bad, but bear in mind... it's the second batch in a row this has happened. tasted absolutely great in gravity samples for a couple of weeks, but then suddenly tastes sour/vinegary and generally smells unbearable. 2 days ago threw in some pellet hops and there were no visible bubbles/foam on the top. krausen had fallen back in and surface was basically clear. now this...

the previous batch certainly had what looked like mould on the top of the dry hop bag that was floating in it when i racked. i kegged it on the off chance i was wrong but it never really recovered. tempted to dump this one and buy a new fermenter (plastic, just over a year old, suspecting that might be the culprit). one more thought... had an eruption a couple of batches ago from a high gravity fruit beer. the fridge i ferment in has had a good clean, but could there maybe still be something lurking in the ambient air?

 

[podz]

Although I've never had a contaminated batch of anything, I'm not a big fan of dry hopping for exactly this reason; it's a potential avenue for introduction of contaminants. Your beer was fine until you tossed those hop pellets in...

 

[unionrdr]

Did you use a muslin hop sack? Did you soak it in Starsan for a while? Sometimes I think even a well-sanitized hop sack gives the nasties already present something to anchor to.

 

[aslander]

That's the best picture I can get.

Hard to tell based on these pics Chris. Gotta shine a light in there or something, its too dark.

 

[northern-monkey]

Did you use a muslin hop sack? Did you soak it in Starsan for a while? Sometimes I think even a well-sanitized hop sack gives the nasties already present something to anchor to.

usually use a disposable empty tea bag and just throw it in, never had a problem. this time i actually just chucked the pellets straight in, no bag. so am inclined to think the hops might not be the problem. but who knows. am adding after a couple of weeks of primary, so a little later than normal. new fermenter and a nice quick malty bitter might be in order. leaning towards chucking this one. tastes pretty nasty....

 

[unionrdr]

Maybe time to pitch the FV too. Get a new one & try not to scratch it if it's plastic. I'm always careful not to scratch mine inside.

 

[Erythro73]

Haven't brewed in three years and I guess I lost my RDWHAHB-ness. My beer is in primary since two weeks ago. Today, I took a sample to measure my FG.

Is this an infection, or merely yeast rafts?

http://imgur.com/XE99k4O,dOspts3#0
http://imgur.com/XE99k4O,dOspts3#1

 

[unionrdr]

Looks like normal krausen to me, but if it tastes vinegary, then it's infected.

 

[Erythro73]

Looks like normal krausen to me, but if it tastes vinegary, then it's infected.

The hydrometer sampling I took tasted very sweet (at 1.031, I guess it is normal).

 

[SaguaroMan]

Although I've never had a contaminated batch of anything, I'm not a big fan of dry hopping for exactly this reason; it's a potential avenue for introduction of contaminants. Your beer was fine until you tossed those hop pellets in...

Hops by their very nature are anti-microbial. Whatever contaminates your brew usually gets introduced beforehand, i.e., not cleaning/sanitizing everything that touches your wort post boil sufficiently

 

[LaCroix99]

Here is a pumpkin ale that got some hazy white swirls in it in secondary. When I moved the fermenter to bottle it coagulated into these chunks.

What is it?

 

[IJesusChrist]

coagulation? Hmmm, unlikely to be bacteria, I would think.

How did you make the "pumpkin" in your ale? Real pumpkin?

 

[Chrisbrewbeers]

Hard to tell based on these pics Chris. Gotta shine a light in there or something, its too dark.

I dumped it... The day after I posted that. The film on top broke up after hydrometer sample and was back next morning. I wish I had thought of flash light. Ipad flash wasn't doing it. I'm just worried that most of my questionable beers have been done in that plastic carboy. I might bleach bomb it.

 

[gregf87]

Hey all. Here is a picture of what I have going on in a coffee vanilla stout. It's in its secondary (been there for almost 2 weeks). Any thoughts? Thanks for the help! Cheers

* Opened it up, still smells like beer (no sour smells). Hoping its okay ...

 

[adamranders]

Hard to tell, but from the coloration in the pic looks like mold. Did you put coffee (grounds or beans) directly in the carbon? If so you should put them in a sack with something to weight it down so it doesn't sit at the surface, in the future.

 

[gregf87]

I added a french pressed coffee to the secondary. Next time I'll have to try beans at the bottom. Still safe to bottle?

 

[unionrdr]

Seeing specs streaking down the sides, I'd say it's yeast. breaking up & settling.

 

[Adon]

Initial brew of this cider was in January, but it's been in the secondary for months. Just pulled it out to bottle and realized I failed to continue filling the airlock. I have some black haze in the airlock, mold maybe? More concerning are the black specs on the top of the cider. There are a bunch of dark specs on top of the sediment at the bottom, but those don't worry me as much. Thoughts? Worth a taste?

I have a gallon of wine in the exact same situation, but that one looks totally fine.

Seems bland compared to some of the pictures on here!

 

[pat1268]

Smells horrible! Session IPA that I dry hopped with cascade was just tryin somthing different


Sent from my iPad using Home Brew

 

[BGBC]

View attachment 222657

Smells horrible! Session IPA that I dry hopped with cascade was just tryin somthing different


Sent from my iPad using Home Brew

What does it smell like? Taste it?

Doesn't look that bad. Just looks like krausen remnants really.

 

[unionrdr]

Yeah, looks normal to me. Fermentation can be funky.

 

[pat1268]

Smelled really bad and tasted worse! Tried a different chilling method I read about in a magazine called no chill don't think it worked for me


Sent from my iPad using Home Brew

 

[unionrdr]

What exactly did it smell & taste like? I never trusted no chill for this reason myself. But did you keep it sealed up?

 

[unclebrazzie]

What exactly did it smell & taste like?

Yeah, I think it's important to identify the smell, if you ever want to stand a chance of remedying. An infection will smell different from, say, a load of bad hops. Yeast autolysis will smell differently from, say, clostridium.

 

[darkgrey]

I hate to be that guy but...

I got into this hobby a few months back and really enjoyed a messed up 'light' pale ale from a while back...went ahead and made a 4gal batch of an espresso golden light with coffee barley and actual ground up espresso, which you can see on the side of the bucket. It's been three months since then and I've not had a chance to get back to my bucket...and now I'm very scared to try it, although it smells somewhat like beer and coffee, I did use some belgian yeast and it def gives off some of that fruity smell, but I just am not certain if this is a large amount of infection or not...

EDIT -- I'm hoping I'm just overreacting and this is just weird krausen remnants, but most people don't primary ferment for three months either.....lol.

EDIT2 -- I tried to cold crash a sample glass in the freezer as with my previous brews anything floating went immediately to the bottom...this wasn't the case on this brew, so i filtered it out into another glass. Nice color, decent aroma. Very very very mild taste, very drinkable. Still not sure about it, however..

 

[IJesusChrist]

Drink it up! Just don't include that gross white stuff in your bottles

 

[inkman15]

Looks like a monster infection to me. The white is probably lacto. Is the black stuff the espresso or could it be mold?

 

[myndflyte]

Yeah I doubt the coffee will cold crash. But if it tastes good, I say go for it.

 

[MichaelW]

Working on my second ever batch, I ran into this after moving it to my secondary. They are bubbles that are collecting together and go around the carboy in a ring.

After my first batch I noticed the yeast settled in a circle at the bottom, so I'm wondering if it's just yeast that have settled and still fermenting, or something worse could be living in my beer...

 

[joebob296]

Hello fellow brewers,

I am fairly new to home brewing. So new that I had 1 more Mr. Beer refill kit left and decided to test out my new equipment with it. On the wort where there are no bubbles there are small brown clumps of something. I dont think that my beer is infected but I am just curious. What are your thoughts?