Primary fermenter got too warm for 7 hours?

[spaceyaquarius]

9 days after brewing a Belgian Wheat Ale (Whitelabs WLP400 liquid yeast), my primary fermenter temp accidentally went out of the suggested range of 70-75 F. It got up to 83.5 F for about 7 hours, but now is back down to 78 F. Sometimes it gets as low as 67 F when it's really cold. I had a brew belt on for the snowstorm, and then the weather got warm out of nowhere today and I forgot to unplug the belt.

Is this going to cause off-flavors in the beer? I know I need a stable fermenter chamber, but it's not gonna happen for a few more months.

 

[pdxal]

At 9 days post pitching most of the flavors are set, and the beer won't be as sensitive to highs. Low temperatures might be worse, possibly causing the yeast to stall and flocculate early. Temp control during the first 4-5 days is generally considered the most crucial.
You should be fine.

 

[spaceyaquarius]

At 9 days post pitching most of the flavors are set, and the beer won't be as sensitive to highs. Low temperatures might be worse, possibly causing the yeast to stall and flocculate early. Temp control during the first 4-5 days is generally considered the most crucial.
You should be fine.

THANKS! Nice to hear. So if low temps stalled the yeast would that cause off-flavors or just a lower alcohol content?

 

[beaston]

Probably wont cause either. May just take a bit longer to finish fermentation.

 

[spaceyaquarius]

Probably wont cause either. May just take a bit longer to finish fermentation.

Even better. I've read that before, that it could just take a few days or more to finish to your final specific gravity.

So basically, heat is the enemy and that is why fermenters are based around fridges with the (Johnson Controls or other type of) thermostat adjustment (not heaters).

Too bad brewers belts don't have thermostats on them.

Now that I think about it, I could use my old broken mini-fridge as a chamber to keep one 6 gallon bucket from getting too cold during the snow/ice storms.

 

[Zepth]

Too bad brewers belts don't have thermostats on them.

Back in the day of my father brewing he used a $2 timer from the hardware store hooked up to a brew belt. IIRC it was about 2 hours on 3 hours off. Of course this will change with room temp, batch size, type of beer, yeast strain, so some experimentation will be required.