Recommendations for brewing at higher temperatures

[BeginnerBebeBrewer]

I currently live in an apartment and therefore I am currently limited with respect to temperature control. I have stuck to Saison brewing recently to take advantage of this.

However, I wondered if there were any other yeast types that enjoyed the 72 to 74 temperature range and as such give me the chance to extend my brewing.

As always thanks everyone for your help.

A curious beginner brewer.

 

[mongoose33]

I can't answer the yeast question, but have you considered a swamp cooler as a way to bring down the temps during fermentation? What you do is drape an old t-shirt over the fermenter and allow it to drape into a pan of water, which moistens the shirt and as the water evaporates, it cools what's inside it.

If you can control temps for maybe 4 days at the outset, you'll get most of the benefit of fermenting at cooler temps. I ramp my beer temp up to about 71 after 5 or 6 days (depending on when the krausen falls) to let the yeast clean up.

If you can easily get or make ice, you can easily control those temps over a few days time.

Below is a pic showing my version of a swamp cooler; it knocks temps back quite a bit. I usually start it by putting ice cubes under the shirt so as they melt they keep the shirt wet. Others will use frozen water bottles placed in the water pan to keep temps down as well. I'm using an Inkbird temp probe to monitor the temperature of the beer; it reads about 64 degrees.

Part of the trouble is that yeast is exothermic as it works, i.e., it heats up the wort by 5-10 degrees. My arrangement below--ambient in my basement is about 65--knocks that back by the same 5-10 degrees. I could cool it more if needed with ice and ice bottles.

View attachment 388556

 

[motosapiens]

+1 on the swamp cooler idea. Shallow pan, t-shirt, water, reduces temps by 5-10 degrees, and most ale yeasts will be quite happy if you can keep them under 70 degrees.at the start. After the first 3-4 days as fermentation slows you can stop filling up the water and let the temps rise to ambient and at 72-74 you'll be golden, as the yeast will clean up after themselves.

 

[sapan]

I live in India and have very high room temps all the time.

The wet T-Shirt idea works fine.
Or consider putting the fermenter in a insulated picnic cooler with water and some ice. Keep swapping the ice periodically. I prefer to freeze bottles of water and put those water bottles in the cooler, next to the fermenter.
This has the advantage for using less ice, and swapping less frequently, due to insulation provided by the picnic cooler.

If you are the DIY types, consider the son of a chiller -
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/pimp-my-system/son-of-a-fermentation-chiller/
http://www.indianbrewer.com/2015/05/son-of-fermentation-chiller-or-better.html
https://threegodsbrewing.com/2013/04/14/son-of-fermentation-chamber-build-and-photos/

 

[Krown]

An other alternative is the cooler bag offered by cool-brewing.

You simply put your carboy in the bag with 2 x 2L ice blocks and you will have a stable temperature in the low -mid 60's. The cool thing about this bag (no pun intended) is that you can fold it when you are done as it is soft.

 

[hottpeper13]

Before I had control I would use the yeast for the time of the year. with that in mind I made a cream ale with Mangrove M10 and Wyeast 2112. The M10 fermented at 72* for ~4 days then all krausen fell,I raised it to 75* for the rest of my 3 week schedule. The M10 beer was (i'm no judge) better then the 2112, and ended up like a sparkling ale, was very effervescent. I plan on going thru a few worts this summer with yeast. But like the above ,swamp coolers are great when space is limited(low humidity helps).

 

[GPP33]

Get a big storage tub from Walmart. Fill with 64 degree water until it's as deep as the beer in your Carboy/bucket (make sure the beer is at 64 before putting it in). Add frozen water bottles or a shirt over the carboy with a fan blowing on it if it needs to cool down a little. The large thermal mass will keep things stable so you don't see temp swings and the evaporation/ice will keep it cool. During the winter you can still make saisons with the addition of an aquarium heater.

Add a small pump attached to ice water in a cooler and an ITC-1000 and you can automate it.

 

[dcbw]

A number of Belgian strains do well at higher temps so you might look into those and start getting used to Belgian style beer

For example, Wyeast 3724 Belgian Saison can go up to 95 (though maybe keep it in the low 80s or high 70s if you can), and 3711 French Saison can do up to 77.

3725 and 3726 also tolerate upper 70s well.

 

[BeginnerBebeBrewer]

Hi everyone,

Thank you so much for your advice. My fermentation bucket actually fits nicely into my brew kettle so I've turned into a swamp cooler. I've got my IPA down to 62 - 66 degrees which I have never been able to do. Its going to be really interesting if I get any difference in flavor profiles/smells.