this beer is runnin a fever!

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Gunpowder

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I'm brewing a very high gravity, high alcohol brew right now... 1.089 est 10% abv. I pitched two packs of US05 and 8 hours later saw high activity and a nice cake of foam. 24 hours later and this thing is VERY active. Looks like a slushy machine inside... very good activity! Clearly the yeasties like this beer :) but the temp is pushing 78 even though another carboy next to it is showing 70. Is this normal? Anything to be worried about?
 
Worry. Get the temperature down below 67°. Use a swamp cooler if no other way. Tub of water, wrap the carboy in a cotton sweatshirt or t-shirt and put a fan on it. High temp fermentation = fusel alcohols.
 
Fermentation creates heat, I've seen anywhere between 6F and 10F above ambient. As the previous poster stated you need to get those temps under control when using US-05.
 
I just put it in a plastic basket and filled it with cold tap water.
 
A spike of anywhere from 5 to 10 degrees above ambient temperature is normal during active fermentation. I had a beer spike 15 degrees above ambient (this was when I first started before I knew about temperature control, and it ended up undrinkable). Unless you're fermenting somewhere really cold, you're going to need some sort of control (a swamp cooler will work for anything but lagers).
 
Worry. Get the temperature down below 67°. Use a swamp cooler if no other way. Tub of water, wrap the carboy in a cotton sweatshirt or t-shirt and put a fan on it. High temp fermentation = fusel alcohols.

Never worry. RDWHAHB, right? Seriously, I agree temperature control is important, particularly with certain yeasts. However, I've had times where things spiked into the mid 70's and I got a fantastic ale. I'm sure I'll get flamed for that, but I really don't care :)
 
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