Did a little experiment Friday, I tried brewing in the basement using a little 10,000 btu Coleman propane burner that runs on those little green propane tanks.
The temps have been hovering around zero for the last two weeks but friday it warmed up into the 40's F so I figured it would be a good day to try brewing in the basement and if it didn't workout I could relocate to the garage.
I steeped the grains for 30 minutes, then topped off the brew kettle for a 4 gallon boil, I just got it up to a rolling boil when the carbon monoxide detector went off, it read 200 ppm normal for our house is 0. We live in a big old two story house thats as drafty as an old English Castle, The basement is a full open basement with an outside stair well and door, I set up the brew pot by the door so I could try opening it if I needed to, even with it open the co levels didn't drop so I ended up moving the whole mess to the garage to finish up.
Hope this helps any of you that have thought about brewing in the basement, I won't be doing it again! It only took a little over an hour to raise the co to dangerous levels with a 10,000 btu propane burner, we didn't really need the detector to tell us there was a problem we could all feel the effects. I can see how people die in their sleep from carbon monoxide, we all just felt a little loopy and had a bit of a headache, you would never know it when sleeping or if you were drinking while brewing.
The temps have been hovering around zero for the last two weeks but friday it warmed up into the 40's F so I figured it would be a good day to try brewing in the basement and if it didn't workout I could relocate to the garage.
I steeped the grains for 30 minutes, then topped off the brew kettle for a 4 gallon boil, I just got it up to a rolling boil when the carbon monoxide detector went off, it read 200 ppm normal for our house is 0. We live in a big old two story house thats as drafty as an old English Castle, The basement is a full open basement with an outside stair well and door, I set up the brew pot by the door so I could try opening it if I needed to, even with it open the co levels didn't drop so I ended up moving the whole mess to the garage to finish up.
Hope this helps any of you that have thought about brewing in the basement, I won't be doing it again! It only took a little over an hour to raise the co to dangerous levels with a 10,000 btu propane burner, we didn't really need the detector to tell us there was a problem we could all feel the effects. I can see how people die in their sleep from carbon monoxide, we all just felt a little loopy and had a bit of a headache, you would never know it when sleeping or if you were drinking while brewing.