Violent Scotch Ale Fermentation

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Rubberband

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My first Partial Mash was a Scotch Ale kit from AHS. I tried to mash my grains in my 5 gal MLT and it was not as difficult as I thought to get the wort out without alot of grist. When I scrape enough money together for a bigger boil pot, I may give all grain a go.

I used an air stone for 20 minutes after cooling my wort and then pitched in two packs of Safbrew S33 that I had rehydrated. To my amazement, I had good activity in the airlock after 4 hours. The next day, I checked my work to see what progress had been made overnight. Well, the bucket lid was bulging and the airlock was plugged. Being a rookie, I casually grabbed for the airlock to take it up to sanitize it. As soon as I touched this thing it shot 8 ft and hit the ceiling. Needless to say it broke and I had to scramble to find a hose to fit into the hole that once held the airlock, which I did. Can anyone tell me what size ID hose fits over the tube in a 3 piece airlock? Also, does anyone have a good picture of a blow off setup for a bucket using a larger sized hose? I'm thinking of a 1" hose diameter if possible.:drunk:
 
Argh, I wish all the homebrew sites weren't blocked from where I work, or I'd be able to tell you for sure what size tubing fits over your airlock. I really want to say 3/8th", but I'm not 100%. It's whatever size tubing comes with most autosiphons, so you could probably check one of the online homebrew stores and go from that.

If you can plug up the whole that's already drilled in your bucket, it should be no problem to buy a rather large stopper (#10 might work, or a bit bigger than that) and just drill a 1" hole yourself.
 
Thank you Mr.bugger and Herr Llama,

I think I will drill a bigger hole in the bucket lid for a blow off tube and plug the current hole. It looks like bugger is using a 1/2" or bigger hose and that is what I will need for the bigger beers.

I had the same problem with a Hefe previously and I had put a 3/8" line in the hole without the airlock because I could not get the hose onto the airlock. Well, long story short, they hose plugged and blew out. The beer must have sat for 18 hours open to atmosphere and it turned out pretty good so, I am not overly concerned about the airlock flying out as much as I don't like the mess that came with it.:cross:
 
Another option is foam controller. I used it for the first time on my last brew which was a Scottish Ale 70. I actually used it to prevent boilovers, but it will also prevent excessive fermentation messes. For my Scottish Ale I used a 2L starter with good oxygenation and I had no problem with just an airlock.
 
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