My first brew today so not sure what’s “normal”. I dipped the airlock in star-san and stuck it in my fermenter. Both sides were about 1/4" higher than the “MAX” which I didn’t notice until I stuck it in the hole. Decided to just leave it alone. An hour later, it looks like all the star-san has left one side of the air lock. I pushed the top of the lid down a bit to see how much pressure was on it and 8 or 10 bubbles came out the airlock. Seems kinda early to be pushing bubbles isn’t it?
pic is here: airlock - Album on Imgur
What was your batch size? How much yeast did you pitch and what type?
From your other post I see the answers to these questions.
Pressure can build pretty quickly in the lag phase while yeast are propagating.
It certainly isn’t impossible.
Thanks all. I’ve been meaning to google “lag time”. Must be all it is because I gave it a full minute and no new bubbles so it’s not real active. I must have caught it at the right time. As you probably found. 5 gallon batch, 11.5g of US-05. Any way to know if you need a blow off tube before getting to “Aw, crap I should have use a blow off tube”?
How much head space do you have in your fermenter? Are you concerned about krausen coming out into your airlock? I routinely use a blow off tube for the first few days of fermentation for just those reasons. I then switch out to a bubbler. Some people just keep a bubbler in place the entire fermenting time while others leave the blow off tube in. It’s a personal choice based on your experience.
There really is not a distinct “lag time” phase. Fermentation begins immediately
It’s a 5 gallon batch with a 6.5 gallon fermenter. Head space looks to be about 5" right now. Yeah, mostly don’t want the lid flying off and making a mess to clean up like the stories I’ve read. I did add a 1/2 teaspoon of yeast nutrient at the last 10 mins of the boil so not sure what that will do. The bucket lid has one of those airlock grommets in it so I guess I would just pull the grommet out and stick whatever size hose I can get in there? I do have another lid that I could drill a larger hole in for a 1/2" hose and swap them I suppose. I’m just not sure at what point you move to the blow off tube, or how you decide you need one if you don’t have any prior experience to fall back on.
That’s a good point. When rehydrating yeast for making bread, that stuff is happening in a couple mins after pitching into warm sugar water. I guess beer yeast shouldn’t really be all that much different. I should have rehydrated it first just for fun but dumped my sanitized water before I remembered it. Maybe next time.
Of course, temperature change, alone, could explain some of the early pressure release…not saying it was attributable to that, but it could be partly due to that and not necessarily CO2 production. That said I pitched a slurry Friday in a lager and had active fermentation within 4 hours on a dropping temperature (measured with a Tilt).
The yeasts know what they’re doing even if you don’t. Relax, check often and record your findings. It an educational process. Stressing over it will just detract from the pleasure of the process. As long as you’re cleaning and sanitizing well and controlling temperatures, you’ll do just fine.
I would recommend attaching a blow off tube just for your own experience so you can see what happens. The important thing is to make sure the hose fits snug inside the opening. I use a silicon hose which is very flexible and creates a tight seal. Whatever container you use for the opposite end of the hose, make sure there’s enough room in case there is some krausen overflow. The hose only needs to be covered (I use Star San) about 1”.
It will be very apparent when you can switch out to the bubbler. In the beginning, fermentation will be very active and the blow off will will bubble very rapidly (several per second). At some point, the bubbling will slow dramatically. I can’t give you a time frame as every batch is different. But, in my experience, it’s about 2 days. The bubbling might be something like one every 30 seconds, for example. You can then change out to the airlock. I do it quickly as you want to limit the amount of oxygen exposure. However, since fermentation is still taking place, there will be a layer of CO2 on top of your beer.
[emoji106]
If you have a old broken plastic racking cane, you can just cut off a piece of it, attach it to you blow-off hose and push the opther end of the plastic tube into the lid gromet. The cane outer diameter will fit just fine into the lid gromet and provide a good seal.
Alternatively, you can attach a hose to the inside tube of an airlock and push that into the lid gromet for a quick and easy blow-off tube. I have done this as well and it saves cutting a piece off an old plastic racking cane. It also may seal a bit better due to the fact that the airlock OD gets thicker near the well.
I did one australian sparkling ale with the slurry of windsor, no kidding 1 hour after there sign of vigorous fermentation, this one was the beer I mash with the lower temp, like 147 I did to go the the market to grab ice, finish the beer with 1,002 lowest FG I got
Took your recommendation last night and swapped the airlock out for some silicone hose I had. I picked up a couple 3/8 stainless elbows a few weeks ago so managed to get all the pieces in some star san and switched them out. The elbow fits much better in the grommet than just sticking the hose in. Just as you said, this morning it’s a couple bubbles every second. By afternoon, it was a few every second. All you guys have probably seen this a million times but for a new guy it’s encouraging to see it all working like it’s supposed to. The temp of the fermenter (I just have a probe on the outside of the bucket) looks to be around 72F (pic here, dark green line: fermenting temps - Album on Imgur). Not sure how I would lower that temp any. Maybe nothing to bother with? The US-05 yeast packet says 71.6F is the upper “ideal” range.
Bob357, well put! Thanks for that.
I was wondering how to get a better fit with the 1/2 silicone hose without the grommet. It was pretty weak. I can see how something rigid inside the tubing would help it seal. The elbow works with the grommet installed and and fits the hose much better so that seems to be working OK. Thanks for the idea!