8
Assuming you're talking about a stainless steel conical, off the top of my head...
Pros:
Technically easier to collect and harvest yeast
Can be more hygenic (less chance of scratches that can harbour yeast/bacteria)
Less fragile than glass carboy (but possibly more than buckets)
If it's pressure rated, you can cap it towards end of fermentation for natural ...
8
You should be just fine. Some breweries still practice open air fermentation and the practice of 100% airlocking your beer is relatively new.
The water in the airlock will prevent bugs and oxygen from getting into your beer, without the water it would still be difficult for an environmental contaminant to get through the airlock. So unless a bug managed to ...
6
"How safe would that beer be?"
If it's steam coming from a commercial appliance (presumably a dish-washer or some other such food-grade device) it wouldn't be any less safe than eating off a dish that came through it. What you might see is a small carry-over of that plastic-y scent into your beer from residuals left after draining. Unsafe? No. Inappropriate ...
6
Out of my 12-13 brews I have almost always had condensation on the inside of the lid of the fermentation bucket.
I have had a thermometer inside the liquid during fermentation, and one on the outside and it does differ quite a bit. Basically the fermentation causes heat => condensation.
Totally normal!
5
Yes, a lower original gravity will result in a lower-alcohol final product. However, if this was an extract kit and if you added the correct amount of water, the discrepancy is almost certainly a measurement error. A common mistake is to draw the hydrometer sample without having first mixed the extract thoroughly into the water. This will lead to an observed ...
4
You should probably just rack to a second sanitary bucket, especially if you plan to add additional sugar to the cider for carbonation.
Ideally, you use a separate bucket with a spigot to which you can then attach a "bottling wand". This allows you to fill the bottle from the bottom upwards, which significantly reduces the amount of oxygen that is absorbed ...
4
It sounds like you do a good job cleaning by dismantling the tap, and that's really the key - storing the fermentor clean so that it can be effectively sanitized when next needed.
Make sure it is drained and completely air dry before adding any seal or you'll get stale water in there. That can mean another round of cleaning to get rid of the odor.
4
it might help to know what you are brewing.
I can't see an airlock on the bucket so depending on what you are brewing you may have to add an airlock so the CO2 can escape the barrel. This would stop it blowing up!!!
Again without knowing what you are brewing it is hard to give any advice.
If you want to know more about airlocks take a look at this video. ...
4
Rhizopus Oligosporus is believed to be "harmless" on the basis of the fact that there has never been a recorded incident of Rhizopus Oligosporus' ability to produce a toxin when fermenting Tempeh, but then again, Rhizopus Oligosporus is believed to be a form of Rhizopus microsporus. The latter one is a documented pathogen that does produce toxins, even ...
3
As Pepi noted in the comments it would take a serious infection to be noticeable in 24 hours (Just think how long it takes yeast to get going and that is supplied into fermentable at a huge number of cells.
First and foremost I recommend moving to an acid based no-rise sanitiser. Starsan is the common brand but other unbranded and just as good alternatives ...
3
I normally clean and sanitize my fermentors and carboys after use (along with all other brew accessories) and then I let everything air dry (or dry with paper towels). Then I store them in large plastic storage totes that have lids that snap on. This has worked great for me. Also, they make long shallow totes that work great for racking canes and mash ...
3
In 20 Tips for Better Brewing (Brew Your Own, December 1995), the author says you should fill the buckets to the brim with a dilute bleach-water solution (one teaspoon per gallon of water) and seal them up; then rinse with hot water on your next brew day:
Personally, I found that recommendation surpising. Maybe make sure your fermenters air-dry really ...
3
Here is some great information about beer skunking based upon wavelengths of light (http://www.safespectrum.com/applications_beer_wine.php). UV is the strongest light source that will cause beer skunking. However visible light, specifically anything under 500nm or thereabouts, are threats for beer skunking. And from this page (http://www.oksolar.com/led/...
3
I don't recommend using it again. Plastic is fairly porous, at least compared to glass or stainless steel. It may also have tiny, microscopic scratches from past usage. There is no way to effectively sanitize the millions of tiny pores and scratches in the plastic which most certainly contain mold spores. Your bleach solution will not be able to penetrate ...
3
Some people develop an allergy to the fungi in the tempeh and the fungus was suspected of being causative of Zygomycosis. IIRC that may now have been disproved and Rhizopus is generally considered safe in food stuffs.
3
No.
When I calculate a solution of 10l at a gravity of 1.100 (which is already big), then I get an amount of 8.4 l water with 2.6 kg sugar.
But that is already stretching things, because without head space your fermentation vessel will probably overflow from kraüsen.
Even for a 25 liter vessel it seems limited (but I do not know the amount of kraüsen ...
3
I get a similar issue with the bucket I use for bottling (I use a glass carboy for fermenting). I am still using the bucket with the usual cleaning straight after use and sanitizing prior to use with no adverse issue to my batches so far. I'm not sure smell is something you necessarily need to worry about if your bucket is visibly clean (no visible deposits, ...
2
The link to the tubing you posted says the tubing rating is 250psi, and a barb with a clamp would surely tolerate at least 60psi, but I don't think figuring out the maximum pressure the system can safely handle is the way to go.
Instead, ensure that your adjustable valve has a maximum pressure so that it that opens when the pressure goes above a threshold ...
2
I don't think you can taste bpa, but certainly microwaving food and eating it from bpa plastic will raise bpa levels in your blood stream. However, it appears that ceasing the behavior also drops the levels back down, so I'm not convinced it's a great health risk and unless you put hot wort into the jug, it shouldn't cause this effect.
The other issue with ...
2
If they are the same volume then there's probably not much in it. But I would imagine the pail to have more volume than the barrel. For primary fermentation, you need about 1/3 additional volume in the fermentor as headspace. So if you are fermenting 5 gallons, you should aim for a fermentor that's 7-8 gallons in size.
The headspace is necessary since the ...
2
Sour, astringent and vinegary. Definitely sounds like bacterial contamination ("Infection"). Lactic and acetic acid also both have higher specific gravity than water or alcohol, so that's probably why your gravity went up between weeks two and three.
Lost cause? I don't know, can you stand to drink it? If not, it's certainly not going to get any better ...
2
I have largely found the "miracle" of champagne yeast to be a myth. It hasn't worked well for me. The failings of pitching dried champagne yeast is primarily due to two things.
First, champagne yeast prefers to ferment the simpler sugars found in grape must. A stuck ferment in a malt based wort generally has a higher ration of complex sugars to the simple ...
2
Either way should be fine. Although I'd probably pitch the yeast before moving it just to avoid having to have another thing to do after moving it. 2 hours probably isn't enough for it to start fermenting vigorously enough to even pop a plugged bung out so it won't cause problems as long as it's secured in your car.
Just think of it as really good ...
2
Its ok. If you keep making beer in it the slight smell won't make your next beer smell any more of less beery than the last one. Its plastic and it absorbs odors. Perfectly normal. There is no reason to think you need to get all that smell out of there. Brew beer and if you start getting contamination due to microbial issues then you've got something to ...
1
An s-type airlock allows air in, but the liquid remains in the airlock rather than getting sucked in
1
There is a trick to pulling a small sample or drawing yeast.
Use a 1" blow off tube of ample length to reach the bottom of a bubbler jar on the floor.
The volume in the tube is enough to draw a small sample, as you draw the sample you will see the sanitizer suck up in the tube, don't let it crest the arch and you're ok.
For a large draw you can use a ...
1
If you have a corker, you can use a cork on wine screw-top bottles. Even if the opening is sometimes lightly smaller, the cork will go in. I tried it many times with success, I also used corks with Scotch bottles with success.
Keeping wine in a plastic primary fermenter for a long time is not a good idea after the fermentation is done, they are not 100% ...
1
If its done fermenting getting it into bottles is better than a plastic bucket. All buckets absorb/transmit O2 at some rate. And depending on your lid, it might not be the plastic at all that's introducing O2. The O2 will ingress regardless of the CO2 unless its pressure is high (which it isn't). It will attempt to equilibrate no matter what. O2 comes ...
1
There are several issues with attempting to ferment with wild yeast. I've not tried it but here are a few things I've heard from people who have.
If you get good results, it is unlikely that you can repeat the process. Know what you are getting is a nice feature of prepackaged yeast.
The wild yeast may not be alcohol tolerant. i.e. They may die off when ...
1
The open fermenter may ferment cooler due to the insulation of a lid, just as a pan with a lid on boils faster, but I can see the difference being huge. that is all things being equal.
One difference that could potentially affect things regarding temperature would be the availability of dissolved oxygen, with more O2 available the yeast should be able to ...
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