temp to high?

[Danny]

Only just getting into home brewing, bought me a coopers DIY kit last week. The first batch has so far gone smoothly, bottled it all up last night and 2day I started another batch. Also this time I accidently filled my wort with about 10L of hot tap water b4 I realised "oh shit hang on I should be using cold water"....anyways it's been sitting for about 2 hours now, and has gone from +40 degrees celcius (it went over, but that's the limit the gauge goes to), to now sitting on 36 degrees, and is going down slowly.

Would I have stuffed it up or do ya rekon it will be ok if it slowly goes down and sits on 24ish degrees (thats roughly what my last batch sat on during the entire fermentation process)?

Cheers.

[emnpaul]

G'day Danny and welcome to the forum.

You didn't say if you've pitched the yeast or not. Over about 36 degrees you might be in a little bit of trouble and if it were me I'd look at getting a fresh pack of yeast or two. If you live near ahome brew shop they will be able to point you in the right direction there. If not then don't worry too much you can just pinch the yeast pack from another kit and then re-use the 'yeast cake" to make the second kit. Kind of like robbing Peter to pay Paul and then paying back Peter with the left overs. You can read about re-using yeast cake and yeast farming here: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=8705

If you haven't pitched it yet then I'd stick the fermenter in a big tub of cool water, preferrrbaly with a couplle of ice bricks thrown in, to help cool it down quicker. Then pitch the yeast at 30ish degrees and continue cooling to a more appropriate temperature. Provided your sanitation was good you should be sweet.

Cheers
Paul

Edit: More complete instructions from Oliver, below.

[Oliver]

Hi and welcome, Danny.

First things first. Cool down the wort as quickly as possible. If you haven't pitched the yeast yet, you want to get it cool so that you can pitch the yeast because the longer the lag before adding the yeast the more chance there is of infection. If you have pitched the yeast you want to get the temperature down ASAP so that most of the fermentation happens at lower temperature. Higher temperatures mean a greater chance of off flavours.

Four possible ways to cool it (or you can use them in combination) are:

1. Put a towel over the fermenter and keep it wet so that evaporation cools it down.
2. Put it in a bath of cold or iced water and change it every now and then.
3. If you have some frozen bottles of water, pour some sanitiser over them rinse them off (unless it's a no-rinse sanitiser), open up the fermenter and put them in. Some will recommend against this, but I think that desperate times call for desperate measures
4. Put it in front of an airconditioner.

If you have pitched the yeast it is possible that the yeast may have been killed by the high temperature. However, if you are seeing froth on the surface the yeast is already doing its work.

Keep the fermentation temperatures as close to 18-20C as you can as this will result in a better-tasting beer.

I hope this helps.

Good luck, and let us know if you have any more questions.

Cheers,

Oliver

[Danny]

Thx for the replies guys. Yeah the yeast is already in. On the Coopers DVD it said to get the yeast in as soon as possible, and even if the temp isn't right to still put the yeast in as that's more important....so done that lol.

It's in an airconditioned room (just an evaporative, so it's not bad, but not the best) and got 2 fans going in front of it. It's down to 30 degrees already with the 28 degrees mark starting to show up, so the temp is prolly ok now.....I guess will just have to wait and see if it will start foaming up. Should I put another pack of yeast in now anyways, and just put it straight over the old yeast?

[Oliver]

Yeah the yeast is already in. On the Coopers DVD it said to get the yeast in as soon as possible, and even if the temp isn't right to still put the yeast in as that's more important

As we old hands often say, the first thing new brewers should do is throw away the instructions that come with the kit

See this thread for some simple tips on brewing the best beer.

If you've got another yeast it won't hurt to whack that in now, if the temperature is dropping fairly quickly which it sounds like it is.

Once the temperature is down, use the wet towel method to keep it cool if you want to turn off the airconditioner.

Oliver

[chadjaja]

Buy a big cooler bag like this.

Sit your fermenter in it and fill it with a few ice bricks or frozen coke bottles. Throw a towel over it and you will be sweet! Was 40 here in melb and I kept my brew at a steady 18 degrees even on the hottest day.

[Danny]

Good idea with the cooler bag. We had a few 40 degree days here the other day during my first batch and the wort's temp gauge didn't go over 24 degrees and that's just sitting in our spare room under the aircon, so I think the temp situation shouldn't be a drama now, just gotta remember for my next batch to not put in half a wort of hot water lol.

Didn't end up getting anymore yeast in as the shops were all shut, figured I'd let it sit and see wat happens, worst case was I wasted a few bucks on the ingredients lol.

Last night it didn't show any signs of fermentation (about 8hrs after I put it together), but this morning when I got up it seemed to have a bit of foam. Checked it just then and it's definitely foaming up, so might be in the clear. It's at about 24hrs now, took a pic for ya's. Do ya rekon it should be ok now, or if it does work it will taste like crap?

[chadjaja]

Looks like a good ferment anyway. Coopers yeasts are a 'bit' more tolerant than most as they expect people to ferment warm as they instruct. Better still to keep it on the cool side though. Is that the new coopers kit fermenter? Lid on or off? If off better to leave it on next time and reduce the chance of introducing an infection.

Beer may taste a bit more fruity and slightly warm if anything but may be just fine all the same.

[Danny]

Ah good to hear. Yeah it's a new kit, and just has a lid which slips on and off, doesn't screw on. Also has a collar thing which sits inside the top and goes down about 20mm under the surface, I'm thinkin it's so ya don't get a big ring of crusty yeast around the edge of the wort. The lid still sits on top of the collar, and yeah ya pull the collar out when the foam has gone down. I leave the lid on all the time, just take it off to see wat's goin on and have a whiff of the goodness lol. It doesn't have one of those bubbler things either.

Will it effect the beer if I take the lid off about 2-3 times a day for a quick inspection? It's normally only for a few seconds then it's back on. I just like to keep an eye on it.

Here's a pic of it just after I made my first batch. The collar is still in place.

[Bum]

Will it effect the beer if I take the lid off about 2-3 times a day for a quick inspection? It's normally only for a few seconds then it's back on. I just like to keep an eye on it.

I'm looking at a slightly dodge picture of it on a smallish laptop screen and find it perfectly visible what is going on in there. Leave the bloody lid on. Only take it off if you have a very good reason to. You do not want to tip a batch just because you think your eyeballs help fermentation.

[Danny]

Will it effect the beer if I take the lid off about 2-3 times a day for a quick inspection? It's normally only for a few seconds then it's back on. I just like to keep an eye on it.

I'm looking at a slightly dodge picture of it on a smallish laptop screen and find it perfectly visible what is going on in there. Leave the bloody lid on. Only take it off if you have a very good reason to. You do not want to tip a batch just because you think your eyeballs help fermentation.

haha yeah ya got a point. Checked it this morning (without taking the lid off ) and the foam has risen a fair bit. She's lookin pretty nice!

[Bum]

Excellent news. Good luck with it, Danny.

[Oliver]

I split off the Port Pirie discussion here.

Oliver

[Guru]

Hey chadjaja, where did you get your cooler bag from?
I've been thinking of using one of these myself to try and keep my fermenter cool. Mildura can get pretty hot this time of year and it isn't always easy to keep the temp down.

[chadjaja]

I got them from bunnings but i believe they are a discontinued item Some have had luck at Big W and target over the years with similar items. Try your big green shed though for maybe a similar product as they work a treat. The big blue cooler slabs were from there too. Plenty of surface area with them keeping it all cool and be sure to add salt water to it so it stays frozen longer.

Good luck.