4th Attempt at a brew....pre pitching tips?

[beattun]

Hello good people,

I've had the fermenter sitting with sanitizer in it now since last night so Im gonna do a brew tonight!

Today I'm gonna try a coopers mexican cerveca, ive yet to pull off a decent brew in 3 attempts since i started after christmas, i have the coopers mexican kit, and BE1 and BE2, which one of those should I chuck in?

I'm gonna stick to the basics for now, kit yeast etc etc, Im determined to succeed with one basic kit before i start branching out with adding other stuff, are there any tips anybody could give a noob / idiot such as myself?

Do I need to rehydrate the kit yeast or something? have seen that mentioned somewhere before but not often seen it here.
When Ive put in my 2 litres of boiling at the start and am adding cold water, should I be adding pre-cooled water as well to get the temp down to......20???
How long can I leave the wort to cool before adding the yeast, if I havent got the temp right before Ive reached 23 litres?
Should I add finings? when?

I think thats all I need to ask, sorry to be asking the usual questions times and time again, anyone else i know whos done a coopers kit has had no worries out of the box, maybe its the brigalow fermenter / airlock etc im using? I seem to have had an air leak from the seal in my last brew, is there any way i can totally prevent this?

thanks in advance!

Brian.

[Kevnlis]

Cerveza is a fairly hard brew to do (second hardest only to Lagers and Pilsners). Due to the light nature and relatively low taste it is easy to pick up any flaws there may be.

Do not re-hydrate the kit yeast just sprinkle it on top.

You can add pre-cooled water if you like, I would suggest keeping this brew at 15C if possible, otherwise just try to hold the temp as low as you can, while keeping it constant.

You should really add the yeast as soon as you can, for a new brewer I would not suggest you wait for any period of time.

Finings will mostly not be of any benefit to a new kit brewer.

Good luck!

[Chris]

Yep. Get that yeast in asap.

There is nothing wrong with a Brigalow fermenter- I'm using two as we speak. Don't bother with the lid and airlock though. Put a piece of gladwrap over the top instead. Secure with a rubber band. It takes a LOT of stress out of the situation that a lot on new brewers seem to have.

[Kevnlis]

Yep. Get that yeast in asap.

There is nothing wrong with a Brigalow fermenter- I'm using two as we speak. Don't bother with the lid and airlock though. Put a piece of gladwrap over the top instead. Secure with a rubber band. It takes a LOT of stress out of the situation that a lot on new brewers seem to have.

I agree, a lot on new brewers seem to stress over the airlock. Put it in the bin and use Glad Wrap (which works much better than the Home Brand garbage) that way you can see exactly what is happening in your fermentor. Get yourself a good quality Hydrometer and a jar for it, it will save you stress and give you more time to enjoy your beers!

[beattun]

Yep. Get that yeast in asap.

There is nothing wrong with a Brigalow fermenter- I'm using two as we speak. Don't bother with the lid and airlock though. Put a piece of gladwrap over the top instead. Secure with a rubber band. It takes a LOT of stress out of the situation that a lot on new brewers seem to have.

just cover the top of the fermenter with glad wrap and secure it with the rubber seal perhaps?
how does that work out in place of the airlock, what i mean is, if you dont need the airlock in the first place, why is it supplied?

[Kevnlis]

Yes I use the rubber seal from the inside of the lid to secure mine, but they do break pretty easily so be sure to soak them between brews if you can.

Why is it supplied... well... I guess someone out there thought it was a simple way to give people comfort in the fact that the brew is fermenting. Problem is the lids are hard to seal, they break down over time, some yeasts take a while to start producing enough gas to give a constant ploop (there is an 'L' in that word) in the airlock and some can continue to release gas for weeks for various reasons making the brewer think it is still fermenting. I honestly wish they would have just given people a decent hydro, jar and tough rubber band to use glad wrap!

[Chris]

Damn right!

[beattun]

thanks chaps, ill try the glad wrap and the rubber seal tonight and see how we go

[Chris]

Another follower!

Seriously though, it is the best change in brewing practice that I have ever made!

[beattun]

ok, done

The only issue is that it was pitched at 26 - 28 degrees

Hydrometer reading after pitching was 1032 to 1035 approx

Do I need to put wet towels around over it now? I have no other possible means of temp control available to me.

Liked the glad wrap by the way, especially liked the way it sucked in nice and tight when i drew a sample from the tap to take my reading!

Fingers crossed eh?

[Chris]

Everything sounds good.

Wet towels do help with the temp a bit.

[beattun]

instead of towels, i went out and picked up a shallow laundry tub today, put the fermenter in that, filled the tub up with water and chucked every ice cube i had in the freezer into the water, along with two esky icebars

its gonna make it a bit awkward anytime i need to take a sample for a reading cos ill have to lift it out and put it back on the two milk crates i did have it on, but hopefully will solve my high temp. problems

[Old Gil]

I would strongly advise to sanitize the hell out of your tap before you take a hydro reading or bottling

[beattun]

I would strongly advise to sanitize the hell out of your tap before you take a hydro reading or bottling

ok, thats the first time ive heard that, how come?

[Kevnlis]

I always give my tap a good squirt of no-rinse (inside and out) before I use it to take wort for a gravity reading or to rack/bottle etc.

This should get rid of any little bugs that may be growing on/in the tap spout.

[beattun]

as an alternative to no rinse spray or such, could i make up a bowl of sanitiser / water and wipe it down with a clean cloth?

[Chris]

Yep. Just make sure you do up the inside of the tap.

Just buy yourself a $1 spray bottle from the reject shop or Woolies.

[warra48]

I always spray my tap with straight no rinse sanitiser, all over and up the outlet, before a bottling session. No point in taking risks for the sake of a few cents worth of sanitiser.

[Kevnlis]

I always spray my tap with straight no rinse sanitiser, all over and up the outlet, before a bottling session. No point in taking risks for the sake of a few cents worth of sanitiser.

Could not agree more warra.

One other thing I do is to use what I call my 'shit' bucket. Before every beer I pour from my taps (be they on the kegerator or in the fermentation fridge) I squirt a good gush into the 'shit' bucket to give them a clean and clear any sediment or gas pockets in the lines etc. The bucket I use is an old 2kilo washing powder bucket and it is perfect for the job!

[Old Gil]

I never used to sterilize the tap pre bottling until i read it on this forum, only had one infection but i don't think it was from the tap, but i do it all the time now just as a precaution. I would definitly do it if having a fermenter in a tub of water, correct me if i'm wrong somebody but wouldn't the water sitting there for a week or two have some sort of infection causing bug in it