Belgian Wit @ 80F for a day...

[Darth_Malt]

I currently have 6 gallons of Belgian Wit in primary with WLP400. Pretty simple brew, half Pils half White Wheat, Motueka hops, Coriander/Seeds of Paradise. We had a really warm day yesterday and our A/C isn't running yet. The thermometer strip on the carboy slowly rose all morning until it went past 78 and just stopped reading.

Sadly I don't have any buckets or anything to put the carboy in to try and ice bath the temp back down. Fans weren't cutting it, and I had to get to work so I didn't have time to try and rig something up.

I'm wondering if anyone has had any experience with taking WLP400 to 80+ F, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Did you get any bad flavors, or just more of the funky yeast esters? Thanks for any input

 

[Rockn_M]

You'll get some off flavors but with a Beglian Wit you might be ok. You might not be able to tell.

 

[mrmop520]

Was this during the first or second day of fermentation? Unless it was during the initial fermentation, this might actually be beneficial--a lot of belgian yeasts need to have their temperature raised in order to fully ferment. At this point if you can, it would probably be best to keep it around that temperature until it reaches final gravity. If you cool it the yeast will slow down and potentially stall at too high a gravity.

 

[Darth_Malt]

This was after a week in primary. It sat in the 80's for a day, now it's back at 75. Still plenty of airlock activity, nice thick krausen, so it appears to still be fermenting fine. It's supposed to warm back up in a day or two so I'm sure it will ramp back up to finish out. I know that's probably not good for the yeast to be changing temps like that, but until I can get some sort of fermentation chamber or something set up, I've just gotta roll with it.

 

[Darth_Malt]

Oh sweet malty Christ how I hate Michigan!!! Got home from work and it's 45 degrees outside and my beer is at 68! I'm now moving a fermentation chamber above a kegerator on the DIY project list. Our A/C in the house should be working in the next few days, which will help...but I still need to be able to control my fermenting temperatures better.

 

[txaggie]

Since it was after the first week, I wouldn't sweat it too much. As others have said, with a belgian, you could get lucky and prevent your yeast from stalling out and who knows what kind if interesting funk you could get from the yeast.

In the future do a search for swamp coolers, even if all you do is just put your fermenter in water with a towel over the top to wick up the moisture, it can do a lot to prevent drastic rises and drops in temperature. This has worked well for me in the past, and I normally would just monitor the temp more closely and add ice packs if needed during the first week during the most active fermentation.