Help! Fermentation Temp WAYYYY Too High

[dinokath]

Doing a maibock using WLP833. Pitched last night at 10pm at 74F, woke up at 8am and had a nice fermentation going so I turned on the fermentation chamber, set the temp to 55 and walked away 5 hours ago.

Just looked in on it and with the cool weather, I had the heater plugged into the controller instead of the fridge so I warmed up the entire batch to 95F! I corrected the fermentation chamber and it is now cooling. There was still clear activity of fermentation but I must ask for some advice.

What would you do? Repitch? Cool it back down and let it ride and see if it hits FG?

Advice?

Thanks all!

 

[ZmannR2]

Let her ride. She'll be fine. Might just produce a little off flavors but you'll be surprised at how much you can do and it not affect anything. But ya get the temp back under control for sure

 

[seabrew8]

I would leave it be and chalk it up to an accidental experiment.

 

[dinokath]

Thanks for the advice. It's down to 90.8 using the thermowell and churning away on the fermentation. Already made a little sign for the inside of the ferm chamber that reads 'Which is plugged in - heater or fridge?'.

Wasn't sure if the yeast would die off that fast but it seems to be doing fine. Thanks again for weighing in!

 

[bkboiler]

i wouldnt rush to any action before you've let the beer keg and taste it carbed and cold. buut, in the 90s is usually enough to get fusel alcohols which will NOT go away with time...ask me how i know..

 

[505-Brewer]

Id crank the temp all the way down until temp of beer is where you want it. Maybe shoot for middle range for that yeast. Good chance you've made a steam beer -possibly with fusels.....but maybe not.

 

[IslandLizard]

You made Steam Beer!

It will be fermented out soon at those temps. After tasting, you may want to decide to let it age a while (in bottles or a keg) to let the fusel alcohols mellow out a bit. Maybe it's not all that harsh.

 

[wilserbrewer]

At 95 degrees you likely had one hell of a quick fermentation and it is likely just about done and readjusting temp at this point won't make much difference.

Please report back, likely need some age on this one idk.

 

[dinokath]

Update

Racked into a keg this morning for secondary conditioning in the fridge for a few weeks. Final stats were off from what Beersmith though they would be:

- OG - 068
- Est FG - 015
- Actual - 012
- Est Attenuation - 76.3%
- Actual - 81.4%
- Est ABV - 6.5%
- Actual - 7.4%

BS usually nails the FG and based on the recipe I used, BS was on point. Guess the WLP833 attenuates much higher when you cook it!

Tastes fine at this point. Took a decent swig off the test jar sample and dumped it into a snifter to give it a chance to 'bouquet'.

No fusel flavor or smell but admit I have always controlled fermentation temps pretty well and not had them, at least that I can taste, in the past so I am not certain what to be looking for other than what I read, which can range from hot alcohol bite to solvent/magic marker/rubbing alcohol smell. There's nothing like that in here at the moment.

There's a definite ester of fruit that I most associate with strawberry at this point. It's actually pleasant. It didn't floc like I wanted it to but the cold crash and lagering should clarify it.

We'll see what it matures into in a few weeks.

I'll report back.

 

[Calder]

Drink a couple of pints, but don't go over-board on your overall alcohol intake. If you get a splitting headache that you can't contribute to drinking too much, then you have fusel alcohol that is not going away.

If you are fine - then the beer is OK.

 

[dinokath]

UPDATE

No one has died from the beer yet, so I am going to say it is OK. No horrible hangovers and the strawberry scent has subsided but it is still there. Everyone that has had a drink so far has picked up on the strawberry. It's a decent beer. I'd do it correctly next time... :/

It is cleared nicely and is on tap now.

 

[Mer-man]

I once had a programming error (user error) on my thermostat and after holding at 0C for some days, an 833 lager went to 25C for a day before I noticed.
It had a faint fruitiness. Maybe we are learning something . . .