Help me avert disaster (mess and/or infection)

[petep1980]

I pitched my ESB this morning. I had a 4 quart starter, about 6 gallons of wort and Wyeast 1098 English Ale. Well fermentation took off like a bandit. Within 4 hours the airlock was dry, another hour later krausen through the airlock. Now I just have the airlock hole without anything in it, and am letting krausen come out for the heck of it. I tried a blowoff, but that thing clogged almost immediately and in the nick of time I glanced down to see the lid on the bucket beginning to bow.

Now I have nothing covering the hole in the airlock. Active fermentation for my ales usually runs 48 hours. Should I just let the krausen flow out and pray against infection?

 

[petep1980]

This is current what I have going on.

I apologize for the picture size.

 

[Yooper]

The first thing I'd do is remove the lid, and just set it on top loosely. So that the bucket is covered, but not airtight. That might keep it from blowing off and hitting your ceiling.

As far as the hole for the airlock, germs can't get in there because so much co2 and krausen is coming out. But I guess a fruitfly could make it in there if fermentation slowed down. I'd put a dishtowel over the top, so that the hole is covered, just in case, but the towel would be washable because it would be disgusting! You could also stop up the hole with a cotton ball, I guess.

 

[ekranzusch]

You could sanitize some aluminum foil and use it to cover over things up.

Also if you are using an the base of a 3 piece airlock to affix your blowoff tube, be sure to cut the bottom of it off if it has the "T" cross plastic bar things. I carefully used a hacksaw on mine with a very fine blade.

 

[petep1980]

The first thing I'd do is remove the lid, and just set it on top loosely. So that the bucket is covered, but not airtight. That might keep it from blowing off and hitting your ceiling.

As far as the hole for the airlock, germs can't get in there because so much co2 and krausen is coming out. But I guess a fruitfly could make it in there if fermentation slowed down. I'd put a dishtowel over the top, so that the hole is covered, just in case, but the towel would be washable because it would be disgusting! You could also stop up the hole with a cotton ball, I guess.

Remove the lid even with the hole open for the missing airlock?

Once ferment slows I can seal it back up with airlock anyways.

 

[Yooper]

Yes, place the lid back on, but don't snap it down. That will keep fruitflies and other critters from getting in there.

One other thing, because of the vigorous fermentation, the temperature can climb over 80 degrees suprisingly fast. Make sure the temperature is in the high 60s. You can add some water to the bin, and even put a frozen water bottle in there, if the fermenter temperature rises. Do you have a stick-on thermomter on the wort? That will help you monitor the temperature.

 

[petep1980]

Yes, place the lid back on, but don't snap it down. That will keep fruitflies and other critters from getting in there.

One other thing, because of the vigorous fermentation, the temperature can climb over 80 degrees suprisingly fast. Make sure the temperature is in the high 60s. You can add some water to the bin, and even put a frozen water bottle in there, if the fermenter temperature rises. Do you have a stick-on thermomter on the wort? That will help you monitor the temperature.

I didn't have a thermometer handy, but what I did was fill a 5 gallon carboy with 70°F water and poured it into that blue bin to help temper fermentation.

The lid is sitting loosely on the bucket, and I have a clean dish cloth over the airlock hole.

This is an extract batch. I was planning a 2 week primary, should I still plan on it? I know yeast has a lot of work to do after FG, but was wondering if that still stood true for extract because I haven't done one of them in a while.

 

[BeerPressure]

Next time some drops of fermcap will eliminate that problem

 

[petep1980]

Well, hopefully I'm not too much over the 72°F upper limit for the yeast. Always an adventure.