Hot weather brewing

[modi2112]

H y'all I have never brewed beer before and was wondering one thing. Being in NC there is not one spot in my house that gets below 78 this time of year. I have brewed a couple of basic meads and they do fine in this temp. But a beer brewing bud of mine says he waits till late fa ll for beer never asked him why so i thought id ask here thanks yallwinter

 

[modi2112]

Ignore the winter at the end of that post my phone messed up

 

[stpug]

A "swamp cooler" or "fermentation chamber" setup really helps to keep the temps cooler than ambient. Of the two, the swamp cooler system is easier to put together. A waterproof container that can hold your bucket plus a few gallons of water and some frozen water bottles. Put your fermenter in the waterproof container, fill with a few gallons of cold water, add a few/several frozen water bottles. Additionally, you can put a t-shirt over your fermenter so that it hangs into the water and point a fan at the t-shirt which promotes evaporational cooling. You should be able to keep the bulk of fermentation in the mid to upper 60s using this method. You will probably have to swap out frozen water bottles occasionally. And as your fermentation is finishing up (4-5 days or so) you can stop worrying about keeping the temps so low and just allow it to naturally rise until fermentation is complete (7-10 days).

Here's an example:

 

[Mozart]

It depends on the yeast strain, but generally ambient temperatures of 78 degrees are too warm for ale yeasts. At temperatures that warm, one can get production of fusel alcohol and esters that create off flavors in the brew.

There are a lot of methods for keeping fermentation temperatures in check (everything from swamp coolers to temperature controlled refrigerators and freezers), but fermentation temperature is likely the principle reason your beer brewing friend waits until the weather cools down to brew beer.

 

[modi2112]

Thanks y'all I will check into the cooler situation or maybe summer will be cider and mead time and fall And winter beer time.

 

[Clanchief]

It depends on the yeast strain, but generally ambient temperatures of 78 degrees are too warm for ale yeasts. At temperatures that warm, one can get production of fusel alcohol and esters that create off flavors in the brew.

There are a lot of methods for keeping fermentation temperatures in check (everything from swamp coolers to temperature controlled refrigerators and freezers), but fermentation temperature is likely the principle reason your beer brewing friend waits until the weather cools down to brew beer.

+1 to this. I'm fairly lucky now that I live in the 'burbs and have a basement that stays fairly cool (usually around 68-72 in there). But when I lived in a small condo in the city, it was difficult to do much in terms of temp control, other than wait for fall/winter. So what did I do? I brewed Belgian beers with Belgian and saison yeasts that can handle those high temps. There are some yeasts that are good at that high heat, just do some research to see what your options are. Then you can do some more traditional ales when the temp drops, if you don't want to build a swamp cooler.

 

[J187]

No need to let the seasons dictate your brewing habits. At least not with ales. It's been 100 deg here the last couple weeks and I've been fermenting a Hefeweisen in my garage, pinned at 68 deg, with nothing more than a like a 30-40 gallon bin from target filled with water and 4 frozen 1 liter bottles which I rotate with 4 others that I have in the freezer. Change em every 8-10 hours (when you wake up and when you come home from work say).

 

[TheBeerDetective]

I'm going to elaborate on this a little bit. I'm about 4 days into fermenting and there is very little action going on in the fermenter. There was some krausen on day 2, but not a lot since.

Here's the catch—I also have a heat problem. I put the yeast in after cooling the wort to 70 degrees, but the temp went up through the day (swamp cooler is a good idea). The temp has been bouncing between 70s at night at near 80 midday.

Is the temp range why there is little action? I used one packet of wyeast for 5 gallons of wort.

 

[Anelda]

As a person who lives in an older house in Central Florida, our house routinely hits 84 degrees inside even with the AC set to mid 70s. Like others have suggested, a swamp cooler is good enough for keeping the beer in the mid to high 60s. I used 3-4 frozen 2 liter bottles and switched them out before work and after I got home.

And honestly? I didn't find a swamp cooler to have that much bigger of a footprint than the bucket/carboy; I kept my swamp cooler in my closet. Oh, and it's way cheaper than buying a dedicated fridge/freezer.

 

[stpug]

I'm going to elaborate on this a little bit. I'm about 4 days into fermenting and there is very little action going on in the fermenter. There was some krausen on day 2, but not a lot since.

Here's the catch—I also have a heat problem. I put the yeast in after cooling the wort to 70 degrees, but the temp went up through the day (swamp cooler is a good idea). The temp has been bouncing between 70s at night at near 80 midday.

Is the temp range why there is little action? I used one packet of wyeast for 5 gallons of wort.

Welcome to the board!! Hope you enjoy it as much as I do

Those temps would actually suggest a more vigorous fermentation than normal. The cooler the temps the mellower the vigor of the fermentation. Krausen at any point after pitching is a good sign that fermentation has begun and you just need to sit it out. After about 7-10 days you can pull a sample for gravity testing to ensure you've had a successful and complete fermentation. The amount of krausen or bubbles from an airlock are poor indicators of progression of fermentation; gravity samples are good indicators of progression. I suspect that all is well inside your fermenter but a gravity sample will tell the truth.

On a side note, generally speaking, you'd start your own new thread for a question like this so as not to "hijack" the original posters (OP) thread. No worries though, it ain't a big deal.

 

[Dralzz]

I'm going to elaborate on this a little bit. I'm about 4 days into fermenting and there is very little action going on in the fermenter. There was some krausen on day 2, but not a lot since.

Here's the catch—I also have a heat problem. I put the yeast in after cooling the wort to 70 degrees, but the temp went up through the day (swamp cooler is a good idea). The temp has been bouncing between 70s at night at near 80 midday.

Is the temp range why there is little action? I used one packet of wyeast for 5 gallons of wort.

Warm temperatures shouldn't be related to low yeast activity. At high temperatures, yeast go crazy and produce off flavors. Cold makes them go dormant, warm makes them TOO active.
The way your beer looks doesn't really tell you how it's doing. Check the gravity. Fermentation sometimes happens quick. It might be finished.

 

[Clanchief]

I'm going to elaborate on this a little bit. I'm about 4 days into fermenting and there is very little action going on in the fermenter. There was some krausen on day 2, but not a lot since.

Here's the catch—I also have a heat problem. I put the yeast in after cooling the wort to 70 degrees, but the temp went up through the day (swamp cooler is a good idea). The temp has been bouncing between 70s at night at near 80 midday.

Is the temp range why there is little action? I used one packet of wyeast for 5 gallons of wort.

What type of yeast did you use? Different yeasts will do well at higher temps, some not as much. What was your OG and did you make a starter? I found that once I began making starters (I almost exclusively use Wyeast as well) I had much healthier yeast activity, even on lower gravity beers. If your smack pack is 2 months old, then you probably aren't getting enough viable yeast out of it to ferment a 1.045 by itself, much less something higher.

 

[TheBeerDetective]

What type of yeast did you use? Different yeasts will do well at higher temps, some not as much. What was your OG and did you make a starter? I found that once I began making starters (I almost exclusively use Wyeast as well) I had much healthier yeast activity, even on lower gravity beers. If your smack pack is 2 months old, then you probably aren't getting enough viable yeast out of it to ferment a 1.045 by itself, much less something higher.

I used an ale yeast (not a Belgian, sadly). My OG was 1.034, and no starter. I did some calculations too late with brewer's friend and they said I should have used a starter yeast. The yeast was about 6 days old, so all good there.

 

[Clanchief]

With that low gravity of a beer, depending on which yeast you use and how well you aerate, you might not get past a 1.020 or maybe 1.015. Just take readings three days apart and see if it's stable or not. But the fact that you had krausen means it was working. Like others have said, when a yeast is too hot, it goes crazy and produces off flavors. When it's too cold, it doesn't do anything.