Sour smelling primary

[clintonejones]

Hello forum, I need a bit of advice.

I have been brewing close to 5 years, doing AG about 2 now, and have never had an issue with infection or anything like that. I've been lucky I guess. Anyway, I recently moved to California from Seattle, and it's warmer year round here. I started brewing and my first beer came out great. After that, the next four beers have had extremely pungent, sour smells in the primary about two days after beginning to ferment. I have cleaned and replaced almost everything I own in case it was an infection, but it still is happening. I brewed yesterday and noticed that when I opened my White Labs yeast vials, there were sour smells already coming from the vial. Is it possible that I am letting my yeast get too warm before pitching it? I have heard that yeast can give off diacetals if they get stressed, which smell sour. I hope this is all it is, because I doubt I'm getting infections 4 times in a row, I am pretty maticulous about cleaning and sanitizing. Any thoughts? If I cold crash and age in the keezer, will this smell go away? Has anyone had this issue as well? Thank you folks for any advice.

:rockin:

 

[CBMbrewer]

How have the final products turned out?

 

[jbaysurfer]

getting 4 in a row is a reason to suspect infection, not doubt it. You weren't specific about what you replaced, but basically, if there's something in your environment/process that is infected, and you brew in that place with those tools, then it's likely one infection will lead to 4 or 10 or as many times as you brew so long as you haven't weeded out that pathogen.

I've never smelled a sour smell coming from a yeast vial though...where'd you get the vials? More info is gonna be needed or this is just going to be another of those witchhunt threads where you get about a billion opinions and it only serves to cloud the real problem even more then if you tried to weed it out yourself.

Edit: doesn't sound like diacetyl to me. It's a buttered popcorn smell (like from the movie theater back in the day) or an unpopped bag of buttered microwave popcorn. In extreme cases it can smell rancid, but that's a different smell then sour.

 

[clintonejones]

Thank you, I guess I should elaborate more. The only final product I tasted was a lager, and it's actually lost the sour smell and has no sour taste. I think it's aged out with time in the keezer.

I replaced my fermenters, tubes, siphon... Everything except the brew system itself. I have a three tiered system, with a ice chest mash tun, and two kegs converted to boil and heat water. The boil kettle has a spigot and sight glass. I have disassembled and meticulously cleaned and sanitized everything. And again, I have never had a beer go bad, let alone 4. I've read that acetaldehydes give the sour smell, and yeast can do this for a number of reasons, as well as can be a sign of infection.

I bought my vials from a local brew store that has been fine up to this point. Again, I think I may have been letting the vials get too warm before using them, because that's where it started getting the smell from.

 

[jbaysurfer]

Thank you, I guess I should elaborate more. The only final product I tasted was a lager, and it's actually lost the sour smell and has no sour taste. I think it's aged out with time in the keezer.

I replaced my fermenters, tubes, siphon... Everything except the brew system itself. I have a three tiered system, with a ice chest mash tun, and two kegs converted to boil and heat water. The boil kettle has a spigot and sight glass. I have disassembled and meticulously cleaned and sanitized everything. And again, I have never had a beer go bad, let alone 4. I've read that acetaldehydes give the sour smell, and yeast can do this for a number of reasons, as well as can be a sign of infection.

I bought my vials from a local brew store that has been fine up to this point. Again, I think I may have been letting the vials get too warm before using them, because that's where it started getting the smell from.

Acetylaldehyde makes more sense then diacetyl. Given it was in a lager and has aged/mellowed/lagered out, sounds like you're onto something with that....