I was brewing a batch of Belgium brown and the plug and airlock blew out! I washed them off and put them back with new vodka, but am wondering if my beer is ruined?
Also any idea why it blew. I have it in a cool dark basement…
Any idea of how long it was open after the blowout?
You’re probably safe, unless it was for a considerable amount of time.
The easy advice here is to never use an airlock and always use with a blowhose with the other end in some star san & water in a pitcher or bucket.
[quote=“Kirk”]I was brewing a batch of Belgium brown and the plug and airlock blew out! I washed them off and put them back with new vodka, but am wondering if my beer is ruined?
Also any idea why it blew. I have it in a cool dark basement…[/quote]
Blow outs happen for one reason: not enough head space for the krausen to expand.
For some yeasts, it is almost a guarantee (top cropping like W3787); for others, you’ll never get a blow off.
These are my general best practices:
- control the amount of wort in your fermenter. Try not to exceed 5 gallons in either a 6 or 6.5 gallon primary fermenter.
- never use a 5 gallon fermenter for 5 gallons of beer.
- keep an eye on your temps. ferming at the high end will almost always create excess krausen.
- when in doubt, use a blow off tube.
cheers.
Meh you’ll be fine. I’ve had a fermenter blow all the way open for half a day and everything turned out good. Don’t sweat it.
No worries. If you clean it and re-seal it in a day or so don’t even give it another thought.
I just cleaned up a blown Patersbier. When I left for work this morning I had soapy bubbles from the Star San on top of the airlock. When I open the freezer tonight, the airlock was cruddy, and the lid was half off the bucket. It wasn’t a big mess like my 2 pre-freezer hefes this past summer.
I’d say you probably caught this in time for it not to be a big problem. When beer is in it’s most active stage of fermentation, it’s expelling a lot of carbon dioxide and not really taking anything in from the ambient air. It would have to sit open like that for quite a while before you should really start to worry about it, and it’s not like it’s a big opening, anyway. If the whole lid had blown off, I’d be a little more worried, but even then, you’d probably still be just fine for at least a few hours, as long as your house or apartment is at least relatively clean. No worries, man. 8)
What are you fermenting in? Did it blow off and expel yeast or did the stopper/airlock come out without yeast. Stoppers are notorious for popping out of a carboy when wet.
+1
RDWHAHB. I had a blow out over night one time and didn’t catch it until the next morning. Batch turned out superb. Now I just always use a blow off tube during active fermentation, even if it doesn’t seem necessary.
You’ll be fine the yeast releases CO2 that will protect the beer from most things thats how brewerys get away with open fermenters.
