New to Brewing!

[Jonny Camp]

G'day ! Ive just bought a home brew kit and put on my first brew. Its only been two days fermenting now but I have been reading that the temp during fementation should be around 25 to 27 deg. Im up in Cairns and its mighty warm up here during the xmas period so i can only get the temp down to 28 , 27 deg when the air con is on and most of the time it sits at 30 degs.

so my question is, sitting at that temp does it affect the brew to the point that it is not as good as if it was say around 25 all the time?

Jonno in Cairns

Cheers

[Clean Brewer]

Jonno,

Being in the area you are in, you really need a working fridge to ferment in as if you are brewing at 30 degrees that is way to hot and you will get a beer that you are most likely not enjoy drinking, even at 25 dgrees, it is too hot also..

Ales should be brewed with an ale yeast at 18 degrees and Lagers should be brewed with a Lager Yeast at 12 degrees to get a much better tasting beer, that said the yeast you use and sanitation are equally important..

Alot of people give up brewing due to the fact that they dont follow the 3 essential steps and produce beer that is barely drinkable..

You really need a fridge with one of these hooked up,
http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=718

and this is how to hook it up,

http://helms-deep.cable.nu/~rwh/blog/?p=29

Just remember, Temperature Control, Good Yeast and Great Sanitation and Cleanliness and you should produce nice beer..

Cheers

[svyturys]

Jonno,
Welcome to the site.
Firstly the bad news. Brew temps should be about 18 to 20C for ales, and about 10 to 12C for lagers.
There's nothing else but ales and lagers.
The good news is that temperature can be controlled even with bush mechanic methods.
Firstly, tell us about your kit. Is it a Coopers thing or did you get it from a homebrew shop?
Your brew temp depends upon the kind of yeast you threw in.
Your yeast is going to go crazy at 30 C. no matter what it is.
I don't know if it's too late but I would chuck a wet towel around the fermenter and place a frozen 2+ litre container of water on top with the screw top off so that as the water melts it will drip over the towel.
A fan blowing at it would help as well.
So, tell us what you threw into the fermenter...especially the type of yeast and the temperature at which you tossed it.
Cheers

[svyturys]

You pipped me to post Clean Brewer.
Your advice looks spot on.
Jonno, if you can get some temperature control then you would have great brews. If the one you've got going is a bit haywire don't worry. It won't cost much to do another one with a bit of temp control.
Have a look around the site and ask questions and you'll be guided through.
I do think the 30 degrees is not doing much good to your yeast.
As I said before, what are the details on what you are doing?
Cheers

[Jonny Camp]

Yeah Cheers for the feedback fella's and and thanks for the welcome !

Im basiclly throwing myself into the brewing thing as ive been thinking about it for a while but ive never really found the info about it until i started reading this site but even then there is always those type of questions like I posted that cant really be answerd until asked.

I bought a 'Brew Celler Complete brewing kit ' from a brew shop and it basiclly has the plastic fementer all the tools needed , sanitizer etc. And also the ingredients which I thought were quite basic. They contain: Morgans Lager, 1 Kg of Dextrose and a pack of carbonation drops.As you prob know the yeast packet comes in the tin of lager.
Now I had the temp at 25deg with the aircon on but after putting the hot water in I just added tap temperature water , not thinking is was a big deal .

Ive tried to keep it as cool as possible over the the past four days , but only now getting the answer about brew temp I reaize I could have done more to make it cooler.

If the temps you are talking about are the only way to get a better brew then I will have to look into getting a fridge type of set up I guess.
I will check the SG level tomorrow and start pouring into bottles and i guess Ill see how it goes from there.

Cheers

[svyturys]

Jonno,
Just a bit of advice about the SG's and bottling.
I take it you put the brew down last Saturday. There's no rush to bottle.
To check whether the yeast has completely finished its worth take a reading tomorrow then another reading the next day. If the readings are constant then you are ready to bottle. Many will say that you should take a third reading before you can be sure you have an FG (Final Gravity).
I never bottle before two weeks. The second week lets the sediment drop to the bottom and results in a clearer, cleaner beer.
Cheers

[Emo]

I've brewed with an ale yeast up to about 22 degrees and it turned out fine but I wouldn't want to go any higher than that.
As svyturys said, don't be in a hurry to bottle. I don't worry about taking gravity reading but I always leave the brew in the fermenter for a minimum of 12 days before bottling and I haven't had a failure yet.

[Jonny Camp]

Yeah I did take a couple of readings and I did bottle the sarvo But I was excited to get it bottled and eventully sooner to being in my gut.

But yeah I think my next brew I will keep it longer, I also had alot of sediment at the bottom , to the point that my last two bottles were very milky. Not sure if that is normal?

Another question is once bottled do you keep it also at the desired temperature as during fermentation or is a reasonable room temp of say 25 deg and a dark place sufficent?

I think I will have to buy a fridge just for my brews as I want the best taste possiblle.

Cheers Fellas

[Clean Brewer]

Yeah I did take a couple of readings and I did bottle the sarvo But I was excited to get it bottled and eventully sooner to being in my gut.

But yeah I think my next brew I will keep it longer, I also had alot of sediment at the bottom , to the point that my last two bottles were very milky. Not sure if that is normal?

Another question is once bottled do you keep it also at the desired temperature as during fermentation or is a reasonable room temp of say 25 deg and a dark place sufficent?

I think I will have to buy a fridge just for my brews as I want the best taste possiblle.

Cheers Fellas

Mate, im sure at those temps, fermentation would have been finished. Once bottled, leave it for 2 weeks in a coolish dark area, this will ensure that it is carbed up, you could probably have a tester after 1 week to see how its going.... If you are using P.E.T bottles, if they feel real hard, they will probably be carbed up enough, if they are still soft to squeeze, leave them longer...

On the milky side of things, ensure you put them in the fridge to chill for at least 3 days, this will help drop the yeast out of suspension more and also the yeast and sediment will stick to the bottom of the bottle better...

Then you can just carefully pour into a glass leaving the last little bit behind..

Cheers