Brewing temperature (complete novice)

[Rob Sharpe]

Not to go crazy but temp control during fermentation is key to a good result. As stated Most yeast will operate over a range and may take longer then advertised at lower temps. But my advice is work out something that gets you as close to a steady 20 as you can. Aquarium heaters in a builders trub is something I did years ago. Now I use a heat belt attached to the temp controller .

Alternatively find a place in the house that retains a steady temp and wrap a sleeping bag or blanket around the fermenter and see how near that gets you when fermentation starts.

As to your point about increase temp , yes fermentation creates heat , but ideally you wan to start at 20 in this case and remove the heat to maintain that 20 when the self generated heat kicks in. This is why even more advanced fermentation temp control includes both heating and cooling

Thanks - that's really helpful

 

[Rob Sharpe]

If you have a house that's got central heating & some insulation you should be fine.

I wouldn't worry about it at the start of your home brew trajectory, as it's something you can fine tune or invest in later if you want to take the hobby further

Thanks - that's very much where I'm coming from

 

[Rob Sharpe]

As others said, just use your home (assuming it is somewhere about 19C - 20C) as temperature controller.

Specific yeast types require different temperatures, but it is not the case of yeast coming with the kit

Thanks. It is a bit chilly at the moment, but at you say one the weather warms up a bit, I can make a start.

 

[Rob Sharpe]

Yup. Find a spot that doesn't fluctuate too much a constant 18c is better than a 19-21c next to the radiator or in the kitchen.

Thanks for the advice - much appreciated

 

[Rob Sharpe]

A lot depends on what type of house you live in. If you've central heating then you should have no problem, but contrary to popular belief there's still about 40% of households that don't have CH. I've never lived in a house with CH.
So Autumn winter and spring I brew in our airing cupboard, leaving the door open various amounts as a crude temperature control. Summer there's always some part of the house that's in the correct temperature range, even when it's like 30 degrees outside.
If it's an ale yeast try not to drop below 18C ambient or the fermentation could stall, and definitely don't go over 25C ambient as you'll get off flavours developing. Been there, done that.

Thanks for that - that really helps

 

[Rob Sharpe]

Answer to the OP I even after my many years of brewing do not have a brew fridge but use either the room or garage depending on the time of the year or most importantly to me I use specific yeasts at the room temps I have so Beoir for bitters/ales upto 21c Kveik for IPA's upto 35c and Novalager for Lagers upto 20c.
It is better to have temp control with a fridge but not everybody has the room or as you are just starting out and financial outlay needs to be kept low until you are grabbed by the bug and make it into a full hobby.
Yeast is your friend until you progress and it is surprising how well you can make a stable temperature in specific rooms/garages to suit the yeast.
goo

Answer to the OP I even after my many years of brewing do not have a brew fridge but use either the room or garage depending on the time of the year or most importantly to me I use specific yeasts at the room temps I have so Beoir for bitters/ales upto 21c Kveik for IPA's upto 35c and Novalager for Lagers upto 20c.
It is better to have temp control with a fridge but not everybody has the room or as you are just starting out and financial outlay needs to be kept low until you are grabbed by the bug and make it into a full hobby.
Yeast is your friend until you progress and it is surprising how well you can make a stable temperature in specific rooms/garages to suit the yeast.
good luck

Thanks for the advice

 

[Rob Sharpe]

Hello & welcome to the start of your homebrew journey!

This is exactly how I started and I found the bottom of the wardrobe to be the best, most constant temperature. I also found that after a couple of brews Mrs M became far more receptive to the concept of a brew fridge in the garage as she didn't like my choice of fermenter location - bonus!
Turned out to be a good method for getting other brewery upgrade spends approved too.

Nice one - thanks for the advice and hopefully Mrs S will see things in a similar light

 

[Rob Sharpe]

As said constant temp is the best idea, in my house i found this difficult as the heating only comes on certain times of the day and drops off at others.

I found a cheap fish tank heater helped to stabilise that and cost £6 I had the flexi tub already so half fill with water the fish tank heater keeps it constant.

I have since modified my plastic FV bucket fitted a DJ sized bung that I melted a hole and inserted the cable for the heater, it now sits in the FV directly and allows it to be sealed up.

This gives me flexibility to use this way or can get multiple 1 gallon demi jons in the flexi tub

Thanks for the advice

 

[Tommo 2]

Thanks for the advice - much appreciated

You could swap the kit yeast for a Nottingham yeast which will happily ferment out your beer from temps from 14c to 22c and can even be used for lager as it can ferment down to 12c

 

[Davegase]

Before I had temperature control, I found the best place for consistent temperature was the cupboard under the stairs. No good if you live in a bungalow.

 

[Fire]

When I started out a couple of years ago I like you was struggling with temperature control. I trawled loads of post on here & decided on the builders trub & aquarium heater. These slid into a little space in the garage & worked great until I got a call from Mrs T saying the power had gone off. After a lot of searching it turned out I had pushed the trub in too far & cracked the glass aquarium heater .
I now have a fridge bought at a local auction with a thermostat heater in & recently upgraded to include an inkbird.

 

[Beer-Kosh]

I use a Peco Electric TE75 Immersion heater. Works really well and is cheap. I just had to make a larger hole in the bucket lid for the bung to fit.

 

[old dog new tricks]

Very similar concept to what I did.
I bought a cheap fish tank heater about £6 and a rubber bung for a DJ. Melted a hole in the rubber bung then cut it open to expose the hole, slipped cable in squirt of glue stuck the bung together bound with PTFE tape.

Fits on the lid of the plastic fv never tried on the djs I use them in a Flexi tub with water and that works as well just make sure the ambient temp is lower than you want for you brew as water can raise this 2c apparently