First kit paranoia

[KC]

So the Landlord finest has been on the go for 9 days. Looks like its approaching its final gravity but as I took a sample today to check the gravity I noticed a couple of things. Firstly it appeared that a shiny oil like film has formed. Didn't notice it in the sample jar but the surface looked very shiny and greasy in the FV. Also there appears to be a bit of crud floating on the top. Taste wasn't too bad.

During this time a sharp drop in ambient temperature made the temp of the bucket drop from 22/20 down to 18 despite using a heat mat. I have since insulated the FV and we are back up to 22. Could this fluctuation be causing problems?

Will the crud drop out when I add finnings? My plan is to dry hop it in a day or two. Add finnings between 15 days to three weeks. Leave overnight, siphon to another bucket batch prime and bucket immediately. Any suggestions. One thing is I don't really want hops in for too long. Don't like it too bitter.

 

[Poochops]

The stress of the first brew! I remember it well it wasn't that long ago for me either. I've only done about eight or nine myself so far but I've had a filmy surface a couple of times and usually experience some form of floaty crud or other in the FV in most brews, it's clumped yeast from the remains of the Krausen and nothing to worry about. You might also get clumps floating up from the yeast cake on the bottom which can look like fungus at first sight!
If you can get a mesh bag for dry hopping I'd recommend it, the pellets make a right mess and never really settle out properly. I'd also leave them in for 4-7 days to take on the aroma and flavour, they won't add any bitterness you'd need to boil them in the wort for that.
I bottled a dry hopped Cwtch at the weekend, i syphoned it off the hoppy trub through a muslin bag into the bottling bucket and fined it for two days in there, then bottled it into primed bottles rather than batch prime so as not to disturb the new sediment.
the dip in temp you had shouldn't have done any lasting damage, just might have slowed the fermentation down for a short while. Good luck :thumb:

 

[terrym]

So the Landlord finest has been on the go for 9 days. Looks like its approaching its final gravity but as I took a sample today to check the gravity I noticed a couple of things. Firstly it appeared that a shiny oil like film has formed. Didn't notice it in the sample jar but the surface looked very shiny and greasy in the FV. Also there appears to be a bit of crud floating on the top. Taste wasn't too bad.

During this time a sharp drop in ambient temperature made the temp of the bucket drop from 22/20 down to 18 despite using a heat mat. I have since insulated the FV and we are back up to 22. Could this fluctuation be causing problems?

Will the crud drop out when I add finnings? My plan is to dry hop it in a day or two. Add finnings between 15 days to three weeks. Leave overnight, siphon to another bucket batch prime and bucket immediately. Any suggestions. One thing is I don't really want hops in for too long. Don't like it too bitter.

First your temperature fluctuations will not cause problems.
The bits currently floating on top of your brew are quite normal, nothing to worry about. And sometimes you get a very slight oily sheen, again nothing to worry about. If you have something looking like a heavy oil slick that might be different, and time will tell on that. For the time being assume you are OK.
At 9 days in you are getting to the point where the fermentation is complete and you can add the hops.If you feel you want to wait longer (why?) then that's OK. But from adding the hops I would only leave them in for 5/6 days, no longer, with the last day or two in a cool place to encourage any remaining yeast to drop. I would then go ahead and bottle (on the assumption that the SG is stable).
I would not bother using finings, your brew will clear in time without it after carbonation. And the hops will be filtered out by using the sock in the kit which is fitted over the end of your siphon tube.
Finally I have done this kit and will probably do it again sometime.