Vinegary smell after primary

[Camberwell Canary]

Recently bottled my second all-grain brew. Looking for clues as to why the primary fermenter smelt so vinegary.

Don't have logbook with me so forgive lack of detail.

Brewed Burton Bridge Bitter in a standard plastic setup with fermenting fridge set to 20C. Everything went as expected. All values matched BeerSmith's estimated values. No surprises.

Took a gravity reading after day 6. Smelt fine. Was within 0.001 of the expected FG. Tasted pretty good, but v yeasty (like a Belgian).

Took a further gravity reading at day 11. Had hit expected FG. Fermenter smelt vinegary. Tasted a little vinegary, but not as bad as it smelt.

Transferred to another bucket to batch prime. Smelt less vinegary. Tasted less vinegary. Still a significant whiff though. The gunk left in primary was so vinegary it singed my nostrils and eyeballs!

Have bottled and three days later no explosions!

Any tips? Is it possible to over-aerate or leave in primary too long? I used a sterilised paint stirrer on a power drill to aerate just before putting the fermenter in the fridge (but no more aeration or fiddling after that).

Many thanks

 

[calumscott]

The gunk left in primary was so vinegary it singed my nostrils and eyeballs!

Are you sure this wasn't just "the CO2 up the nostrils" effect? Free CO2 in high concentration dissolves in the moisture of the nasal membranes to produce carbonic acid which does exactly that.

Tasted a little vinegary

That's a little more worrying though. I think you just have to wait and see. If you did get acetobacter in there then you'll have 5 gallons of rather nice malt vinegar for your chips...

14 days is what my beer gets in primary (unless it hasn't finished of course, but never less). Over aerating - I believe that's impossible. It's often said that it is impossible to even get optimal oxygenation of wort even with agressive agitation like the paint stirrer and battery drill technique...

...I'm going to say it's either acetobacter and you've got malt vinegar, or its just a bit of an off whiff from that particular fermentation and everything will be great.

 

[Hawks]

I'd tend to agree with calum - CO2 up the nose can make you panic.

Also, what yeast did you use ? I have used a couple that have an almost vinegar smell / taste until they drop right out, at which point the beer tastes and smells fine.

Leave it some time and taste again, hopefully you'll be fine :thumb:

 

[Camberwell Canary]

Great. I harvested some yeast from a bottle of Partizan IPA.

Made a litre of starter. Smelt fine.

I will post back in 30 days!

 

[Camberwell Canary]

OK so after a few weeks conditioning, it tastes mostly of fairly acidic apple juice.

On the nose it's a little bit like the smell of a Hefeweizen (but still apples).

There's some hops. Not much malt flavour. There was plenty of malt flavour one week through fermenting.

I wouldn't say it tastes particularly vinegary anymore - more just acidic.

Would be very grateful for advice from experienced brewers. I'm wondering whether it was worth riskiness of harvesting that yeast.