Where to brew a lager!? (temperature trouble)

[ale1125]

Hey guys,

So I am thinking of brewing an american lager, or a Mexican cerveza. I might buy the all-grain ingredients pack from the homebrewcompany... or I might buy the ingredients for a corona-clone but struggling to find a good recipe & will probably cost more.

Question - Literally where should I have my 6 gal fermentation bucket/s during fermentation?

I live in east-anglia/south east England - so considering these temperatures - are garage temperatures ok as of now? I assume room temperature brewing is not ok for lagers, unlike ales?

My thinking on potential problems for brewing a lager in the garage --> Temperatures (especially in summer) change dramatically from night to day, but then in the winter it gets too cold in the night and still cold in the day. So when on earth do I brew a lager??

I am concerned to brew an excellent lager i'm going to have to purchase some sort of crazy expensive temperature regulator and brew in the garage. I just hope the garage is ok.

Thanks for any advice!

 

[Dads_Ale]

For a true lager then you need lager yeast they requires a low fermentation temperature. If you do not have the means to achieve this low temp on a constant basis then consider using lager ingredients but US05 American ale yeast that will ferment at normal ale temps. not authentic but gives a perfectly acceptable pseudo lager.:-(

 

[ale1125]

For a true lager then you need lager yeast they requires a low fermentation temperature. If you do not have the means to achieve this low temp on a constant basis then consider using lager ingredients but US05 American ale yeast that will ferment at normal ale temps. not authentic but gives a perfectly acceptable pseudo lager.:-(

So how do I go about achieving these constant required temperatures? Keep the bucket in a constant temp. fridge? There must be some standard way of doing it.

 

[Dads_Ale]

I believe you would need a converted fridge that can maintain a constant low temp (suitable for the yeast you are using but usually about 10c). This usually means adding a st1000 temp controller ( not that difficult or expensive) to a standard fridge. Biggest sticking point is convincing SWMBO that you need a dedicated brewing fridge

 

[Scaff]

I keep mine in a cupboard in my office (converted loft) with a thermometer and a small green house heater with a thermostat set at 25degrees, I don't think it ever come on as the room is always warm and well insulated.

Years ago I had it under the stairs, insulated the walls with a foam type sheet and had another greenhouse heater.

You don't need a lot of room if it's just a 25l bin or 2. Perhaps knock something up and use some solid insulation like kingspan in it, cover the bin in a duvet if needed?


Scaff

 

[serum]

I keep mine in a cupboard in my office (converted loft) with a thermometer and a small green house heater with a thermostat set at 25degrees, I don't think it ever come on as the room is always warm and well insulated.

Years ago I had it under the stairs, insulated the walls with a foam type sheet and had another greenhouse heater.

You don't need a lot of room if it's just a 25l bin or 2. Perhaps knock something up and use some solid insulation like kingspan in it, cover the bin in a duvet if needed?


Scaff

For lager you'll probably want to use a fridge rather than a heater as you'll need to get the temp lower than ambient rather than higher at this time of year.

Lager works well when colder, check the kinds of yeast you want to use for guidance. This article might be quite helpful:

http://byo.com/stories/issue/item/9-10-keys-to-great-lager

 

[ale1125]

Thanks for the help, I'm probably going to start looking at getting a dedicated brewing fridge for the garage.

I've found a few articles about how to set up a lager fridge.

https://byo.com/stories/issue/item/1082-temp-controlled-fridge-projects

http://beersyndicate.com/learning_resources/beer_tutorials_view.asp?id=22


My only problem reading these unless i'm being an idiot is that the American authors seem to interchangeably use "fridge", "refrigerator" and "freezer" - which leaves me confused as to whether I should buy a fridge or a freezer for this??

You'd think a fridge would be cold enough, but perhaps freezers are easier for temperature control?? I don't know.

Then the second article links to an example temperature controller - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...B0002EAL58&link_code=as3&tag=wwwbeersyndic-20

which has "freezer" in its title, brilliant.

 

[Dads_Ale]

I don't think you can use a freezer as the shelves act as the cooling circuit and you need to take them out to get the FV in. At least our undercounted one is like this.
The fridge temperature controls are a bit hit and miss and generally are set too low if you want to keep it about 10c. You would need a separate controller, search for st1000 on the various home-brew forums or youtube and you should find info on how to make your own or there are pre made units on eBay from time to time. They have hot and cool outlets and you simply plug the fridge lead into the cool side and a small heater (if require) into the heat side.

 

[Dave1970]

as said you need an STC-1000, a fridge or freezer and a tube heater (or some other source of heat but the tube heater is imho the best option).
STC-1000 gets built into an enclosure with 2 plugs - you could buy one from here but it's obviously a lot cheaper to build your own - plenty of instructions available for doing this on this and other forums.
Fridges or freezers can work, the advantage of fridges is that the compressor is designed for more on & offs, a freezer on the other hand will need more protection from too many on/offs - fortunately the STC-1000 does have a compressor protection function built in so you'd want to set the time delay on that higher. My fridge will only get down to about 2 degrees and a freezer would go lower which would be good for lagering, but makes little difference for fermentation.
Freezers can also get condensation that rots the bottom of the freezer, being designed to be below freezing they're not built for moisture

 

[the_kitchen_brewer]

If you're feeling very flush then this thing looks cool:

http://www.brewjacket.com/

About £180+Delivery+VAT+Import Duty and I presume it will need a step down transformer since it's designed for the US market.

I don't drink enough lager to justify one myself, but if it works as well as they say it does (and at this stage it's a bit of a gamble tbh) where you just set the temperature and it does the rest, and doesn't take up a lot of space then it could be a bit of a winner, and hopefully the price will come down.

 

[Dave1970]

Clever looking bit of kit but it only cools, OK in the house but if you're looking to brew in the garage year round it's no use.

 

[the_kitchen_brewer]

Clever looking bit of kit but it only cools, OK in the house but if you're looking to brew in the garage year round it's no use.

That's a good point actually. I do all my brewing in the house, but I believe proper lager yeast creates rotten egg smell whilst fermenting so you wouldn't want that in the house!

I did read on their kickstarter that if it's successful they plan to do one that heats as well, will be interesting to see what happens!

 

[brewpirate]

Once you get temperate control I highly recommend the 2 week quick lager schedule. I have used it a couple of times and works great. If you are a bit of a nerd check out brewpi

If you can keep the temp in the mid to low 60's you may want to use a clean yeast like US-05. You can get a similar character but use a little less hops as a mexican yeast seems to knock back the hop character while a clean lager lets it shine though.

Good luck!

 

[walshman]

Hi guys I have started my first lager off , a Coopers continential in the fridge in tne shed I go in twice a day and check the temp in the fridge . When it gets to about 14 i turn it on until the temp gets to 9 or 10 then turn it off again , Its been in there fot two weeks now , bubbling every 40 seconds or so . I hope its worth the wait !