first fermentation question?

[fryguy17601]

I have some simple sugar wash with turbo yeast fermenting. People are talking about the PH of the wash. I thought you were not supposed to open the bucket. How do I test or look at it for color without exposing to air. It is bubling in my garage but I dont know if it is to cold in the garage. What is ideal temp for this? Can I use a beer fermenting temp sticker on the bucket?

[Tater]

Wont hurt to open and check.Around 75 f is good for most yeasts and sticker should work fine on bucket.

[HookLine]

A properly set up ferment, that is well under way, is relatively infection proof.

[DrTorque]

Getting an infection is bad, but not as bad as it would be if you were doing beer or wine. Take precautions, but don't be paranoid about it. When I'm doing something new, I open it up to check the progress daily sometimes. Wash your hands, make sure your meter or whatever else you put in there is clean, etc. I've never seen any evidence of infection in any of my batches, and I can get pretty careless sometimes. The important thing to do is to make sure everything is clean and disinfected at the start, when you've got a warm sugar solution that is ripe for a runaway infection. Once it cools and the yeast starts working, infections have a harder time taking over.

Check your pH if you've never done that before. If it's fine - don't ever worry about it again as long as you keep following the same recipe and you have a stable water supply. Check the pH again only if something changes.

As for the temperature, the yeast like it to be warmer (to a point), and the warmer it is, the faster they work. Unfortunately, the warmer it is - the more undesirable chemicals and off-flavors they will make. Cooler is safer, but your reaction rate will slow exponentially. When I ferment in the high 60's, it takes weeks.

[fryguy17601]

Thanks for the help. The wash is 74 F right now in the evening. What temp should the wash be at?

[rad14701]

Thanks for the help. The wash is 74 F right now in the evening. What temp should the wash be at?

You're at the low end for a decent ferment... 75 - 85 F will keep the ferment steady enough to help thwart infection... Lower than that and you won't have a good boundary layer of CO2 to protect the wash... With a good airlock there is less concern but the wash will slow considerably...

[fryguy17601]

How do I know when fermentation is done?

[rad14701]

How do I know when fermentation is done?

For a sugar wash it should taste "dry" (sour), not sweet at all... Any bubbles should be random, caused by off gassing of CO2 trapped in the trub at the bottom of the fermenter... You might see a layer of yeast building on top of the trub... The easiest way to tell is measuring the specific gravity (SG) of the wash... It should be at or below 1.000 for a sugar wash... A wash with a lot of solids in it, or molasses, might finish above 1.000...