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Hey folks. So a few weeks ago I brewed a 10 gal batch of a pretty generic amber. Used only cascade in the boil. No dry hop.

I don’t have a 10gal fermenter, so I have to split the batches into two 5’s. I clean and sanitize like a maniac. After I had them in secondary for a about a week, I noticed an odd film on top of one of the carboy sand not the other. Never seen it before, should have taken a pic.

So I went along my normal process, got em both kegged, carb’d and tried them did by side last night. Now, that was by far not a best effort. But it’s good. However, one of them, the on that developed the ‘film’ had a weird sort of after taste. Almost like a stale aroma or cardboard boxy. Sorry, that’s the only way I can explain it. It’s not horrible, but I don’t think I will be filling my buddies growlers with it.

Same and new yeast used in both buckets. Everything was the same with both portions of the batch.

Anyone have any insight as to what my have happened with that one half? I’ve brewed a lot of batches and this is the first time this has happened...I don’t know what I did

Thanks folks!


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Oxidation maybe. But the film on top of one of them is an indication something took hold when you racked to a secondary. Personally, I don't rack to secondary carboys at all. If you stop that practice, it will certainly lower your chances of picking up a bug in the future.

McGruff wrote:Oxidation maybe. But the film on top of one of them is an indication something took hold when you racked to a secondary. Personally, I don't rack to secondary carboys at all. If you stop that practice, it will certainly lower your chances of picking up a bug in the future.

Thanks for that. I googled oxidation and it says the exact flavours I’m getting. Dozens of batches and I’ve never run into it so kinda got complacent I guess.

Damn.


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Yea, but the film on top concerns me. What did it look like?

Very very very thin. Wasn’t quite clear, but I wouldn’t say it had any/much colour. Seemed to clump a bit of I swirled the carboy...

I just dunno...


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sounds like a mold pellicle. maybe one of your carboys was infected. It may not ruin a batch but it usually give a slight taste.

joe_r_harvie wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 05, 2020 3:47 pm

sounds like a mold pellicle. maybe one of your carboys was infected. It may not ruin a batch but it usually give a slight taste.

thanks!! The thought had crossed my mind too. All kegged and carb'd, one of them is quite good, one is destined for the woods...first time in my time brewing I've had to dump anything. So disappointed.

I'm a cleaning and sanitizing fanatic, so this really bothers me. Time to go through the gear, purge some older stuff and give everything a real good cleaning.

The fact that one of your fermenters was oxidized and had some foreign bacteria or fungal growth might not be two unrelated things. It's possible that one of your fermenters didn't have a great seal and since most CO2 is produced during primary fermentation by the time you moved it to secondary it probably didn't have enough CO2 left to push the oxygen out of the bucket.

I also use the same bucket for secondary as primary, it's really weird that a lot of instructions include moving the beer to a different bucket for secondary still. I think the transfer probably caused both issues but you might also want to take a look at the seal for the bucket that went bad, see if air was getting in. Remember that cold crashing can suck air in through the one way valve also