Fruit flies. I HATE fruit flies.

[bwarbiany]

Dustin opened the fermenter today, on a batch of Rye Pale Ale. Entered fermenter Sun 6/7, dry-hops added Mon 6/15. He checked the beer this morning, and a few fruit flies flew out. Not good. Last time this happened it was a waste of 15 gallons that had soured on us.

I can hope that this hasn't been hit long enough to cause a problem, and that it may have fully fermented... If so, will Campden tablets help here?

What can we do?

And what is it about Rye Pale Ales that so attracts fruit flies -- the last batch we lost was also a RyePA?!

[carbon]

Sounds like you need to step up your sanitation. Are your carboy's airtight? I don't think that fruit flies are especially attracted to rye. I just tapped a fresh keg of RyePA yesterday. If your beer is foul, I'll give you a consolatory pint.

[bwarbiany]

Sounds like you need to step up your sanitation. Are your carboy's airtight? I don't think that fruit flies are especially attracted to rye. I just tapped a fresh keg of RyePA yesterday. If your beer is foul, I'll give you a consolatory pint.

Fermentation vessel isn't airtight unfortunately -- but we sanitized pretty darn well. I have to think this is something due to them finding their way into the fermentation fridge and the fermenter...

I just want it to stop. Oh, and I want to kill any bad stuff in the beer before it actually is ruined, since I can at least hope it's still okay.

[brahn]

Yea, I'm pretty sure the flies are attracted to the smell of the fermentation. I've caught them hovering around my fermenters, but thankfully never in them. We're basically controlling the rotting of grain, and it seems reasonable that flies would be interested in that.

I would doubt that the flies are in there to begin with, but maybe the first set of flies could have left eggs... I believe the flies tend to carry acetobacter, so it wouldn't really matter if the fermentation were complete since the bacteria would be consuming the alcohol. I'm not sure about that though.

As far as preventing them, there are large airtight containers that would hold your 15G batches. Maybe it's time to look into them? There are some at US Plastics, they're a bit pricey, but how much do you value the effort put into a wasted batch of homebrew?

Or maybe you could try flypaper in your fridge ...

[backyard brewer]

Without an airtight fermenter you're pretty much hosed. I've caught them around the fermenter and around the kegerator before. Never in it though and short of boiling the beer again, you're double hosed.

[bwarbiany]

Will Campden tabs kill acetobacter?

[bwarbiany]

Brent,

I suppose you're referring to these?

We need to replace that fermenter anyway (I just have never been a fan of the bucket, and I think we knew it had a limited life being a softer plastic), and buying one nicer closed fermenter may help us until we can afford to build a stainless conical. The cost of a ruined batch is enough to justify this...

[brahn]

There are a ton of options there, I think these look pretty cool. I really don't know my plastics very well, but I think the buckets are polyethylene (HDPE) so even though these are medium density I think they'd be ok.

[backyard brewer]

How about a Sanke? It's a tad small for a full 15G batch, but they make great fermenters. You can stretch a carboy cap over them. I'm going to play around with making a tri-clover fitting to convert them, but I haven't got to it yet. You can sanitize them by boiling a little water in them and letting the steam do the rest.

[lars]

A tri clover works quite well on a sanke. I don't use mine for fermentation, but I can point you in the right direction if you want to go with the tri clover/sanke thing.

On another note, I use a wine fermenter available through B3 (and probably Provisions) to ferment my 13+ gallon batches. I think it would work fine for a 15 gallon batch, as long as you use a blow off tube.

[BrewMasterBrad]

These are what I use. They work great, are made of HDPE and they are airtight. I drilled a couple holes in the lid for the thermowell and airlock. This also allows me to perform closed transfers from the fermenter to the keg by using CO2 to push the beer out.

[Second Home]

There are a ton of options there, I think these look pretty cool. I really don't know my plastics very well, but I think the buckets are polyethylene (HDPE) so even though these are medium density I think they'd be ok.

These seem very reasonably priced... Can you modify these to put an on/off flow valve on the bottom?

[BrewMasterBrad]

There are a ton of options there, I think these look pretty cool. I really don't know my plastics very well, but I think the buckets are polyethylene (HDPE) so even though these are medium density I think they'd be ok.

These seem very reasonably priced... Can you modify these to put an on/off flow valve on the bottom?

Yes you can. The bottom of the cone has threads on it. BrianC uses one of these and if he ever figures out how to post pictures, we might get to see it.

[brianc]

BrianC uses one of these and if he ever figures out how to post pictures, we might get to see it.

Touché!

I'll snap a few new pics a little later and put them in my BrewCommune photo album.

[Second Home]

BrianC uses one of these and if he ever figures out how to post pictures, we might get to see it.

Touché!

I'll snap a few new pics a little later and put them in my BrewCommune photo album.

Awesome! I am really interested in getting a few of these. Do these need to be replaced often because of the plastic or do they hold up really well?