Krausen out of airlock

[geobotsar]

Hi guys
I put my beer last night into the FV and went for sleep.
Wake up this morning to find the krausen coming out of the airlock viciously.
Is there something i can do to save the beer? It is a 27 Litre Young FV, the beer was up to the 21Litres. Now the krausen is up to the lid and coming out of the airlock.

[Cully]

Don't worry about it. You dont need an airlock anyway, its just a way to get you to buy more stuff. You dont really need a lid on your Fv - we only put one on to stop the cat or the kids falling in. Beer has been brewed in " yorkshire squares" - big slate open top vats - for hundreds of years. Fermentation creates a layer of CO2 which sits on top of the beer and protects it. You don't need to save your beer, just crack the lid on the fv and everything will be fine.

[geobotsar]

Thanks Cully. I read somewhere about a blowoff tube, so i constructed one with my siphon.
Isnt there a chance of contamination if i take the lid off?
Thanks for your help

[Kev888]

The fermentation trying to escape is pretty common, especially if your FV is a bit on the small side. Its not ideal (obviously) but ts unlikely that the beer will be harmed, unless you clean it up with a dirty rag or something in the excitement. The blow off tube will help reduce the mess so that sounds like a good idea.

Its good to keep flies and spores/dust etc out of the fermenter; taking the lid off briefly is normally not much of a risk at all, but I'd advise against open fermenting - some breweries do it but the environment for most homebrewing is less set up for that.

You don't need an air-tight seal though, so its fine to crack the lid open a tad or loosely cover it with a (sanitised) teatowel or something if thats of any benefit. One thing I've started doing recently if the yeast gets excited is to prop the lid open a bit and drape some cloth over it all, but if your blowoff tube works thats probably better - my lid isn't sealed well enough to make one practical.

Cheers
Kev

[arfurpint]

same here and that's a relief. On my 2nd extract brew and from what I've read it seems to be OK but always good to get a 2nd opinion. My 1st extract went OK and is still conditioning. I roused this one after 24 hours and it went nuts foaming up the place. It's safe to go back in the room now.