Temp Control or Not

[40oz]

I live in San Diego CA, and most of the time throughout the whole year it's about 72-75 ambient room temperature.

I have been brewing a lot of IPA's and Pal Ales. I was looking into possibly buying a few temperature controls for my SS Brew Buckets and now SS 14 Gal Chronical Fermenter

Will those few degree's lower from the ambient temps I already have here make a big improvement in taste?

 

[CA_Mouse]

Remember that fermentation will raise the internal temperature of your fermenter as much as 10*F. I live about 90 miles north of you and ferment in a chamber with an A/C unit to keep temperatures in the 64-68*F range for all of my ales, ciders and meads.

The better you can control your fermentation temperature, the better your beer will be. In my case it made a lot of difference.

 

[JONNYROTTEN]

Your actual ferment temp will be at or close to 80 deg way to hot.If you have the space by a used chest freezer on craigslist and an Inkbird controller.For around a $100 you could be set

 

[csurowiec]

I have found that temp control helps a ton. Both in making a better tasting beer and better consistency batch to batch. If you are making the same recipe multiple times, temp control will help it taste the same each time.

 

[JonM]

Temp control will open a whole new world to you - Altbier and Scottish Ale yeasts like mid to upper 50s, hefeweizen yeast loves 62-64, the awesome 002/1968 likes to be at 64, and then there are lagers ...

Temp control is worth every penny.

 

[timdsmith72]

Short answer, YES!
Longer answer, This:

Remember that fermentation will raise the internal temperature of your fermenter as much as 10*F. I live about 90 miles north of you and ferment in a chamber with an A/C unit to keep temperatures in the 64-68*F range for all of my ales, ciders and meads.

The better you can control your fermentation temperature, the better your beer will be. In my case it made a lot of difference.

 

[40oz]

Thanks for the replies, temp controls it is!.

My temperature isn't that far off....ambient vs fermenter, but after thinking about consistency, that would make more sense about temp control. I was think about buying the SS temp control system.

Thanks a bunch I appreciate it!

 

[SFC Rudy]

What they all said.

 

[mongoose33]

Since I haven't done an exbeeriment checking to see the effect temp control has on my beer I can't offer a definitive answer--but there are several "it depends" issues as well as my own particular answer.

Some beers simply won't work well at higher temps, which really limits what you can do. And as others have noted, fermentation raises the wort temp perhaps up to 10 degrees above ambient. My ambient is about 65 degrees but left to itself my beers will get to 70 to as much as 72 degrees while fermenting.

I started paying more attention to fermentation temperatures at about my 5th or 6th batch. It may be a coincidence but that's about when I started to produce beers I'd rather drink than what they serve at the local pub. Seriously; I sit there drinking theirs while thinking "I wish this were mine."

You might be able to test this using a swamp cooler. There's a thread in which that discussion is ongoing. That swamp cooler will likely drop your fermentation temps 5-7 degrees depending on how you do it. This would let you examine the role temp plays in your own brewing without spending much at all to test. And you can get more cooling out of it if you drip water onto the cooler and/or use a fan to promote evaporation.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=593167

As to whether my beer is better with temp control? All I know--and I'm knocking on wood as I write this--is that since I started doing it, I've only produced one beer that I wasn't WOWed by, and that may be due to trying first-wort hopping without having accounted for the increase in bitterness.

People ask this question over and over here and the overwhelming response is to control your fementation temps. I can't recall reading a post from anyone where they say it doesn't matter. Do it.

 

[corkybstewart]

I've been brewing since 1992, and obviously my process has evolved dramatically over the years. The one thing I recommend to brewers who want to raise the quality of their beer is to get fermentation temps under control, using the optimum temp for each variety of yeast. Other things (like mash temp stability, long vigorous boiling)make a difference, but nothing improves your beer like regulating temp control.

 

[40oz]

It may be a coincidence but that's about when I started to produce beers I'd rather drink than what they serve at the local pub. Seriously; I sit there drinking theirs while thinking "I wish this were mine."

LoL, I'm already there, that's funny though

 

[skraeling]

Will it make a difference? Yes. Will that difference always be perceptible? Maybe.

Its one more thing that you can actually physically control. You cant make your yeast do things by sheer will. You cant ferment the beer yourself.

You can control the temp.

If temp control didnt matter why do breweries bother doing it? Consistency.

It is ONE variable that you can easily remove from the equation of good beer.

 

[lawrenjl]

I ferment most of my ales at 65 degrees year round and they turn out great. Also, I have the ability to make a saison in the dead of winter and ferment it at 90 degrees. Another capability is the ability to cold crash. In short, control you fermentation environment!

 

[ChelisHubby]

I found that by control fermentation temps I can taste the differences in a good recipe and one that is just fair. The difference is huge in the flavors the yeast produce. If the wort is kept at 66 to 68 depending on the yeast it will taste much cleaner than a wort that was allowed to reach 74 degrees for only a day.