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Just picked up a home brew kit. THe only place I can do it is in the garage. I was gonna build a box lined with closed-cell roofing insulation and put a lightbulb inside of it. Think thats gonna keep it around the right temperature?

That'll probably keep it too warm. Ales like to ferment at 55 to 65 degrees F, lagers at 35-45 F. Most homebrew stores sell a "bucket heater" that is nothing more than a thin strip of heat tape that goes around the bucket. That, plus some insulation, should be all you need.

Splinter wrote:

Just picked up a home brew kit. THe only place I can do it is in the garage. I was gonna build a box lined with closed-cell roofing insulation and put a lightbulb inside of it. Think thats gonna keep it around the right temperature?

What temperature is your garage normally at, and what style of beer are you brewing?

Here's what I was talking about:

http://morebeer.com/product.html?product_id=16674

The lightbulb approach has some potential issues. The main one is that it may be too warm unless you use some sort of thermostat to control it. You'll also need to make sure the fermenter is covered to keep the light from skunking the beer.

Captain Ned's temperature ranges are slightly off. Most ale yeasts will get sluggish below about 60F, and are generally OK up to about 70F. 65F is about optimum for ales. Most lager yeast work well at 50-55F for primary fermentation; but after that you want to drop the temperature down into the 30s for lagering (cold conditioning).

That morebeer.com heater would probably work well if you had some sort of outboard thermostat for it. At least you don't need to worry about the effects of light on the beer...

You don't have some area of your house that generally stays between 60F and 70F where you could ferment? Some out-of-the-way corner of the basement, a closet, or something?

Unfortunately not. I rent a room in a basement suite, and I also rent a garage in which I work on my car.


I cant do it in the basement suite due to the smell.

The garage is pretty much the same temperature as outdoors, which can range between 2C and 18C this time of year, there is very little insulation

Splinter wrote:

I cant do it in the basement suite due to the smell.

Smell? Aside from the smell of the cooking beer, the smells produced during fermentation are very faint and localized to the area around the fermenter. I can't smell the fermenting beer in my fermenters unless I put my nose right over them.

Yup, most of the smell is on brew day, when you boil the wort. Unless you're planning on setting up a propane burner in the garage (or outside), you'll be doing that part in the kitchen anyhow.

Occasionally you'll get a batch which throws some sulfury odors during fermentation, but even then it usually isn't particularly strong.