Is my Youngs Fermenter not airtight?

Piercemeear

Hello, hello. I am brewing beer in a bucket fermenter for the first time, having only used glass demijohns before. Young's 25l Fermenter with a snap-on lid.

I cut a hole in the lid and put in a bung airlock. I've read that many leave the lid cracked and this is fine, but I'm used to the bubble airlock from demijohns.

I pitched my yeast on Sunday, saw little or no activity in the airlock until this morning. Cracked the lid and saw it was bubbling merrily! I guess snap on lids are not actually airtight, and the gas is escaping from the seal? Or am I just not snapping the lid on hard enough?

I always used the airlock as an activity indicator in previous brewing. Will I just have to lift the lid occasionally once I suspect it's tapering off?

BeerNut

Piercemeear wrote: »

I guess snap on lids are not actually airtight, and the gas is escaping from the seal?

Could be. The area around the airlock bung could also be where the leak is.

I wouldn't worry about it.

Piercemeear wrote: »

Will I just have to lift the lid occasionally once I suspect it's tapering off?

The only reliable way to tell if fermentation is happening or not is to take gravity readings.

Piercemeear

BeerNut wrote: »

Could be. The area around the airlock bung could also be where the leak is.

I wouldn't worry about it.

The only reliable way to tell if fermentation is happening or not is to take gravity readings.

I taped around the bung, it looks pretty solid. But may not be, of course.
Okay, grand, I'll just keep going and take a reading in few days.

Followup question:
I'm dry-hopping once fermentation in finished. Last time (with 1 gallon demi) I put the hops into a new vessel and syphoned onto them, as recommended somewhere online. Is there any real point in doing this, or can I just drop the leaves into current fermenter?

Thanks.

BeerNut

Advice varies. Plenty of people dry hop in the primary and it works fine.

Tube

The snap on lids quite often don't snap on fully, hence you don't get a tight seal.

If you plan to re-use your yeast then you really shouldn't dry hop in primary.

Piercemeear

Tube wrote: »

If you plan to re-use your yeast then you really shouldn't dry hop in primary.

Wasn't planning on it this time, but that's a very good reason not to!