Never seen this before!!

[brewinhard]

I just brewed JZ's Tripel recipe on Sunday. Got a 1090 starting gravity with
a 72% efficiency (all-grain). The gravity was a bit high, but oh well....
I pitched about 1 1/2 packets of fermentis safbrew T-58 (rehydrated of course)
into the cooled wort at 63 degrees. Sealed the lid on the bucket, and let it sit.

The next morning, I went and checked on the fermentation. I saw no activity in the
airlock except for tiny bubbles in suspension in the water in the airlock (always a good
sign that fermentation is beginning). Having brewed many a strong belgian ale and being
familiar with belgian yeasts and their propensity for raging, explosive fermentations, I made
an executive decision to be proactive with this fermentation as I have in the past.
Since I had to go to work for the whole day and be out of the house, and not wanting to
come home to a huge mess on my wood floors, I quickly and carefully pried off the lid to check on the fermentation status. The krausen was all the way to the top of the bucket. Now this is nothing new of course, so I simply just "placed" the lid on top of the bucket (with an airlock in place) and a gallon jug of water on top of the bucket to keep the krausen from raging out of the bucket on onto the floor.
When I got home later that afternoon, the fermenter was still @ 63 degrees with no mess and the krausen was still all the way to the top of the bucket. AWESOME... Long story short, when I woke up the next morning and checked on the fermentation, the krausen had dropped to only about 1 inch above the wort ( @ 63 degrees)!! I secured the lid on the fermenter and wrapped it with a jacket to slowly bring up the temp. as the recipe called for and went to work.
When I came home that afternoon, I walked in the door and smelled some serious rotten egg action!! I expected to see some activity in the airlock and to my surprise there was none!! Is it possible that a 1090 tripel has basically flatlined in less than two days? And what was up with the rotten egg odor? I have experienced sulfur with lagers before but never with belgian yeasts. Has anyone else experienced that with the T-58 yeast? I do know I need to take a gravity reading but I do not want to open the lid for fear of exposure to oxygen and infection. I will probably take a gravity at the end of the week and give this beer time to finish if it hasn't already. How strange, I have NEVER had a big beer finish THAT fast before!! Any info from you fellow brewers would be very welcoming right now.... THANKS!!

[BrewerB]

Another post I read involved a belgian yeast strand and rotten-egg like aroma. That's not something I've encountered but more experienced brewers indicated it wasn't necessarily something be concerned with.

Did your OG 1090 Tripel finish fermenting in 2 days? I'd find that very hard to believe. Not at 63F.

What size batch did you make? Is 1.5 packs of dry yeast enough to ferment your batch volume at a 1090 OG?

When I fermented in buckets I found it very hard to go by airlock activity. Often there were no bubbles in the airlock despite an active fermentation. Something to do with the lid not forming an airtight seal.

[brewinhard]

Thanks for the quick reply! Being the curious person that I am, I could not go to bed without solving this one. I first swirled the bucket to resuspend yeast thinking I might have a stuck fermentation due to inadequate pitching (I aerated for 60s. with pure 02). Still no airlock activity!
Finally took a gravity reading and it was at 1050 having dropped 40 pts. in 1 1/2 days! Tasted great but still the aroma. Aroma I am not too concerned with b/c it will most likely leave as the beer conditions. Well, as I took the gravity and broke the surface of the 1 inch krausen remaining, I observed that the beer had a rolling fermentation going on under the foam!! Man, buckets suck, but they are soooo easy to use!
So, still no airlock activity even though when I slightly push down on the top of the lid, the airlock bell (3 - piece kind) will rise up! My lid is super hard to pry off.... so where is my leak?
Rubber grommet, perhaps? Then why would the bell still go up? Anywhewwwww.... I think the beer will be fine, suffice my monkeying around in it while it was still fermenting. Has anyone else encountered this?

[TapItGood]

2 things come to mind:

1) Check the bottom of the airlock on the inside of the lid. If might be clogged with dried krausen funk.

2) Make sure there is enough liquid in the airlock. sometime gas is escaping the airlock you just don't see the action becuase the level of liquid is to low.

I've had both scenarios happen. Once when #1 was the case it ended up blowing the lid of my fermenter. That was fun. The beer was named Blown Lid Belgian.