My first infected batch

[Duzdisluk Infektid]

This sucks. I was so happy with this beer the first week after I bottled it, but by the second week, the hop flavor fell way off, and it started tasting more like a Belgian than an CA APA with spicy clovy-ness dominating the pallette. I also got a few gushers.

There's a brown dusty residue that rides the head and lacing. When holding bottles up against the light, there's a lot of yeast both in suspension, and coating the bottom. There's also an obvious stringy, snotty bacterial slime in some of the bottles.

After crash cooling in the fridge for 24 hrs, the bottles stopped gushing.

It was perfect at time of bottling. I bottled from a plastic bucket fermentor and used the spigot. I had taken a sg sample using the spigot the day it was brewed, and I forgot to clean it out afterwards. I know that was a mistake as these are tough to clean without removing them.
On bottling day, I scrubbed the spigot with a line brush and soaked it in a cup of iodophor. That may not have been good enough. I should have used a racking cane and played it safe. It does have a killer head though!

[ziggy]

Sounds like you could have had infected bottles too. Once bottles get any visible mold on them I recycle them. It's not worth it to ruin great beer by trying to save a few bucks using dirty bottles. Try making sure your bottles are super clean next time.

[Ozwald]

Also be careful with those plastic spigots when cleaning them. Some brushes with stiffer bristles can create scratches inside them. After I had some problems with them I only clean with soft cloths & extended soaks. I also went the extra step to mark them each time I use them by notching the end of the spigot handle with a cutting wheel on the dremel. They're pretty cheap so after 3 or 4 notches I just replace them. If they need cleaning beyond a simple PBW soak they'll get pitched early.

[Duzdisluk Infektid]

Sounds like you could have had infected bottles too. Once bottles get any visible mold on them I recycle them. It's not worth it to ruin great beer by trying to save a few bucks using dirty bottles. Try making sure your bottles are super clean next time.

I'm downright anal about reused bottles so I don't see that as the most likely of culprits. As soon as I (or anyone else in my household) empties one, it gets immediately rinsed out and put in a cooler full of PBW. They spend no more than 48 hours before being delabeled (if needed) and are then transferred to a seperate bucket of Starsan (I was previously using Iodophor, but Starsan seems to have better staying power) When that bucket gets full, they drip dry and get put in wooden case crates and covered by a large sheet of aluminum foil (sprayed with starsan of course)
When bottling time comes around, they get one last starsan soak and 12 pumps of my bottle washing pump thingy.

Looking back, I think I messed up by keeping/reusing some transfer tubing after mistakenly letting it soak in iodophor for a couple days. It stained it brown, but I thought that wasn't such a big deal. Upon closer inspection, it also seems to have created a scale inside the tubing. I'm sure that's a potential breeding ground for infection...now I know better...plus I switched to Starsan. The other possibility is the plastic spigot on my ferementor. I never felt good about that thing as it's impossible to see how well you've got it cleaned internally. Also, on my bucket, the nipple scrapes the ground when you're setting it down if you're not careful, so it's all scratched up. I think I may retire that fermentor as a cleaning bucket and go for a spigot-less ferementor the next time. I don't trust anything with threads on the cold side anymore.

[Duzdisluk Infektid]

Also be careful with those plastic spigots when cleaning them. Some brushes with stiffer bristles can create scratches inside them. After I had some problems with them I only clean with soft cloths & extended soaks. I also went the extra step to mark them each time I use them by notching the end of the spigot handle with a cutting wheel on the dremel. They're pretty cheap so after 3 or 4 notches I just replace them. If they need cleaning beyond a simple PBW soak they'll get pitched early.

Per my last response, I think you're probably on to something. What about the FPT fitting on the ferementer itself? On the bucket that I've got, it's molded right in. Aren't all those threads a likely infection vector too? Are there other plastic buckets with spigots that just use a thru hole and secure with a nylon nut and I/O rubber washers? I would think that would be prefferable as you then have the ability to dispose of/replace the female end of the fitting. And another thing...every time you remove and replace these fittings, the rubber washer(s) get scratched all to hell too.

[spiderwrangler]

it gets immediately rinsed out and put in a cooler full of PBW. They spend no more than 48 hours before being delabeled (if needed) and are then transferred to a seperate bucket of Starsan

Not saying it's the source of problems, but are you rinsing the PBW before putting it in the Starsan? If not, you are raising the pH and decreasing the kill power of the Starsan.

[Ozwald]

Are there other plastic buckets with spigots that just use a thru hole and secure with a nylon nut and I/O rubber washers? I would think that would be prefferable as you then have the ability to dispose of/replace the female end of the fitting. And another thing...every time you remove and replace these fittings, the rubber washer(s) get scratched all to hell too.

That's precisely what I'm using. If you can't find a bucket without a nut molded, just get a regular fermentation-suitable bucket & drill the hole yourself (just be sure to leave ~1/4" of plastic between the bottom of the hole & the bottom of the bucket). As for the spigots, I was using these: http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/bottling-spigot-for-bottling-bucket.html. I find they tend to leak internally (where the red & clear parts meet) & can potentially cause an infection even on their first use. Not a high likelihood, but it is possible. The more you open/close them, the higher the probability. Regardless of how good of shape they look, I automatically pitch them after their 2nd use. I'm now using something that looks like these: http://morebeer.com/view_product/16592/102270/Spigot_For_Bucket. I can't comment if they're exactly the same, but from the picture they appear to be the same or at least very close.

Some other tips, I don't recommend doing the ferment in a bucket with a spigot. If you do, by no means should you use that spigot like the bucket is a conical. Do not take gravity samples from it or open it for any reason beyond transferring to the bottling bucket/secondary. When you do the transfer, do not open & close it multiple times such as taking a gravity sample, closing it & then doing your transfer; set up your transfer & open it only once. No matter how high quality the spigot, there will be beer/break that works it's way between the two moving parts. While you can disassemble the two parts from each other for cleaning purposes, it has nearly the same effect as opening & closing the spigot multiple times.

There are going to be a lot of people out there who have done the exact opposite of what I've said with no ill results. I'm not saying that a spigot will get you an infection every time, or even that it's a high probability. But it can happen - and I've had it happen to me before really taking a close look at my spigots. It's something to look at when you're getting 'mysterious' infections that don't seem to be caused by typical sources. For a part that only costs a few bucks, it's worth it (to me) to remove that potential from the equation.

[ziggy]

Sounds like you are doing really well with the bottles so the problem must be the plastic parts. I just replace plastic tubing, buckets, etc every few months. It's cheaper than an infected batch.