Looking for opinions on my methods please!!

Is there a reason why you used the Campden tablet? Bad water?

Not a lot of people like mead that's gone bone dry. Give it some time, stabilize (potassium sorbate AND potassium metabisulfite), then sweeten to your desired taste (at least 1.015).

I assume you meant EC-1118? It has a pretty wide temperature range (50F to 86F), but I'd try and keep it some where in the middle (65-72F). You may want to do some research into "swamp cooler".

Definitely look into SNA (staggered nutrient additions), using Fermaid O or Fermaid K. Also, look into using a hydration protocol using Goferm.

https://www.meadmaderight.com/

Hiya, Justsomeguy - and welcome to the community. One low tech way of keeping your fermenter cool is to use a gerry-rigged cooling system. That might mean placing your fermenter in a trough of cold water (could be your bath or a sink or large plastic box), and adding ice to the water. You might then soak a towel in cold water and drape it over the fermenter so that a few inches of the towel is also soaking in the water bath. As the water from the towel wicks the water from the bath it will also tend to evaporate and as it evaporates the towel will drop in temperature (that's physics) and that cooling with pull in adjacent air creating a micro draft which will also enhance the cooling effect. (this is similar to a device called a desert cooler where you use water soaked straw in mats covering windows to create a low tech air conditioner) Not certain but I think that you can easily create a 10 degree cooler micro-climate around your fermenter. You may need to add more ice each day. And remember, if the ambient temperature is 80 F the temperature inside your fermenter will be at least 10 degrees hotter and the hotter you ferment at the more compounds the yeast will produce. Sometimes you may like the flavors those compounds add and sometimes you may not... The harsh flavor is, I think, due to different alcohols the yeast produce at higher temperatures (fusels). They add a burning heat rather than a pleasant flavor...

hi and Welcome to our community

It's typical when people first start out to not know as much as they eventually will learn. And unfortunately some of the unknown things in the beginning 10 to create meads that are kind of hurting in a way.

It's Not Unusual when with someone first starts out they're not aware of all the different parts and pieces that are employed to make good Mead. Those are proper yeast rehydration. Those are temperature controls. Feeding your yeast nitrogen to keep them healthy and happy and lastly choosing the correct yeast strain with the honey, and other adjuncts so that it's a good marriage between the two.

What Bernard told you was true about being able to make a little bit of a cooling situation I would add that if you have the wet towel draped over your car boy you could put a small fan on there and run it on low and that would continue then to dry out the tell which would continue to wake up more moisture out of the water in the Basin and that would cool your stuff even more. One thing that Bernard mentioned was that your ambient temperature inside your vessel would be hotter than the ambient temperature of the room. When you're just making small one gallon batches there's not enough kinetic energy to really change the temperature from Ambien to the Must In Your Vessel.

But that certainly holds true as you start making larger and larger batches there can be an increase in heat from the kinetic energy of the yeast metabolizing the sugar. But is you're just now making single gallons that's really not part of the equation. But certainly temperature control is. When we lacked a troll the temperatures if it gets too warm it makes the least unhappy and when they're unhappy they make off flavors as a byproduct.

Some of that will go away over time as you both cage it although those of us that have a well-defined pallet can taste the footprint of that even years down the road.