longest fermentation on record

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beachman

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I know, I know, there is a ton of info on fermentation and I think I have read it all, but I haven't seen this. I am on my 7th batch of homebrew. All have turned out well. This one is a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale knock off. sp gr 1.045 to start. I had it in the primary for a week sp.gr. 1.015, then moved to secondary. I also dry hopped it. Someplace in the middle of the secondary it got cold down here one night, down to about 45 degrees. I moved it back indoors 70 degrees (it was on the back deck). No activity seen for next three days. sp. gr. 1.014 I was about to bottle. Then it started again and has been going for the last 10 days! It bubbled this morning! sp.gr. came down to 1.010, then 1.005, then 1.001 over this time period. Clearly it is still fermenting, but it fermented well for about 3 days in the primary and then some in the secondary initially. comments?
 
I am no expert, but this very well may turn out to be your best beer yet :) Let it sit!
 
What yeast did you use? What kind of airlock are you using? What are your sanitation procedures?

I am skeptical of the final gravity, most brewer's yeast will not attenuate that low.... Does it look strange?
 
1.001 FG? That is 98% attenuation. I would be nervous. Did you taste the beer when you took your hydrometer readings? Based on my very limited experience and my basic understanding of attenuation, alcohol toelrance, etc, infection (bacteria or wild strain of yeast) would also be on my mind.

TIFWIW, I am a noob.
 
I would check your hydro with water to make sure it is giving you accurate readings...
 
I am the high possibility of infection camp - not that that is necessarily a bad thing. Looks like it infected late on in the process so you won't get the crazy sour flavors, but something relatively light (with time) that is really good in pale ales
 
Two comments. 1.001 is unlikely unless it is infected.

Also, dry hopping for two weeks is sort of not good. You don't want to dry hop for more than a week, really.
 
Brewers yeast is only going to ferment the simple sugars. Attenuation should be somewhere between ~60-80% for most beers. That is because the yeast can't consume the complex carbohydrates in your wort. If your reading really was 1.001 @ 70 degrees F, you don't have any of those complex carbs in your "beer" so something had to consume them. At that SG, you're not really going to have anything resembling the taste of beer - but a bitter, alcoholic water.

So, I sort of have to agree with the folks who already said they think you have a bug. If that reading was accurate, I'd suspect some sort of wild yeast or other bug that was introduced when you racked to the secondary.

From the troubleshooting section of How to Brew (http://www.howtobrew.com/section4/chapter21-1.html):
"If the beer seems to be bubbling too long, check the gravity with a hydrometer... If it is below 10 and still bubbling at several per minute, then a bug has gotten hold. The beer will not be worth drinking due to the lack of flavor."
 
I disagree whole heartedly with CiscoKid. You will NOT have a watery drink. If it is an infection, (my guess) it can go two ways... sour and interesting/good or sour and gross. I lean toward the above comment that because it likely happened after/during your transfer you will not be totally lost. You may not like it, but it may be great who knows.

I have had a few things get infected at my house (I have been testing how loose I can be with sanitation and now I know) and my house flora has a raspberry kind of taste to it that actually worked out with a porter I made, but does not work well with lighter beers. It was fun to try. Basically, I just set aside a small amount (1-3 gallons) of beer after primary with an open top for a day, then airlocked it up and let it sit for a long time. I never took gravity readings on these (I wish I had) and bottled them after the gross stuff on top fell back in and no bubbles were coming from the lock.

Good luck!
 
A few things:
1) Don't dump it!
2) Anything that is plastic and has come in contact with it (including auto-siphon or any tubing) DO NOT USE anymore unless you are making another brew that you want to infect
3) Clean the hell out of anything else that comes in contact with it
4) Don't dump it
5) Take a taste, if it is sour, let it sit for a few months and try again.
6) Don't dump it
 
Thanks for all the comments. BTW, I did only dry hop for 3-4 days, sorry for misleading there. I was wondering about contamination. I did nothing different with this batch, but boy, it's weird that is has been bubbling for so long. I will, of course, follow standard home brewing procedures and drink it anyway. Answers to other comments - 1) yeah, the 1.001 is probably an exaggeration, but it is close. I doubt I'm going to see any more fermentation. 2) I do taste out of the sample I test for sp. gr and it tasted the best at that stage of any beer I have done at the time I transferred to the secondary. Since then it has gotten worse with each tasting. Guess that goes with contamination. However, I will bottle this weekend and report back on a 3 week tasting. Final question - what is the longest anyone has seen fermentation go on and then gotten a regular beer out of it?
 
Maybe you should leave it alone, dry hop for a couple weeks, stop drinking it. Just an Idea
 
Also, dry hopping for two weeks is sort of not good. You don't want to dry hop for more than a week, really.

It's not the purpose of this thread, but I would debate this statement. Many folks will dry hop in their kegs and have them sitting around for 2 months or more will no ill effects detected.
 
"Also, dry hopping for two weeks is sort of not good. You don't want to dry hop for more than a week, really."

Carnevoodoo, why do you say that? I dry hop in the Keg and they end up being in there for over 3 weeks. Did you have a bad experience? You can dry hop for as long or short as you want to depending on what kind of aroma etc your looking for
 
First, I agree with the idea that you have an infected batch. Bacteria can process complex sugars that brewing yeast cannot. An apparent attenuation of 98% in a beer is unlikely to be a good thing.

Second, accidental souring rarely results in a good brew.

OT - Third, after a week of dry hopping, very little is added and some undesirable flavor can be extracted. Based on actual experience. Now, I dry hop for a week, remove the bag and repeat if needed.
 
There are really no benefits to dry hopping for more than 2 weeks total. You won't extract any more flavor out of your hops, and a lot of beers can start to develop what is called a vegetal flavor. You can eventually see negative effects from leaving them in there. If they're in your keg in a kegerator, you'll see less detrimental effects due to the temperature.
 
I had a beer get infected and get down to 1.002 once. It was godawful lighter fluid.

Don't pitch it yet, but don't expect it to be drinkable either.
 
I say bottle it. Give it the two or three weeks conditioning. Try it. If you don't like it, wait a couple of weeks and repeat. Do this about 48 more times and if you still don't like it, you can dump the last bottle.

If it tastes like crap, it's probably still better than a heiniken.
 
I say bottle them, put them in the hall bathroom tub that nobody uses and put a tarp over them....
 
Hey Beachman, how does the story end. I have the same thing going on right now. After 14 days, airlock activity showed up and gravity is dropping. Were you able to salvage your batch?
 
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