Fementation Stopped Early

Hello,

I'm trying to brew some dark ale for the first time, and everything has been going well but after 7 days fermentation seems to have stopped at a hydromenter reading of 1.02 for the last 2 days. Is there anything I can do to get it down to below 1.01 or will I have to start again.

Any help would be great as it smells good and I don't want to chuck it.

Thanks

What was the OG? What kind of yeast was used?

it's possible you're done at 1.020, especially if this was an all extract batch. I've had a couple of brews finish that high. Both were all or mostly extract and both were good beers.

According to "Designing Great Beers" different companies' extracts have a different amount of fermentables in them. While this doesn't seem like this should be, I guess it is. If you are really concerned you might gently swirl the carboy, but don't get too vigorous with it, and by all means don't dump it. If worse comes to worse raise the temp a few degrees, but the airlock will not be a sign of activity, as you will have CO2 escaping from the rise in temperature. You will have to use your hydrometer to see what is really going on.

Sorry, but what does OG mean, if this is the starting gravity it was 1.04.

Not sure what yeast, It came with the brewing pack i brought. It was just a sachet i sprinkled onto the top of the mixture.

I just don't want the bottles to explode if i bottle it too soon as well.

OG stands for original gravity; what you're calling starting gravity.

Without knowing what the yeast was, we can't say for sure where it will end up. Each different yeast has a different attenuation; a fancy way of saying how much sugar it will turn into alcohol. If you bought online, or your Local Homebrew Supply has a website where they list what comes in their kits, go there and look and see what it was. But that does still leave us with how fermentable your extract was, but we will have a better idea if we know the yeast.

OG is the same as starting gravity. If it's only been a week give it some more time and see if it goes down, I've had brews stop around the 1.020 mark and wouldn't go any further. After a while if your hydrometer reading still doesn't change you're probably safe to bottle.

By the way, how long has this been in the primary?