Higher gravity than expected

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kanta

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I made a version of the st pumking clone on the recipe sub forum, and aside from a few spice alterations, and using a big freaking pumpkin instead of the 2lbs the recipe called for, i ended up with an og of 1.120. I used the English ale yeast from the first post in that thread, which has an attenuation of 65 to 70 iirc. this will leave a lot of sugar behind i am guessing, so will i need a different yeast later on, or will it carbonate properly with the addition of lemon sugar? i was shooting for around 1.080 but i guess that was overshot a bit.
 
kanta said:
I made a version of the st pumking clone on the recipe sub forum, and aside from a few spice alterations, and using a big freaking pumpkin instead of the 2lbs the recipe called for, i ended up with an og of 1.120. I used the English ale yeast from the first post in that thread, which has an attenuation of 65 to 70 iirc. this will leave a lot of sugar behind i am guessing, so will i need a different yeast later on, or will it carbonate properly with the addition of lemon sugar? i was shooting for around 1.080 but i guess that was overshot a bit.

1.120? Whew! My guess is sugars from the additional pumpkin are what you're picking up... but I'm certainly no expert. I wouldn't do anything different with the yeast, personally.
 
it was 1.120 in the dot, i was tempted to take a picture. the wort is a lovely deep amber color
 
it was 1.120 in the dot, i was tempted to take a picture. the wort is a lovely deep amber color

WOW....I want to see how this turns out. With that high of an OG, how much yeast did you pitch? Did you rig a blow off tube? Take pictures, this could get intersting. Last week i did a triple decoction and came out at 1.086 for an IPA that I was hoping to get 1.069 out of and things got very explosive. Sorry no pictures, I was too busy rigging up a blow off hose at 4:00am, while the airlocked quivered, on the brink of launching as brown funk oozed from every pour. :rockin:
 
i didn't top off and forget to mix because this was an all grain batch. 10 lb pumpkin (guessing the weight but it was large) and a mix between https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/southern-tier-pumking-clone-191381/ and the adjusted recipe on page 20. i know that's a common mistake, but if i made one, ( or several) this isn't it.

as far as updates, i actually brewed this on Thursday so I've been listening to some violent bubbling from the bleeding that already overflowed once from the small half full jar. The sound woke my oldest son on Saturday morning which was kind of funny. It's been at 66 in my fermentation chest freezer the whole time and sounds like it's slowing down. i pitched a starter that i stepped up twice over a week
 
Ahh, indeed.

Even though I was wrong in this situation, I've found on here that it is best to get information BEFORE we start diagnosing a poster's problems. Because often it IS one of those common issues we get on here all daily, so we can save a lot of time looking at alternatives until we know for sure.

AND, I've found that if everyone trying to help starts throwing their ideas and suggestions into the mix, it often confuses and sometimes even scares the OP, especially if it's a panicky noob. I've seen a frazzled new brewerssuddenly try everything suggested in a thread, as we're posting and end up trying several often cokamanie fixes all at once.

So I try to ask the questions first if the clues are not in the first post.

And as you know if a posters does give info like *hint hint* OP, whether it's all grain or not, and gravities, time in bottles, temps (as specific as it may warrant) it helps us do a better and QUICKER job, because just like a help desk in an IT department, we can skip parts of the diagnostic tree.....
 
Ok so to clarify the info from my earlier posts: This is an all grain batch of a ST Pumking clone attempt, combining the grains and pumpkin from the op of the link above with the spices and sugars of the page 20 recipe in that same thread. I used a starter of WLP002 stepped up a couple of times over a week to try to get pitching rate high enough. I was shooting for an og around 1.080 or so and possibly due to the pumpkin being much larger than the recipe called for our maybe the extra lb of sugar from the second recipe, i ended up with an og of 1.120. My question is that with an attenuation of 65% to 70% , I would guess my fg will finish pretty high, so will this complicate bottling? Specifically bottle carbonation, or will i even need to use another yeast to finish primary fermentation?
 
I would guess my fg will finish pretty high, so will this complicate bottling? Specifically bottle carbonation, or will i even need to use another yeast to finish primary fermentation?

If a beer is done, it is done, and it doesn't really matter what the FG of the beer is. My OG 1.170 5 year aging barelywine for my 50th birthday in a couple more years finished at 1.040 and that was with two different yeasts, a ton of oxygen, and lots of nutrients.

The beer ain't going any lower. And at 17.3 % abv, it doesn't really need to. So I'm not worried about it being high, because it's finished. That's what you need to make sure, not what the FG of something is, but if it is truly finished or not.

What you will need to consider, depending on the abv and how long you're aging it, if you will need to add fresh yeast to it at bottling time to insure carbonation.
 
I was assuming a hair over 10% abv and I would like to be able to hand these out for the holidays, although since its such a big beer, i think it may be more appropriate to give them out for thanksgiving 2013 and just let it age for all that time. Plenty of time for the spices to meld and mellow (3 sticks of cinnamon are sitting in there). Thanks for the perspective, Revvy. I will probably have to use a second yeast at bottling too
 
I forgot all about this beer sitting in my fermentation freezer at 65 degrees for the last couple of months. I am guessing it's time to take the beer out of primary by now, and since I am not adding anything to it (dry hopping/fruit) I assume I can just bottle now and let it age for however long...although I am kind of worried about whether the yeast will be up to the task. I plan to get a FG reading on Thursday so I can estimate ABV and then bottle, but do I need to dump in some additional WLP002 or even a different, more alcohol tolerant yeast to be able to prime those bottles, or should some of the original yeast be able to be roused by the priming sugar?
 
Racked the beer to a carboy today to get it off of the cinnamon sticks that have been sitting in there for the last 2 months, plus I guess 2 months is plenty of time sitting on the yeast cake, although I'm sure a couple more months wouldn't have hurt. FG was 1.021 and it tasted awesome, albeit a little more sweet/malty than I thought it would be and the cinnamon is pretty strong, but that should fade over the aging period. I'll give it however long in the carboy (basically until I need the carboy for something) and let it age out. Hopefully the timing will be right to crack into this batch between Thanksgiving and Christmas of next year
 
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