Broken hydrometer and don’t know when to secondary…

SO I brewed a pale ale on December 3rd with the following recipe:

12.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 82.76 %
1.50 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 10.34 %
1.00 lb Carafoam (2.0 SRM) Grain 6.90 %

1.00 oz Summit [18.50 %] (60 min) Hops 59.4 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.90 %] (30 min) Hops 14.5 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.90 %] (15 min) Hops 9.4 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (5 min) Hops 3.5 IBU

When I went to grab my hydrometer to test OG, it flew out of the tube and broke, so I want able to get a reading. I did check for conversion and tasted it and it was very sweet.

I fermented with rehydrated us-05 and it has been fermenting ever since. Heres the thing. Normally my ferments take about a week, with a few strong days of bubbling and then it tapers off. This one however was different, it has been at a slow bubble for two weeks now. During the first week the temp spiked to about 74 so I had to crack a window in the basement bathroom where it was fermenting to cool it off a bit. I checked this morning and it is now giving me a bubble every 20 seconds. Which it has for a week now.


I have no way to check gravity since I don’t live near a LHBS and have to order online. Should I wait until bubbling stops? From beersmith it tells me this is about a 1.067 OG (assuming my so so 65% efficency- don't ask...) so taht could explaion teh longer fermenting time.. Should I taste it to see if its OK? Or should I just RDWAHAHB?

3 weeks or 8 days after action has stopped.

I would just order a new hydrometer (or three) and leave the beer alone until the new one gets there. If you're kegging, and it tastes good to you you could go ahead and keg it, but I wouldn't bottle without a gravity reading. If you won't want to get a hydrometer yet, I'd let it sit for a month before bottling.

Get a new hydrometer? They're about $5-6, and by the time it shows up you'll have nice clear beer, and no worries of bottle bombs.

Never even look at the air lock in regards to fermentation progress.

Lol, I have a hydrometer, but never look at it.

3 weeks or so primary.

1 month if you aren't going to secondary.

Unless you are going to a competition, who cares what the OG, FG, or ABV is?

Don't sweat it.

My first 16 or so batches I used the hydrometer.

After they all did about the same thing, I got lazy and stopped taking readings.

As long as you don't bottle early, nothing you do with the hydrometer will make the beer any better.

Hell, I might just mail you mine if I can find it.

Yeah, I've found that measruing exact hop additions and hydrometer readings aren't super necessary. I only do it to know where I am, what numbers im hitting, etc. I also want to make sure if Is tumble across a fabulous beer, I have notes on what I did.

4 weeks and bottle it

HexKrak said:

Get a new hydrometer? They're about $5-6, and by the time it shows up you'll have nice clear beer, and no worries of bottle bombs.

Never even look at the air lock in regards to fermentation progress.

Click to expand...

+1

leave it in primary for a month, don't worry about the secondary, and order a new hydrometer online.

well, I am dry hopping with cascades in the secondary for a week. I figure ill wait it out another week, add my dry hops and go home for christmas and let it do its thing.

gonna need a new hydrometer so hope you ordered one already. It can't hurt to let it go another 4 to 7 days for the hydrometer to arrive. Hydrometer or now, a Dec 3rd brew would be a minimum of 21 days until I go to my keg, sometimes I wait a solid 4 weeks.
So you could have a new hydrometer before the 3 weeks from brew date arrives.

Just ordered two new ones. Wish they made hard plastic ones...

HexKrak said:

Get a new hydrometer? They're about $5-6, and by the time it shows up you'll have nice clear beer, and no worries of bottle bombs.

Never even look at the air lock in regards to fermentation progress.

Click to expand...

+1. They only bounce once