Ever feel like you've hit a slump?

I brewed today for the second time in 3 weeks and after a terrible efficiency 2 weeks ago, I was more on the ball today and had help from some very experienced guys. Last efficiency was 58% and today was under 50. I milled the grains myself at the shop so I can't guess what it is, but we missed grav by 13 points. Beer may be tasty, but I just don't feel good about it.

Almost like the sophomore slump. I swear I used to be good, maybe I've just lost the magic. :cross:

Don't worry, you'll hit that hot streak again.

I suspect most homebrewers have slumps. I've had a stretch where the FG was consistently high: AG, PM, yeast changes, didn't matter. Turned out the thermometers were both reading low, so my worts were less fermentable than they should have been.

Did the experienced guys have any insights or suggestions into why you're having trouble?

Have you kept good notes on temperatures? Are you fly or batch sparging? What temp is your sparge water? Have to you tested your PH? How about conversion test with iodine?

5gal
Batch sparge
5.2pH stabilizer
Sparged to 1.020
Collected near 7gal, boiled to 5

Here's the weird part: Our pre-boil OG was right on point and during boil we pulled a sample at 1.056 corrected. Once cooled and pitched, 1.044. We couldn't figure it out for the life of us. Between us we have 50+ AG sessions under our belts. Target OG was 1.059, recipe built with ProMash. I even set it to 60% efficiency after our terrible week 2 weeks ago so that's a miss of nearly 15 points off a 60% eff.

Iodine tested, appeared to have conversion. 2-stage mash, protein/saccarification.
Can't figure it out, but I'm taking several months off. Hobby or not, it's no fun with no answers.

RedSun said:

...Our pre-boil OG was right on point and during boil we pulled a sample at 1.056 corrected....Once cooled and pitched, 1.044.

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Wow...that sounds like an error in measurement or some faulty equpiment.

That's a pretty big disparity...and to have your gravity go down after the boil???

Is it possible to give us a run down of your equipment and some more of your process? With the experience you guys have...it's not likely we'll find something new but ya never know.

I hate sounding like a broken record the last few weeks, my apologies for that.

I had a second guy measure, then we tested the hydrometer and thermometers while cleaning up. Real peculiar, like a ghost in the machine type thing. Last time I missed grav I didn't sparge enough, just called it good when I sould have sparged another 6qt or so, at least that I understood.

This time I batched thrice, just to hit the numbers, but I'm unaccustomed to hitting much lower than 70%. Not sure what I can change. Puzzlement faded into many a homebrew after the session of course.

RedSun said:

Can't figure it out, but I'm taking several months off. Hobby or not, it's no fun with no answers.

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You're taking several months off because of the slump? Or b/c you've got enough homebrew for a while? If you're using the same methods that worked before the slump, to me it seems its just a fluke(or two) and the sooner you brew - the sooner that awesome batch will pop up again.

If that doesn't work, maybe this will inspire you:

"Any road followed to its end leads
precisely nowhere. Climb the mountain just a little bit to
test it's a mountain. From the top of the mountain, you
cannot see the mountain."
-From "Muad'Dib, Family Commentaries" by the Princess Irulan

Good luck

I think I'm taking some time off because I've got plenty HB (nearly 150 bottles) and I either need to get more friends or develop a serious drinking problem. Still trying to uncover the error of my ways, but it's time to get back to the basics...

Been drinking Usul and Weirding Way this past weekend, expanding consciousness.

RS

Dude, you need more beer! 150 bottles isn't nearly enough. Start brewing now!

Seriously, when I first started brewing my extract batches seemed to get steadily better with each batch. After awhile, though, I hit a slump. I just couldn't make a good batch. The only way out, though, is to brew your way out of the slump. Don't get too caught up with efficiency issues. Correct me if I am mistaken, but I am pretty sure that all of those batches you were disappointed in still had one very important thing in common: they were beer.

I've been feeling kinda slumpy lately. Basically hit my gravity yesterday, but it was with an assumption of pretty low efficiency. Still having trouble getting enough heat to transfer when I'm decocting, so I think I'm going to backburner that process until I figure out how to directly heat my mash.

In fact, I think I'm going to step back and just do a clean, simple, American amber ale. Maris Otter, some Munich, some medium crystal, a wee bit of wheat, Cascades, Amarillo, and US-05. Simple, clean, tasty, single infusion mash.... something I can knock out in five hours. Backburner the Berliner Weisse and American Strong Ale until I get some stuff cleaned up and get back on track.

I actually was worried about my brewday on Saturday since I hadn't brewed for about 2 months. I added a couple extra pounds of 2 row to each 11 gal recipe and I missed the OG on my pale ale by 1 and my porter by 2.

I know what you mean though, I've missed my target gravity (low) on like 4 or 5 brews in a row before. It sucks, but in a way it's good because it makes you re-evaluate your processes to try to find out what's going on. Anytime you do that you're bound to improve your brewing.

I do have newish equipment and I'm thinking that's the problem, but I hit more stable temps with the new mash tun than the old one. The saturday brew hasn't started fermenting surprisingly either, nearly 48 hours with WLP001. I'll hit it with Nottingham if it doesn't pick up and if it still doesn't roll, I'll hit it with the ol' drain. Haha.

It's not a slump...didn't you purposely brew some "light" beer for your light-weight friends on the right??? >>>>>

That's the beauty of HB'ing. Don't hit your mark? No problem...change the name of the brew.

the_bird said:

I've been feeling kinda slumpy lately. Basically hit my gravity yesterday, but it was with an assumption of pretty low efficiency. Still having trouble getting enough heat to transfer when I'm decocting, so I think I'm going to backburner that process until I figure out how to directly heat my mash.

In fact, I think I'm going to step back and just do a clean, simple, American amber ale. Maris Otter, some Munich, some medium crystal, a wee bit of wheat, Cascades, Amarillo, and US-05. Simple, clean, tasty, single infusion mash.... something I can knock out in five hours. Backburner the Berliner Weisse and American Strong Ale until I get some stuff cleaned up and get back on track.

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Not much to figure out WRT direct-firing.

Mash in a kettle. Put it on the burner. Fire it up. Stir. Turn off the burner about 5 degrees short of your target. It's that easy. It's also easier to hit your first step via infusion...in other words, heat up the strike water, then combine with grains to hit your first rest target. Any adjustments can be made on the fly, and any stepping is as easy as turning on the burner and stirring.

I do like the idea of going simple and clean. I love doing some intense, difficult stuff, then going back to basics. My latest Pale Ale was exactly that. Busted it out in less than 5 hours.

If I go the scupture-route, it'll be incorpoated in that design. I'll need a lower-BTU burner, though; it's so easy to blow right through the temps with the monsters I've got right now. What are you using for a burner? Just a 55k turkey fryer?

Personally, I've hit slumps here and there. Whenever one of my brews gets infected (which has happened a few times over the course of 50 batches), I get really down. Or, I used to. Now I just shrug it off. Though, it really did disappoint me when my bock went south, just because I spent so much time lagering it. But what can you do? At least I got through half the bottles before the bacteria woke up. But yeah, slumps come with the territory. I hit a period where I could not brew a good dark beer to save my life. I made two stouts...both were just out of control. Then a porter, which is still aging. Too much dark grains on the stouts, and what I believe was contaminated yeast on the porter. I saved the oatmeal stout with some blackcherry flavoring, but the imperial stout ended up stalling and then turning into gushers in the bottle. The porter...it's still aging in carboy, trying to get rid of the weirdness from that yeast.

The more you brew, the more opportunities you'll have for great beer. Not every one gets hit out of the park, but that's why it's fun.

the_bird said:

If I go the scupture-route, it'll be incorpoated in that design. I'll need a lower-BTU burner, though; it's so easy to blow right through the temps with the monsters I've got right now. What are you using for a burner? Just a 55k turkey fryer?

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Yep. You? !@#$

Evan! said:

Yep. You? !@#$

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Banjo Cooker and the Bayou Classic Patio Cooker. I might play around with the latter next time I want to do a step mash, it's easier to handle. You have a separate kettle for mashing?

the_bird said:

Banjo Cooker and the Bayou Classic Patio Cooker. I might play around with the latter next time I want to do a step mash, it's easier to handle. You have a separate kettle for mashing?

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If you count my new 15-gallon beast, I have 4 viable brew kettles. One is a nice, thick-walled aluminum 8-gallon kettle from Sysco. The other two are the thin-walled 7.5-gal things that came with the turkey fryers. Not great for mashing due to the thin guage of the metal, but they get the job done if I'm mashing two at the same time (like I did on Friday). You just have to keep an eye on your temps because the loss is quicker. But having 4 kettles makes it so that I can mash in two at the same time, and still have 2 free for the runnings and sparges.

I think I'm one kettle short. I've got the keggle and a nice 5-gallon SS pot that I use (and will need to keep using) for heating sparge water.

the_bird said:

I think I'm one kettle short. I've got the keggle and a nice 5-gallon SS pot that I use (and will need to keep using) for heating sparge water.

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I know you're probably not able to drop a lot of $$ right now due to the kegging upgrades that you're doing, but I highly recommend instawares' eBay listings. That big kettle was $70 shipped, and their customer service is awesome. Just something to keep in mind for the future.

Next investment's going into taps for the fridge, but I'll keep that in mind for the future....

Speaking of the Bayou classic, that's how I get down. 55k stainless 30qt, 89 bucks. Real good deal. Can brew many many batches on one tank and it boils 6.5gal pretty fast too.

That part of my system I've got down. Also, 20 marbles in the brew bot helps a ton with boilover.