Need help quickly - I am brewing now.

Well, I am brewing an IPA with an expected gravity of 1.069.. I am mashing right now! I had a good 152-degrees holding steady, with propane heat on (it is cold here right now) to maintain temp. I set my alarm for 12-minutes to check on it, and WHAMMM!!! I come back to find a 175-degree temp mash. I am only about 25-minutes into the mash.

WHAT DO I DO?

Should I check my Gravity right after the 60-min mash? I assume it will be much lower due to the high temp. If I get a much lower OG/I suppose I can just balance the hops and call it an amber or brown ale??

Would you bother continuing?

If the gravity reads to make a favorable ABV beer at the mash stage, can I salvage the brew?

A prompt response is appreciated!

Might as well keep it going. Worst case scenario is lots of body, low alcohol and a bit sweet. Hop it like you planned and see what happens.

Worst case is a bad batch. Best case is something tasty and worth drinking.

Oh man.....I feel for you.

Conversion stops once the temp gets above 168F....and at the temps you hit you may have already leeched tannins into the wort.....but don't take my word for it....not certain it is un-saveable at this point......

I assume you turned off the heat.....just hang tight for now I guess.....and hopefully someone else chimes in with more concrete answers for you......

Maybe let it cool to your target temp and keep it there for 60 mins to get conversion and run with it.....see what happens.....

I would bring the temp back down asap and keep going. Your gravity should be the same, but your enzyme levels could be very low. Do you have supplemental enzymes to add to it? If not i would just keep going and hope for the best. Hoping someone else might chime in here too....

1) Relax
2) Take a deep breath
3) slowly apply common sense
4) throw a little ice in there
5) stir stir stir to dissipate the heat to 152
6) Continue with brew day. You'll be fine.

Always continue! Never give up. Bring temps down, finish the mash as usual. Then check a pre boil gravity and go from there. If not too low then maybe you can add some fermentable sugar or DME to bump it up. If too low then reduce the hops and make a pale ale.

It is ironic-- the first two batches were VERY good (oops, I drank them all)... and this is the batch that I said I was going to share for Christmas! Murphys Beer Law?

Therefore, am I seeing the answer that even if the gravity reads correct, I still may not have fermentable sugars?

Besides wort, what else would be a good solution for fermentables? All I have on hand tonight is sugar... but could get corn syrup tomorrow --

If corn syrup works, how much would you apply to a 5-gallon batch? I am just trying to prepare for 'salvage'

Table sugar would be fine. Add it the last 5 min of the boil. All depends on how far off your target gravity you are. Do you have a refractometer? Or just a hydrometer. If you have a refrac you could pull a tiny bit of wort with 10 min left and see where you are at then adjust the amount of sugar accordingly.

Yes, it is Murphy's beer law. I made a batch I was going to share with some friends while making xmas wreaths and it turned out nothing like expected. Drinkable, just weak.

Personally, I'd follow the suggestion of sfrisby and just bring it down to temp and continue with your day.

Good luck

okay BEER gods: my 60-minutes of f*up'd mashing is complete! My gravity is 1.058.. my target was 1.069/IBU of 47... If I adjust to be more balanced.. this puts the IBU of about 47 and I can adjust the hops and get it dang close to that goal.

NOW, the big rookie question.. even if my gravity is reading (which it is) at 1.058-- does this really mean that my wort is fermentable? Meaning, can there be 2-batches of beer-- both at 1.058 wort and one being more fermentable than the other?

I should mention as well, that the 'flavor' of the wort is rather dry... not as sweet as what I would have thunk. Therefore, probably can boost with the table sugar and not make it too sweet!

Brew day is finished. I hope to be reporting much happiness in the near future with my new electric rig, and better thermometer readings (I also discovered that my thermometer shows rolling boil at 200-degrees).

My OG to report is 1.071 - that is due to the addition of about 3/4 lb of sugar at 5-min until end. Also, reporting pre-boil OG did not account for additional pre-boil water. I boiled the batch down to about 5.10 gallons.

That stated, I am pretty close to my Recipe OG. However, I still do not know for sure that I have good/true fermentable sugars in my wort.

I left the IBU per the recipe (about 47) - It is probably going to balance just fine.. but the ABV is the only concern. The recipe shows that the Final Gravity should end at 6.7% ABV. I would be happy at this point for a 4% ABV as long as it does not taste too sweet.

In my un-experience opinion, at time of yeast pitching- it does not seem to sweet to me. Therefore, I hope this will be a salvaged batch.

That's all you could do was run with it......you never k now, might be your best batch yet!

Let us know how it turns out.....in the New Year....

Yes-- I will report back..I will probably keep this one in the fermenter until late January. Time to plan another brew and learn from my experiences.

Well, 24-hrs have past....and I feared that the yeast was stalled due to no activity in the airlock... I noticed that I had a defective lid on my new fermenter bucket. It was not sealing and therefore no activity showing in the airlock. I tried to tape up the edges, but could not get a good seal. Therefore, I bought a new lid, sanitized, and installed it tonight on this *****-batch-from hell. Murphy's law continues.

While I was sanitizing the new lid, I decided to take a gravity reading. Well, what do you know-- we are making beer. Tonight I am at 1.061 and had good krausen on top. After putting the lid on, the airlock went crazy. I know that I should realize that this beer will probably stall out before expected FG, but heck-- it tasted pretty darn good!

HBC said:

NOW, the big rookie question.. even if my gravity is reading (which it is) at 1.058-- does this really mean that my wort is fermentable? Meaning, can there be 2-batches of beer-- both at 1.058 wort and one being more fermentable than the other?

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You are reading the density of the beer. Sugar makes it more dense. Three beers could all have the same OG, say 1.060:

The first is unfermentable and FG is 1.060. Not likely in brewing, but I am sure there are some completely unfermentable sugars out there.

The second is an average fermentability. It ferments to 1.015. Great.

The third is especially fermentable. It ferments to 0.990 (it can be lower than 1.000 because the alcohol is less dense than water).

So to answer your question, yes they can be different. It is possible to denature mashing enzymes at high temp and not convert starches to fermentable sugars and get an OG that doesn't drop as much as expected. Not sure how long it takes to denature.

Thanks, and I suppose that Is what I assumed too reading past comments.
I know there is a learning curve with making beer, and I enjoy the education. I just want to make 'better' beer-- and know I have to learn from my mistakes. It is just nice to know that I may have a salvage brew since there is great activity happening right now as we speak and 10% attenuation right out of the gate.

There is hope.
thanks

freisste said:

You are reading the density of the beer. Sugar makes it more dense. Three beers could all have the same OG, say 1.060:

The first is unfermentable and FG is 1.060. Not likely in brewing, but I am sure there are some completely unfermentable sugars out there.

The second is an average fermentability. It ferments to 1.015. Great.

The third is especially fermentable. It ferments to 0.990 (it can be lower than 1.000 because the alcohol is less dense than water).

So to answer your question, yes they can be different. It is possible to denature mashing enzymes at high temp and not convert starches to fermentable sugars and get an OG that doesn't drop as much as expected. Not sure how long it takes to denature.

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... I noticed that I had a defective lid on my new fermenter bucket. It was not sealing and therefore no activity showing in the airlock.

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Perfect example of why we cannot trust airlock activity to indicate fermentation or lack thereof......although, I do understand someones angst when there is no airlock activity when there should be.....

Many professional, and amateur brewers mash in for fifteen minutes. The belief is that it only takes that long for conversion. Hopefully, your temps maintained below 160 for that long. Not uncommon to raise temps to halt conversion. I do not know at what temp you are prone to extracting tannins though.

well then, I actually was below my goal temp for about 15-min-- thus the reason I up'd the heat in the first place-- maybe we will be fine after all!

HBC said:

well then, I actually was below my goal temp for about 15-min-- thus the reason I up'd the heat in the first place-- maybe we will be fine after all!

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It will be fine. I considered a 15min mash to shorten the brew day. RDWHAHB