Extreme Brewing Imperial Pilsner Stalled at 1026, What To Do?

I made the Imperial Pilsner as per the recipe in Sam's book Extreme Brewing. Although I've kept it at 45F for a couple months now (I orginally brewed in on 8/2/09) it seems to have stalled at 1026. I've checked it a couple times over the past 2 weeks with Fisher NIST calibrated hydrometers at 60F as per the calibration and so that's not the issue. This was my first lager and although it tastes ok, you can tell it's not quite ready yet. Any suggestions? The FG is called for 1016 and I was dead balls on at 1088 for my OG (recipe called for 1089).

what was your pitching rate?

I pitched a new packet of Wyeast 2035 American Lager that was well within the 6 month window. I smacked it and let it swell at 70F for 24 hours then sanitized and pitched as soon as I got it to pitching temp. No apparent problems but I just can't get it to get those last few percent of fermentables.

You need to pitch a lot of yeast for lagers, even more for that high gravity.

Mr. Malty says you should have pitched 6.5 packs with no starter, or made an 11L starter with 2 packs of yeast for a simple starter, or 4L with 2 packs for a stir plate starter. I would just step up with one pack though. In any case, just pitching the pack with no starter is severely under pitching for a lager. You might need more yeast for those last few points.

OK great, thanks for the info. The recipe makes no mention of this and I'm new to lagers so looks like I'll have to repitch. So if you do yeast starters on a stirplate for lagers, do you have to keep them at lagering temps or is room temp sufficient?

Irrenarzt said:

OK great, thanks for the info. The recipe makes no mention of this and I'm new to lagers so looks like I'll have to repitch. So if you do yeast starters on a stirplate for lagers, do you have to keep them at lagering temps or is room temp sufficient?

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Room temp is ok.

However, I'm not sure I'd repitch at this point. I mean, the fermentation has started, and got to 1.026. That's not finished, but the yeast definitely has reproduced and been working.

I'd go ahead and do the diacetyl rest now, and see if it drops another 8 points or so during the rest.

It may be done anyway, extract beers in general dont have the fermentability of all grain beers.

That and you pitched about 1/10th the yeast required for that beer.
How long did you aerate for?

I aerated for about 3 minutes, 10 psi medical grade O2 with a 0.5 micron stone.

your high o2 level is probably what got you as far as you are... a massive starter would definitely have been justified for that beer. you may have more luck teasing the yeast back into action than repitching - I have never been able to get any attenuation out of repitching yeast in unfinished high gravity beers. some yeast energizer and a gentle stirring would probably be called for. good luck! I had several bigger beers stall out on me before I started using o2 and stirred starters.

I agree with the above poster. Extracts all contain different amounts of unfermentables, and I had a tough time when I was using extracts, nailing down a recipe so that it would work the same each time. I would brew the same recipe with one brand extract and it would come down to 1.015 one time and then it would stop at 1.020 the next ... and I almost never got a brew down below 1.010 with extracts.

With that said, I think most likely your beer is done. Just keg it, enjoy it, make notes on what to do differently next time. The more you mess with it, the higher probablility that you'll do something to mess it up.

cheers

~r~

I kegged this last night and put it in the fridge. I'll start into it on Wednesday. I dropped my hydrometer so I wasn't able to measure after the diacetyl rest. Thanks for all the good advice.

just be careful with late additions of yeast nutrient that someone recommended. if the yeast don't spring back to life and eat that stuff up, it makes for a terrible flavor IMHO

I had a pint of this just now and it was pretty good actually. I'm liking it regardless.