Don't know what to do

[Sciyan]

Hi

I've made a regular mead and I think I've made a mistake when fermenting. I need advice for the next step. Here my data :

Clover honey
Yeast : Wyeast 4184 Sweet Mead
OG : 1,110
After 28 days, racked it. Gravity : 1,064
After 118 more days, gravity : 1,062

I think I shouldn't have rack it after 28 days and know there is no yeast left, so that's why nothing happen and the gravity is still the same.

Don't know what to do now.
-Pitch yeast again ? What strain ?
-Bottle it ?

Thanks in advance for your advice.

 

[tweake]

what nutrient did you put in?
i'm guessing none which is why its stuck.
add nutrient and repitch a champagne style yeast, i do not what you have available to you but anything thats recommended for stuck ferments will do.

 

[Sciyan]

I add a lot of nutrient and all the other stuff that mead yeast need for mead fermentation. The problem I think is that the fermentation wasn't finished at all when a racked it. I created the stuck fermentation

I'll try to find a good yeast to restart it !

Thanks

 

[tweake]

really need ALL your data, not just what you think we need to hear.
need to know what nutrient and how much you put in and when it was put in. details, need details.

racking it will not cause it to stick unless theres another problem. i rack all mine before they are done and they all finish. most of the yeast makes it through the racking.
if it took nearly a month to barely get half way makes me thing it had other problems to start with.

i think that yeast may be the one that really finicky and hard to use.

whats your temps like?

 

[Sciyan]

7 kg clover honey
2 teaspoon wyeast nutrient
2 teaspoon nutrient (can't remember the brand)
1 teaspoon de CaCO3
Pasteurize ~70C / 20 min
At least 2L yeast starter made with nutrient/honey/malt extract
Yeast : Wyeast 4184 Sweet Mead (max ~11% tolerance)
Fermentation temparature : always around 20C
Final volume : ~21L
Didn't check the pH

 

[tweake]

would be handy to know the second nutrient.
i think you had to much nutrient at the start and probably not enough DAP overall.
so yeast started great and gobbled up all the Nitrogen and stalled when it ran out.

some of the nutrient packs are not straight DAP so the amount you use is a whole lot more.
eg require 5-6 teaspoon minimum up to 10-20 teaspoons depending on yeast.

should have been 1/2 teaspoon wyest nutrient at start, 1/2 teaspoon at 1/3 sugar mark.
the main nitrogen nutrient would be start at just after lag and finish adding the total amount by the 1/3 mark. how much depends on brand etc and how much per day depends on how fast it ferments. on a fast ferment you may have to add it hourly.

if you feed in heaps of nutrient at the start you will breed many more hungry mouths which gobble up all the food.

 

[fatbloke]

It's probably a yeast issue. That yeast is the one yeast that's aimed (by HBS) toward newer mead makers, yet those of us who've used it know that it's a finicky bugger to use.

Despite it being a liquid yeast, it seems it's still better to make a starter with it as it can be very fussy if you just smack the pack, and let it start it's own thing.

I'd suggest that the OP gets some K1V1116 and then researches "restarting a stuck ferment" for the correct technique and sorts it out that way.

Yes it will be higher alcohol etc, and will need longer ageing etc but at least it will be finished and either end up drinkable or to use for topping up other batches.......

 

[Sciyan]

would be handy to know the second nutrient.
i think you had to much nutrient at the start and probably not enough DAP overall.
so yeast started great and gobbled up all the Nitrogen and stalled when it ran out.

some of the nutrient packs are not straight DAP so the amount you use is a whole lot more.
eg require 5-6 teaspoon minimum up to 10-20 teaspoons depending on yeast.

should have been 1/2 teaspoon wyest nutrient at start, 1/2 teaspoon at 1/3 sugar mark.
the main nitrogen nutrient would be start at just after lag and finish adding the total amount by the 1/3 mark. how much depends on brand etc and how much per day depends on how fast it ferments. on a fast ferment you may have to add it hourly.

if you feed in heaps of nutrient at the start you will breed many more hungry mouths which gobble up all the food.

Before starting doing this mead, I had read on how to do with zymurgy special edition and the book "The Compleat Meadmaker". Because of my background in beermaking I didn't believe that I needed to add the nutrient a little bit each do or so. In fact, it sounded like if each day your increase your contamination risk by ading "not clean" stuff into your mead. So that's why I've put everything at the begining. But with your explantion, it's looks like thats what happen to my mead. The yeast just eat everything !

Now, I'll try to find good yeast to complete the job !

 

[tweake]

have a read up on SNA "staggered nutrition addition". unfortunately kens book is becoming a little out of date.
i've only recently found WHY it works.

 

[regulatedhobbyist]

have a read up on SNA "staggered nutrition addition". unfortunately kens book is becoming a little out of date.
i've only recently found WHY it works.

Would mind sharing? I was wondering the same thing earlier today actually.

 

[bob1852]

have a read up on SNA "staggered nutrition addition". unfortunately kens book is becoming a little out of date.
i've only recently found WHY it works.

Yep. Ken's presentation this year at NHC was very informative...I hope he's working on version 2.

 

[tweake]

Would mind sharing? I was wondering the same thing earlier today actually.

i've have a rough understanding on it so please do not take it as gospel.

basically to much dap early on means yeast multiply a lot more. so you have many more mouths to feed which consumes all the dap quickly leading to dap deficiency. more importantly the large amount of yeast use up all the amino acids etc.
large amounts of dap also interfere with yeast ability to take up amino acids.

when the alcohol gets up to a certain point the alcohol interferes with the yeast ability to take up nitrogen.

organic nitrogen plays a fairly important role. tho i'm still getting my head around and i'm not good at writing so i'll leave that till later.
but from the charts it seams to help a lot. not only when adding it at the start but also at the mid point of the ferment.

a lot of ferments struggle because of lack of nutrition rather than lack of dap.
especially in the last half of the ferment.

 

[tweake]

so really need to get inorganic nitrogen and vitamins in at the start and leave the dap out. let the yeast feed and build up on that and only add dap after the ferment has gotten going. then drip feed the dap so they don't starve but also don't have excess.