Stuck at 1.030

Hi,

I had a Nut Brown Ale get stuck at 1.020 a couple of weeks ago and couldn't get it to finish fermenting (https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/bottling-1-020-a-95866/).

Now, I've got a dry stout stuck at 1.030. I put some "yeast nutrient" that I got from the LHBS and tried to rouse the yeast fairly aggressively. I also put it where it will warm up to about 70F (from 65F). Is there anything else I can do? I really don't want this to be stuck at 1.030 forever!

This is my forth brew. Here are my notes:

12/27/08

Ingredients used from Bacchaus and Barleycorn
* 6.66 lbs dark malt extract
** Thomas Coopers Dark Malt Extract (3.3 lb can x2)
** Cans had "178/07 10:02 DARK MALT" stamped on the bottom
* 1 lb Crystal Malt (40L)
* 1 lb roasted barley
* .5 lb chocolate malt
* .5 lb malto-dextrin powder
* 1.5 ounces Bullion Hops (pellets)
* 1.25 cups DME
* Wyeast Thames Valley (1275) Activator Yeast
** MFG 02DEC08

Process:
* Smacked the yeast activator pack at 10AM
* Brought 4.5 gallons of water to 157F in brew pot
* Steeped crystal malt, roasted barley, and chocolate malt at 155-158F for 30 minutes
* Brought to a boil
* Removed from heat and put in dextrin, malt extract, and hops
** Hops were in a course grain bag
* Boiled wort for 60 minutes stirring constantly for first 40 minutes
** Wort kept blubbling (blurping + bubbling) so had to stir constantly or it would

splatter all over stove
** Hop bag was empty when removed from wort (pellets dissolved)
* Used [newly homemade] wort chiller to bring down to 70F in ~15 minutes
* Poured all wort into 5 gallon Better Bottle
** Had lots of troubles with the filter in the funnel getting clogged up
*** I'm guessing this had to do with the dissolved hops and some grain escaping the fine

mesh steeping bag
* Agitated by rolling BB on floor for about 12 minutes
* Filled Better Bottle until about an inch above top ring with boiled water
** Lots of foam (most from the wort) came out of the top when doing this
* Put in one 12oz bottle of bottled water to increase the liquidlevel just a bit more
* Took OG reading using Fermtech Beer Thief
* Let sit for about 20 minutes to let foam subside before pitching yeast

* Original Gravity was 1.057 at 72F
* Specific gravity was 1.030 at ~65F on 01/15/09
* Put in some "yeast nutrient" and sloshed around in BB fairly roughly and placed nearer heater vent on top shelf on 01/15/09

kcstrom

Yeast nutrients at this point aren't going to do you a whole lot of good, but warming and agitating can, so you seem to be on the right track.

Some suggestions for future reference:

- make a proper yeast starter, using the MrMalty.com pitching rate calculator as a guideline.
- Use any yeast nutrients in the boil
- use Foam Control drops to prevent boilovers and blow-offs
- I wouldn't bother with hop bags and straining the wort - it'll all settle out in due time underneath a layer of yeast in the fermenter. It's a matter of preference (i.e. there's nothing wrong with using bags and straining), but it makes the process easier.

Your procedures look textbook. This is also one of the best posts I have seen as far as providing the necessary details to diagnose your situation. I think Bacchus turns their ingredients well so it should all be fresh (your yeast was packaged only 3 weeks earlier). Here are a few ideas:

You don't say what time it was when you pitched yeast. The packet should look like you put 20 lbs of sh** in a ziploc sandwich bag.

Are you sure its a 5 gallon BB and not 6.5 gallons?

It was 10am, did you crack a homebrew first? The only time I have ever had a brewing problem was when I wasn't enjoying a homebrew during the process.

You could try opening it up and pitching in a packet of dry yeast on top. Bacchus has those smaller Muntons packages for about $1.50. I always keep one on hand for just such an occasion. If that doesn't get it going again in a couple of days, read about making a yeast starter, then try pouring that in.

I thought I would try to help a neighbor. Hopefully one of the experts on here will have some ideas.

Wait a few days to see if the yeast wake up. I recently had a stuck fermentation that required gentle agitation (don't want oxygenation), however, it still took 24 hours for the yeast to get back to work after agitation.

That's also probably some old extract, assuming it's LME. 178/07 likely means it was canned on June 27, 2007. You're brewing 18 months later. That, combined with the dark color, might give you poor fermentability.

Thanks all for your responses:

Fat Guy Brewing said:

You don't say what time it was when you pitched yeast. The packet should look like you put 20 lbs of sh** in a ziploc sandwich bag.

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I was about 3.5 hours from the time I had smacked the pack and it had blown up pretty big. This was the 4th time I've used the SmackPacks (although note that I did have an issue getting stuck at 1.020 as well).

Fat Guy Brewing said:

Are you sure its a 5 gallon BB and not 6.5 gallons?

Click to expand...

Yep. I have two 5 gallon and two 6 gallon BBs. I used a blow off tube with this one and it sent a fair amount of stuff out of it on days 2 and 3.

Fat Guy Brewing said:

It was 10am, did you crack a homebrew first? The only time I have ever had a brewing problem was when I wasn't enjoying a homebrew during the process.

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I did crack a homebrew during this (my first beer - an American Wheat).

Fat Guy Brewing said:

You could try opening it up and pitching in a packet of dry yeast on top. Bacchus has those smaller Muntons packages for about $1.50. I always keep one on hand for just such an occasion. If that doesn't get it going again in a couple of days, read about making a yeast starter, then try pouring that in.

Click to expand...

I'll give this a shot if things don't start looking up by tomorrow. I'm stopping by Bacchus and Barleycorn this evening for grain for my first all grain tomorrow.

Thanks for the help!

kcstrom

uncleozzy said:

That's also probably some old extract, assuming it's LME. 178/07 likely means it was canned on June 27, 2007. You're brewing 18 months later. That, combined with the dark color, might give you poor fermentability.

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How do you get June 27, 2007 from 178/07? I believe you, I'm just curious how.

I looked for the Dark LME cans that had the least amount of dust on them. Everything seemed to have dust sitting on the top of it. I'm looking forward to doing all grain so I don't have to worry about the age of the extract.

Thanks for the response!

kcstrom

Oh, I see now. 178th day of the year.

uncleozzy said:

That's also probably some old extract, assuming it's LME. 178/07 likely means it was canned on June 27, 2007. You're brewing 18 months later. That, combined with the dark color, might give you poor fermentability.

Click to expand...

The store referenced by the OP does a very good business. I would be very surprised if they had any cans more than 3-4 months old. Now that I know what to look for I will check a few next time I am there.

Strom- I think you have everything covered, he must be right about the extract date. I am very shocked. I don't know if you would want a full 11g package of yeast at this point, thats why I recommend the Muntons, its just 5g. If it doesn't kick back up a day or 2 after agitation, give it a try.

So after warming it up and aggressively agitating it, the specific gravity is still stuck at 1.030. Even if the LME is over a year old, shouldn't it ferment down further than that?

I sort of hate to put in any dried yeast as I was hoping to wash the yeast that I used for this beer for my yeast library. At the same time, I don't want to drink overly-sweet Stout beer.

I forgot to pick up a packet of muntons when I was at the LBHS last night. I have some S-04 I picked up before as well as Nottingham. Are either one of those okay?

Thanks for the help!

kcstrom

No idea. Try searching for some threads on extra fermentation or something like that.

Here is what I would do. This has worked for me. It's not the cheapest solution, but it might be the best solution.

Buy another can of LME and another ounce of your hops.

On your stovetop, make a 1 gallon batch of your beer. Add enough LME to get to your correct OG and add enough hops to hit the correct IBUs for a 1 gallon batch. Do a full 60 minute boil. Use Beersmith, etc, to get all your measurements correct. Skip the specialty grains.

Cool to 70 and transfer to 6 gal BB. pitch another Wyeast smack pack. Aerate the hell out of it.

Carefully rack your original 5 gallons of beer on top of your new wort.

Let the magic happen.

This will allow you to harvest your yeast AND fix your beer.

Read through the archives, there have been a lot of these lately and the solution is always the same:

- Rack onto another cake.
- Build a starter and feed a little of your beer to it every day for a few days, and then pitch that once you have lots of yeast built up in the starter.

The suggestion to make fresh wort and pitch yeast, and then rack onto that, is what I would recommend, though I would let it reach full krausen (1-2 days) before racking the beer onto it so you have time for the yeast to grow to numbers that will have a shot at fermenting out the beer. It also wouldn't hurt to rack half the beer one day and the other half onto the fresh yeast the next day. You want to do everything you can to ensure you have plenty of viable yeast to finish fermenting the beer.

Simply pitching a dry yeast pack into the beer which is stuck WILL NOT WORK. Don't bother trying it. Yeast need oxygen for growth, and they don't grow well with alcohol present, so you will just be wasting yeast if you try that.

I'm betting you are not only underpitching, you aren't aerating well enough, so your underpitched yeast are running out of oxygen before they are multiplying to sufficient numbers to ferment your beer. A green apples aroma/flavor, or even nail polish remover aroma, would confirm this, those are symptoms of underpitching.

Good luck.

I created a starter a few days ago with the same yeast and dumped that in. It didn't form a krausen but there are lots of little bubbles floating to the top. I haven't taken a measurement of specific gravity yet.

I wasn't sure how to get more oxegen into it without ruining the beer, but I hadn't thought of making a 1 gallon batch that was really well oxigentated. I'll probably wait until Sunday to see how much it has fermented down. I'll report back here what I find.

Thanks for the suggestions.

kcstrom

Semi-unrelated question since the OP has fresh ingredients, but is it pretty common for old extract to attenuate poorly? You'd figure the sugars would break down into simpler ones that would be easier, not harder, for the yeast to eat.

Some bad news to report. I checked the specific gravity this evening, and it only got down to 1.026 with the new yeast that I had pitched in.

At this point, I'm just going to call it done and bottle a less than dry 'dry stout' on Tuesday evening.

Thanks for the helpful suggestions through this.

kcstrom

One more idea, if you have 2 more fermenters, you could make another batch (this time find some fresh LME), then mix them half and half. Even if you don't, you will still have a good beer. Just part of the trial and error.

I am very curious about the date of the extract for your brown ale. I haven't used liquid extract from that store in a long time. Now that I think about it, the times that I did, may have been when my hydro was broken and I didn't check gravity. I may have been having the same problem and just didn't know it. Its a good reason to switch to dry extract. I think I will be at that store in a couple of weeks and I am definitely going to check some dates on the LME. If I find any '07, I am going to ask them about it.

So I was in the alleged store today. By the way, its Thomas Coopers out of Australia, not the Coopers out of England. Anyway, I looked at a few cans of Amber and Wheat and they had the same born on date, 2007. However, the Light Extract had a date that was late in 2008. I asked the owner about it and she said the '07 cans were just shipped to them in December, '08. They do sell quite a bit of product, so these cans haven't been sitting in the store aging, they just arrived from a distributor. So, the distributor must have a warehouse full of the '07 stuff and is still shipping it out.

Maybe we can get people from other parts of the county to look for Thomas Coopers extract and check the date of the bottom of the can and report back. If the story I got is true, then there must be other stores around the country getting the same old stock from distributors.

She also did say that old LME will just make a darker beer and it won't cause stuck fermentation. Not sure what to say about that.

I don't think there was anything wrong with your yeast or extract. The problem is that roughly 30% of the sugars in your beer are unfermentable. Crystal, roasted barley, chocolate malt, and malto dextrine all provide pretty much completely unfermentable sugars. I'd say 1.026 is exactly where it should be with 74% attenuation on that grain bill.

maltMonkey said:

I don't think there was anything wrong with your yeast or extract. The problem is that roughly 30% of the sugars in your beer are unfermentable. Crystal, roasted barley, chocolate malt, and malto dextrine all provide pretty much completely unfermentable sugars. I'd say 1.026 is exactly where it should be with 74% attenuation on that grain bill.

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+1!

I had a chocolate stout end at 1.031 after a month in primary. A pound of lactose added .010, so technically the gravity was 1.021 (OG = 1.078). A lot of people seem to have problems getting recipes with extract down under 1.020, myself included in that. So I would think your stout would be a little sweeter than a "dry stout," but other than that I think you're where you should be.

Here's the math if you're interested:

OG was 1.056 (at 60 deg F), so 56 points.
7 pounds of extract + 3 pounds of unfermentable sugars means only 70% of the 56 points can ferment. 70% of 56 is 39 points that are fermentable. If you get the avg attenuation for your yeast, you get about 74%. 74% of 39 is about 29 points. So out of you original 56 points, only 29 should ferment. 56 - 29 = 27, i.e. 1.027.

It had dawned on me yesterday as I was bottling this beer that the malto-dextrin would be adding some unfermentable density, but I hadn't done the math to see how much. Thanks for pointing this out and doing the math.

Thanks FGB for checking the dates on their other cans of LME while there. I wonder if B&B ever checks the dates on the supplies they get and if they have any kind of push-back with their distributors. I'm still a noob, so perhaps over a year old isn't that big of a deal, but everything I've ever read has said to use the freshest ingredients you can.

Thanks for all of the help to all of you who have offered up advice on this thread!

kcstrom

kcstrom said:

It had dawned on me yesterday as I was bottling this beer that the malto-dextrin would be adding some unfermentable density, but I hadn't done the math to see how much.

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The maltodextrin didn't help, but the bigger culprit was all the crystal. between the 2 you had 1.5 pounds of extra unfermentables, and while they will ferment a little, you could have got this down to below 1.020 without them. A dry stout typically won't have any crystal/maltodextrin as they add sweetness (through the added unfermentable sugars).

I bet it will still be a good beer though -- just more of a sweet stout

I'm glad someone smarter than me picked up on the grains. I hadn't thought about steeping grains adding density/gravity. It pays to be detailed in your posts.