Did my dry hop charge make my yeast sad?

[Shade]

So - in an effort to make the tropical hop bomb my wife and I enjoy drinking the most, I went fairly all out in terms of the volume of hops added for the most expensive batch I've ever made.

550g/19oz in total of Mosaic, Equinox and Amarillo -> 60g in the boil, 200g in the whirlpool, 250g in the fermenter dry hop, 40g in the keg dry hop.

OG was 1061, estimated FG was 1013.

After 5 days @ 18C/64.5F, I put the 250g/9oz dry hop charge in the fermenter in a hop filter and waited patiently, then took my first gravity sample at 9 days, it was at 1018. I put the temperature up to 20C to finish it off, checked at day 12, still 1018. I put it up to 22C until day 16, still 1018 so I have up and kegged it.

It's probably the best beer I've made but I am wondering why it finished so high. The calculated IBUs is 85 so it doesn't really seem sweet, although maybe a little more rich than I'd like (although I made my way through 4 glasses yesterday without complaint).

So - did the dry hops made the yeast sad? I used 1.5 packets of US05 as recommended by Brewsmith, and temperature was fairly carefully controlled. I heard one time that hops are acidic and stress yeast so possibly that is the reason, but I understood folks dry hop after high krausen regularly.

 

[kh54s10]

An FG prediction is just that a prediction based on a calculation. There are many factors that will change the FG.

All grain or extract. (extracts tend to be higher FG and often stop at 1.020. If all grain what was your mash temperature?
Have you calibrated your thermometer and hydrometer? Recipe?

.005 high. IMO, if under 1.020 and it tastes good.....

 

[Dcpcooks]

Hops/alpha acids didn’t slow your yeast down. I’ve hopped above 140 est ibu’s.
Did you have mash high? Have Carmel Malts? Cara? Sugar? There are several ways to play with a recipe to dry it out.

Sounds like you made a really good beer. Cheers

 

[thehaze]

I would not worry about that FG. As long as it tastes good, and it does, it is not an issue worth spending too much time thinking about it. Like Dcpcooks pointed out, if you mashed high and / or use some Crystal malts, it would have impacted the FG.

If it makes you feel better, I had inconsistent results with US-05 for the past 5 brews with this yeast. A higher mash temp. does affect this yeast. Crystal malts will also do the same. I get high attenuation when I mash low at 149F/65C and use a simple grainbill, with 5% low colour / lovibond Crystal. The rest of times, it will not attenuate as much and I can see it being negatively impacted from recipe to recipe.

 

[divrack]

As the above guys say, it's a bit high maybe but unlikely to be hops. For what it's worth I'd say .013 is a bit low for that level of bitterness. I would be shooting for maybe 15 or 16 for that strength especially in winter. You probably just had some hotter mash than measured but it's hard to say without knowing your process and even then yeast can be a fickle thing.

Enjoy the beer!