Gravity too high after 10 days?

[zacster]

I brewed up a batch of AHS Stone Ruination IPA clone 10 days ago. It has 10lbs of lme + 2lbs steeping grain, a lot of hops, and used WL yeast. This is my second batch of this. I took a reading last night and it was down around 1.022, and this seems high. The OG was 1.068, and the expected OG was 1.075.

Should I just wait another few days and take another reading? The first batch of this I did was done in a week and was down to 1.015. Should I do anything else to kick start it? I have some Safale 05 if it would help. I also need to transfer to secondary and dry hop, per the recipe. Should I expect it to drop some in there too.

I really want this batch to come out good. Last nights sample was really tasty.

 

[schweaty]

Give it four more days and then check it again or just leave it in primary until fermentation is done. You could GENTLY agitate the carboy to help the flocculated yeast get back into action. Have you been taking frequent hydrometer readings? Also, what is the temp you are fermenting at?

 

[zacster]

I took a reading a few days ago and it hasn't really dropped. The sample from last night was a little sweet, although it definitely has alcohol. The temp is around 67.

Maybe I should take my sanitized racking cane and give it a gentle stir to get the yeast going again.

 

[zacster]

I took another measurement last night and it was still at 1.022, five days later. I'm tempted to add a half package of Safale #5 that I have. Should I try that? I don't know what else to do. The samples taste great so I want this to finish.

 

[McGarnigle]

I can't imagine pitching half a pack of dry yeast will do anything. The yeast probably won't respond to such an alcoholic environment, and you already have tons of yeast cells in your fermenter. Stirring or warming could help.

 

[ArcaneXor]

Ramp up the temp and agitate the *sealed* carboy - you don't want to be introducing oxygen into it. If that doesn't do the trick, pitch a couple of packets of an attenuative dry yeast (maybe along with a quarter pound of dextrose and 1 tsp of yeast nutrient to give them something easy while they acclimate), or make a big ass starter out of an attenuative liquid strain.

 

[zacster]

Here's an update.

After an additional month in the primary, I transferred it to the secondary today and added the hops. I purposely stirred up the sediment a bit so it would transfer some yeast FWIW. The hydrometer read 1.020 so it was a little lower. I don't expect it to decrease any more at this point. It tasted fine so I'm not too worried. I wasn't leaving it in the primary on purpose, I just didn't get around to it.

Would it be a good idea to cut back a bit on the bottling sugar after I let it sit another 2 weeks or so? Or should I just follow the directions?

 

[zacster]

Another month+ later, I finally found time to bottle it. Over the month I've noticed that it never stopped bubbling. I put starsan in the airlock, so when it bubbles it leaves a trail and I could tell how quickly it bubbles by how large or small the resulting foam bubbles are. Anyway, when I took a gravity reading I was shocked to see that it was at 1.012! That's almost 80% attenuation from the original 1.068 (and I think it was actually higher.) It seemed to be stuck at 1.020 or so but patience is a virtue with this. The tasting was the important thing. WOW. A great beer. It had LOTS of alcohol as you'd expect with that kind of gravity drop.

The one thing that changed was the temp. It is June after all and my house is getting warmer, although the weather so far this year has been horrid. We're on our 8th straight day of rain.

I used mostly 22oz bottles for this one, only 3 Grolsch bottles that were small. I'll have to resist tasting this before it is done.