HELP! My fermentation stopped too soon

[BikerGuy]

I need some help! I brewed an amber ale about two months back that came out perfect, by far my best home brew yet, and only my 4th all grain. I was pretty extatic and wanted to improve on the recipe slightly. Everything seemed to be going pretty good (just like before) until I put the beer in the fermenter.

Fermentation took over 24 hours to start, but when it did, it was the most violent fermentation i'd ever seen. It literally blew the cap off of my airlock at one point. It slowed down after the first day to a steady normal level, and stopped two days later. Now it's been 18 days in the fermenter, and I wanted to rack to the keg, but when I checked the gravity it's up at 1.022, when last time I was down around 1.005.

I drained the yeast about 5 days ago, but I know there's some left in there. What can I do to restart fermentation to get the beer to where it should be (or at least a lot closer to it)? Do I have to repitch?

Thanks for your help

 

[JLem]

What changes did you make? Same yeast? Temps?

At this point im not sure the yeast in there is going to take it down any more - assuming there are more sugars to ferment in there. Might try repitching. If you decide to repitch, I'd make a nice healthy starter of a tolerant strain and see if it gets you any further.

 

[BikerGuy]

I noticed a few things change during the brew process. The only thing that I actually changed in the recipe was an added 1oz of orange peel during the last 10 min of the boil. There were a couple of other things I noticed during the process.

The fermenter is sitting in a room that is a little warmer now that the weather's heating up. During the winter my house was constantly around 65F, where now it's around 75F.

This time I also had my materials overnighted to me, instead of picking them up at the Home Brew shop. I generally go down myself to make sure that the (liquid) yeast is kept cool until i'm ready to use it. This time when it showed up, it was paced on an Ice Pack, but that had long since melted, and the viles were warm to the touch.

 

[grouperdude]

did your mash temp vary from last time?

 

[BikerGuy]

It did vary more than last time. I initially heated my water to around 180, then transfered it to a cooler that i use for mash-in and sparge water storage. My strike temp was just over 170, and My goal was to maintain about 165 for an hour. When I checked it at 30 min, I was down at 160, so I added more water from the sparge/mash-in cooler until the temp was back just below 170. At the end of the hour it was back down around 160.

I also noticed it seemed like I got less wort out of the mash than last time. but after the boil, the starting gravity was 1.055, the last beer it was almost the same. So I figured that I was still on target...

 

[grouperdude]

Hopefully some one can chime in since I never have done all grain. But I think that means more sugars that don't ferment with a hotter mash?

 

[lumpher]

if you mashed that high, no wonder. the higher you mash, the fewer fermentables. you need to bring that mash temp down to 152 or close to it (depending on style)

 

[Draken]

It did vary more than last time. I initially heated my water to around 180, then transfered it to a cooler that i use for mash-in and sparge water storage. My strike temp was just over 170, and My goal was to maintain about 165 for an hour. When I checked it at 30 min, I was down at 160, so I added more water from the sparge/mash-in cooler until the temp was back just below 170. At the end of the hour it was back down around 160.

I also noticed it seemed like I got less wort out of the mash than last time. but after the boil, the starting gravity was 1.055, the last beer it was almost the same. So I figured that I was still on target...

So typical mash temps are 147-158. And the hotter you get the less fermentable sugars are in your brew. At those mash temps you fermentation is likely done at 1.022. I am actually suprised it got that low.

 

[Yooper]

It did vary more than last time. I initially heated my water to around 180, then transfered it to a cooler that i use for mash-in and sparge water storage. My strike temp was just over 170, and My goal was to maintain about 165 for an hour. When I checked it at 30 min, I was down at 160, so I added more water from the sparge/mash-in cooler until the temp was back just below 170. At the end of the hour it was back down around 160.

I also noticed it seemed like I got less wort out of the mash than last time. but after the boil, the starting gravity was 1.055, the last beer it was almost the same. So I figured that I was still on target...

So typical mash temps are 147-158. And the hotter you get the less fermentable sugars are in your brew. At those mash temps you fermentation is likely done at 1.022. I am actually suprised it got that low.

Mashing at 160 means less fermentable sugars, as mentioned. I don't think it's possible that you mashed the first batch at 165 and ended up at 1.005. I think that there is an error here and the first batch was mashed at 150, so it finished properly, and this one was way way too hot.

At 1.022, it's done and lucky to have started at all since temperatures over 165 denature the enzymes needed for conversion.

 

[BikerGuy]

I replaced my food thermometer, I guess it's possible that I measured/wrote down the wrong temp info.

Well, is it ruined?

 

[Yooper]

I replaced my food thermometer, I guess it's possible that I measured/wrote down the wrong temp info.

Well, is it ruined?

No, not ruined! Just done at 1.022. Wait another week or so and bottle it and just accept that it's not as dry as the original version.

 

[Andrew5329]

Well, is it ruined?

If the issue is starch conversion, try adding a dose of Amylase Enzyme, you can pick it up pretty cheap from your home-brew shop and if it works it lets your yeast keep working, if it doesn't, your out $3 with no harm done.