made my must 2.5 weeks ago it's been fermenting away . fairly steady however I have had a real problem with temp fluxuations beacuse of the weather changing. so i put heat into the room to level it . well I noticed fementation bubbles in the airlock just about stop an errant one or two every couple of minutes but last night the thermostat on the heater broke ad ran all night bringing the temp in the must up to 82-84 degrees F . DId I kill my yeast? god I hope not if so what now. also my Og was 1.134 when I opened the fermenter this morning it smells really alcoholic but my hydrometer reads 1.044 6% . I was figuring on much higher alcohol content. Am I reading somthing wrong or missing a step in the math ? I am aware of the adjustments in the hydrometer according to temperature still this will only bring me to about 1.047-1.048 . I could use a little help because I am about to rack to secondary glass for the next year or so and I don't want it to rot or something due to the 6% not being high enough or having a problem in that phase .
Now What .. where is the big kahuna
- Thread starter stonehead
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First of all, those temps are not going to hurt the yeast one little bit. It's fine. Some wine yeast strains LOVE hotter temperatures, so it'll go quick. What strain did you use?
Secondly, your math isn't very good! You're already at nearly 12% alcohol by volume, and depending on what yeast you're using, it could be about finished.
Secondly, your math isn't very good! You're already at nearly 12% alcohol by volume, and depending on what yeast you're using, it could be about finished.
To determine ABV, a good formula is (OG-SG) x 131.
So, in this case (1.134-1.047) x 131 = 11.397%
The potential alcohol scale on the hydrometer isn't really useful, since it's only giving you the potential alcohol on the OG reading.
Wlp 720 will go to 15% under the best of conditions and can attenuate around 75%, so you may be able to get the SG down to 1.020 before it's done. It'd be 15% and sweet, so it would definitely need some aging time.
Those higher temperatures you experienced won't harm the fermentation at all, so don't worry about that!
The BigKahuna is alive and well in YooperBrews sig line 
As always...She's right on the money! Your Yeast is fine at those temps!
Sometimes wine and mead ferment the last few points at a very slow rate. If all really seems to be slowing down...you COULD gently give it a swirl to get the yeast up off of the bottom. I'd say you are in good shape, but you're gonna have some pretty strong stuff for a while.
As always...She's right on the money! Your Yeast is fine at those temps!
Sometimes wine and mead ferment the last few points at a very slow rate. If all really seems to be slowing down...you COULD gently give it a swirl to get the yeast up off of the bottom. I'd say you are in good shape, but you're gonna have some pretty strong stuff for a while.
