Hoping to avoid posting, I've read through many, many posts about people not hitting their target OG, but none quite the same situation as I have.
I was brewing an AG recipe for a Racer 5 clone. This is only my second AG, but the first (a St. Rogue Red Ale clone) has been in the bottle for almost 4 weeks and is awesome, so perhaps I had inflated confidence. All went well with the mashing process, I hit the all the temps, right amounts of grain and water, and the color was actually a little darker than I anticipated for a Racer 5 clone. Nevertheless, the boil went as expected and I cooled, transferred to primary fermentor (had about 6 gal post boil so no new water added) and took an OG . . . 1.011. I doubted it, so i tinkered a bit with the positioning of the hydrometer in case it was stuck, and still the same. Tested plain water, and it was 1.000.
I went ahead and pitched the yeast and it was bubbling within 18 hours, but finished within 48 hours. It's still in primary (10 days now, with no action in 8).
2 things come to mind as possible culprits (beside simply a faulty reading for whatever reason): First, this being my second AG, I really don't know what a good crush on the grain should look like. I used the grain mill at the local brew store, and ran it through twice. Same store and grain mill from which I got my first batch for the Rogue clone 3 wks prior, for which I only ran through once and hit all the right OG/FG readings. But being new, I still don't know exactly what the crushed grain should look like - - to me it didn't look THAT much different than it did before the crush, but just chalkier; it didn't look broken up or ground up, and there was little any powder.
The second issue was that inside my mash tun (chest cooler), i was using a 3' braided stainless steel as a filter, and i think a lot of grain may have gotten under it, resulting in much of the liquid being drained coming from high in the grain bed.
But 1.011? Even with uncrushed grain, is that possible? In all the posts I've read, I don't see anything CLOSE to that low, regardless of what's gone wrong. Any ideas? (and I'll gladly accept brewmaster-error feedback if that's the problem).
Grain bill:
12.5 lb Pale Malt(2-row) America
1.8 lb Wheat Malt America
0.7 lb Crystal 20L America
0.5 lb Caramel Pils Malt Belgium
I was brewing an AG recipe for a Racer 5 clone. This is only my second AG, but the first (a St. Rogue Red Ale clone) has been in the bottle for almost 4 weeks and is awesome, so perhaps I had inflated confidence. All went well with the mashing process, I hit the all the temps, right amounts of grain and water, and the color was actually a little darker than I anticipated for a Racer 5 clone. Nevertheless, the boil went as expected and I cooled, transferred to primary fermentor (had about 6 gal post boil so no new water added) and took an OG . . . 1.011. I doubted it, so i tinkered a bit with the positioning of the hydrometer in case it was stuck, and still the same. Tested plain water, and it was 1.000.
I went ahead and pitched the yeast and it was bubbling within 18 hours, but finished within 48 hours. It's still in primary (10 days now, with no action in 8).
2 things come to mind as possible culprits (beside simply a faulty reading for whatever reason): First, this being my second AG, I really don't know what a good crush on the grain should look like. I used the grain mill at the local brew store, and ran it through twice. Same store and grain mill from which I got my first batch for the Rogue clone 3 wks prior, for which I only ran through once and hit all the right OG/FG readings. But being new, I still don't know exactly what the crushed grain should look like - - to me it didn't look THAT much different than it did before the crush, but just chalkier; it didn't look broken up or ground up, and there was little any powder.
The second issue was that inside my mash tun (chest cooler), i was using a 3' braided stainless steel as a filter, and i think a lot of grain may have gotten under it, resulting in much of the liquid being drained coming from high in the grain bed.
But 1.011? Even with uncrushed grain, is that possible? In all the posts I've read, I don't see anything CLOSE to that low, regardless of what's gone wrong. Any ideas? (and I'll gladly accept brewmaster-error feedback if that's the problem).
Grain bill:
12.5 lb Pale Malt(2-row) America
1.8 lb Wheat Malt America
0.7 lb Crystal 20L America
0.5 lb Caramel Pils Malt Belgium