Stuck Fermentation?

[Deuchar]

I have just recently started homebrewing and my first batch was created using an extract kit - Woodforde's Norfolk Nog dark ale to be exact. This batch is still in my fermentation bin (I only have a primary fermenter at the moment) 10 days after pitching the yeast.

Fermentation was quite vigourous over the first 3 or 4 days but has subsided since then although there still seems to be a bubble or two every now and again. The starting gravity was approx 1.041 and currently sits at approx 1.020 and stubbornly refuses to go any lower. My fermenter has been kept between 17 and 21C (65F-ish).

My questions are:

Should I cut my losses and rack into bottles now (despite the relatively high SG which is well above the recipe final gravity of 1.010 - 1.014) or should I just keep on waiting in the hope that the SG will creep lower?

If I rack now, should I cut down on the priming to prevent burst bottles?

Thanks in advance!

 

[80/-]

Hi Deuchar (great pint BTW!),

I've recently started homebrew from kits as well and seldom get the FG down to below 1,018 on the Muntons kits I've used so far.

I've left the beer fermenting for anything between 2 to 3 weeks without any problems, so if you have the patience, I'd wait to see if the FG comes down any lower.

If it doesn't - I wouldn't worry too much - all of the beers I have bottled at 1.018 to 1.020 have been fine in the bottle with the stated amount of priming sugar. Note I use plastic bottles, so the worst I have to worry about is spilt beer - if you use glass, you might want ot be a bit more careful.

HTH

A

 

[Deuchar]

Cheers 80/-. I'll be a bit more patient and maybe leave bottling to the weekend.

 

[Janx]

Just wait. Let the yeast settle out. Don't worry about the &%*^%&$ hydrometer readings. Beer doesn't know what gravity you expect it to be. It's done when it's done. Let your beer sit another week or two and it will taste better and who cares what the gravity is.

Hydrometers - making new brewers feel like something is wrong when it isn't for over 50 years. Cheers!

 

[D-brewmeister]

Hydrometers - making new brewers feel like something is wrong when it isn't for over 50 years. Cheers!

Word, I use a hydro, but I am one of those anal brewers who wants to know exactly what is going on at all times. It really has more to do with nerding out than it does with making good beer. If you follow good methods, and it sounds like Duchar is doing fine, there is little to wory about. Of course, having a secondary makes letting the beer sit for a while to assure full ferment a bit better (less chance that yeasty flavors can sneak in there), and I think that sometimes the act of racking the beer from one vessel to the other can stimulate that last little bit of fermentation (as does any form of disturbance of the fermenter -- just see how many people have their secondary fermentation act up when they move the carboy in preparation for racking to a bottling bucket!). Another factor to consider is the composition of the extract being used, something which you have no controll over (one reason to move toward all grain). When you buy a batch of extract, you have no idea what ratio of fermentable to unfermentable sugars is there, so predicting with any precision what your F.G. should be is darn near imposible. So basically, I wouldn't worry about a thing with this batch, Duchar, go with the flow, have a homebrew, yada yada.

 

[uglygoat]

what's a hydrometer?

one week in primary, two weeks in secondary two weeks in bottle should be good, unless you know you put a lot of fermentables in it. then give it a month in the secondary and maybe similar in bottle...