General final gravity u

My last couple batches, ales the final gravity reading was 1.020 or a little higher. That’s after 1 week primary fermentation and another week secondary fermentation!! They look and taste alright but seems high to me. Using white labs America ale blend and use a starter. WLP060. Was hoping or higher alcohol content. What’s up??

My advice would be to leave your beers in primary longer. Really, secondary isn’t necessary at all unless you want to rack the beer onto some fruit or you need to free up your primary vessel. Even though there may not be a ton of activity in the airlock after one week, the yeast are still in there doing their thing. Once you rack it to secondary, you greatly reduce the number of yeast cells in solution and your gravity isn’t going to move much more, if at all.

For most beers, I let it ride in primary for 3 weeks at least. Maybe 5-6 weeks. And then straight to the bottling bucket.

Hard to say without a little more info. What was the OG? Are they big beers or no?

Extract or AG? If AG more about your mash process.

Was your starter properly sized? Pitch and fermentation temperatures?

First thing that jumps out at me from what you did post is…why do you transfer after 1 week? Especially if you’re not happy with the FG? You’re rushing the beer off the yeast when it may not be done. Let it sit on the yeast longer.

Do you use a refractometer or hydrometer for specific gravity? Refractometers aren’t accurate in the presence of alcohol. Refractometer readings need to have a correction factor applied for a true reading.