I did a 3 gallon BIAB version of the NB nut brown ale. Rehydrated a pack a danstar Nottingham and pitched when wort was about 68 d F. It’s been two weeks in the primary. Ambient temp has been low 60’s. O.G. was 1.054 and now two consecutive readings of 1.018 spaced 24 hours apart after two weeks. I gently stirred the beer to rouse the yeast and brought the FV upstairs where ambient temp is 70 d F.
According to the danstar technical data sheet, they claim attenuation to 1.008. In my limited experience, I’ve usually end up around 1.018-1.020 when using this yeast.
What say you brewers? Give it more time? Continue to rouse the yeast? Pitch more yeast? Is it done?
need to know all the ingredients ,mash temp ,and time to give an opinion . I have used that yeast before and the only time it finished high was with LME. for me .009 is what I get. got .014 with LME in the recipe . btw when I use it the grav is down to.009- .014 in 6 days or so.
5 lbs Maris otter
0.2 lbs English chocolate
0.2 lbs crystal 120L
0.2 lbs Belgian biscuit
0.2 special roast
90 min mash. Target mash temp 154 d F. Measured temp every 15 min
90 min 151 d F
75 min 155 d F
60 min 153 d F
45 min 151 d F
30 min 156 d F
15 min 156 d F
0 min 154 d F
looks like a tasty beer. I would say its done, as for the high FG I would brew up a second batch the same way except use 04 or 05 yeast and see what that yeast gets down to. one other thing you can do is add some yeast nutrient to the boil. also you can use different water profiles. got to love the hobby.
Thx grainy. Is it possible the higher mash temps resulted in less fermentable sugars for the yeast? I based the mash temp on the instructions from the AG Nut Brown kit, and it doesn’t specify what the O.G. should be. Anyone else brew this AG kit with similar results?
ya, I used to mash at 154- 156 but I always got down to 1.010 anyways. my mashes are at 150 now witch end up at 1.008-1.012. been using 2 row or pilsner, maybe other base malts are different .
At best if you were to average around the 155f mark I would say from experience that your FG would range around 1.012-1.015 at a high again varying on average SG. Most times a high depending on yeast would be closer to 1.013 depending on grist. You had mostly base, so grist was not an issue here. Your temp should be fine for Nottingham and the 70’s should have kicked it up.
I would hope for 1.015 at this point from all indications.
Are you sure you have calibrated your hydrometer and are compensating for temps etc…Its really a 50/50 game with hydro’s and over the years I have had ones that read -/+ 1.001-1.005 as sometime the paper shifts inside during handling is my thought.
Most hydro’s will read 1.000 @ 60f with low/ no TDS H2O. If in question just look at yours as it will say.
Now if you plan to bottle condition, I would be very leary of adding additional sugar and/or would myself add more yeast to primary to get this SG down to norm as you will have “bombers” for sure if you add additional bottling sugar now. I don’t have a chart handy but in the past when I checked the “sugared” wort prior to bottling it was only 1.003-1.005 higher than terminal to hit around 2.5 volumes.
If you are 1.006-1.010 higher than terminal (depending on mash temp/ grist again) right now and were to bottle, just a real wild guess is you would carbonate in the bottle to around 3-3.5 or higher volumes which may or may not cause issue. If you wish to just salvage this batch without much todo I would do the following.
Just leave the wort unsugared and add like a half/quarter pack of fresh yeast and fill some plastic 12/20 oz pop bottles and then test one at 7 days, 14 days etc… and when they are carbed up then put them all in the fridge to try to stabilize at the current volume you wish plus if just moving forward in this way then they should “dry” out and not be sappy sweet.
[quote=“apf87c”]
According to the danstar technical data sheet, they claim attenuation to 1.008. In my limited experience, I’ve usually end up around 1.018-1.020 when using this yeast. [/quote]
No way, It will always ferment close to 1.010 unless you used alot of dextrin malt/ mashed only at/above 158f or used other unfermentables in the grist OR your making strictly extract based beers as this can cause high FG but usually no higher than 1.015 unless your making really high gravity beers or something else in combo like I will mention below.
The only Diff if you happened to overlook at some point and used without noticing etc… is Danstar Windsor yeast. As this other British yeast is a very low attenuator and will always leave beers at least 1.003-1.005 higher than Nottingham.
I do correct for temp when measuring my S.G., but it’s worth mentioning.
I just rechecked a measurement and it’s down to 1.017 now, so looks like there is some movement. I’m going to keep at 70 d F and continue to rouse the yeast and recheck a sample next week. If it’s still high, I will pitch more yeast.
Thanks for the thoughts on bottling conditions. Thankfully I keg!
Good action on the kegging. Not much worries then----> IE: You will want to get that puppy under 1.015 for sure…If not hitting 1.010 area anything much above 1.012 will give you a pretty sweet taste especially in a brown ale. Sounds like it just slowed way down or was very slow initially although 2 weeks at 60-65f is pretty unusual for this yeast or any of its ilk to stall out or be extra sluggish unless it was really old like left at room temp for over a year or two. If kept cold they last a long time.
Being Dry yeast, you don’t have any real concern about O2 in the wort at pitching. So that’s not it either. I can only imagine that you had a very low viable count at the onset as that is the only plausible answer here.
[quote=“apf87c”]So, to double check my equipment, I tested my hydrometer in 60 d F water. The gravity reading was 1.005!
So corrected, my S.G. is hovering around 1.012-1.013 if I did the correction right.
I think I need to upgrade to the laboratory grade hydrometers. This was driving me crazy![/quote]
Very good Sir, looks like we found the issue/ future issues. Just a minor semantics note… you want to use DI/distilled water when checking a hydro if not already following this practice.
Don’t goto the cost of lab grade, most $5 hydro’s are usually off no more than 1.001 and just return it if far off initially. I am not going to get into a long dragged out discussion, but if your looking to upgrade SG/FG checking ability I can steer you into a DIGITAL refractometer for under $100. Just search my prior threads if you wish to know the fine details about these units. They are slick as a whistle. I keep my old hydro that is 1.002 off on the shelf for friends to stare at in wonder. I haven’t used it for over two years now it just collects dust.
Absolutely, What is especially nice when using these units is during fermentation on lagers. So I pull just a quick sample and one drop later I know exactly where my SG is at and then can raise my temp accurately for diacetyl rest. So say I start at 1.050 let go 10-14 days and then test usually I will be close to half or better reduction in SG then a few days later I check and if anywhere close to 3/4 or under 1.018 I raise the temp in steps for a few days.
Here is an example from my Helles in November.
11.14.13: 11.8 brix/ 1.049 SG 48f
11.20.13: 6.9 brix/ 1.015 SG 48f
As you can see I checked this one at 6 days and it attenuated faster than usual. The reason why is I pitched the 2nd step of my starter at high krausen. So temp was now ramped for the rest. Had I waited until closer to 10-14 days per usual op I would have been at terminal SG. Which is not a be all end all, But what happens is you are kind of stuck with higher levels of VDK that will be reduced somewhat during primary conditioning and lagering, but you would have knocked them out at higher rates if a “true” diacetyl rest was conducted during the end of active ferment.
11.25.13: 5.7 brix/ 1.010 62f
11.28.13: Stable at 1.010 Reduced temps in steps for lagering.
12.5.13: Rack to secondary for lagering. 35f
Check your PM for the place I found that is by far the best price across the net. Well years ago anyways. Do some searching as maybe somebody finally decided $130-170 was asking way too much.
