Target Gravity

[photoguy]

The last two batches I made were a bit higher in Gravity than I anticipated. Both were extract recipies with starters, they would ferment like crazy on the first day and then the airlock would stop bubbling. Big yeast cakes though. After 8 days in the primary, the gravity went from 1.056 to 1.024, this seems a bit slow. Should I leave it in the primary? will it still ferment? What could be causing the slowdown?

[linuxelf]

what temperature are you fermenting it at? If you're going too cold, it could cause the ferment to take a long time to finish.

[Lufah]

What kind of beer is it? 24 seems like a pretty high finish gravity. I would leave it in primary for another week and see what it does. What did you do for aeration? What temp are you at?

Travis

[photoguy]

The beer was a porter, I used a aquarium pump to oxygenate around 20 minutes and then shook it periodically. The bucket ferments wrapped in a blanket in my kitchen. I actually already put this one in a secondary. I'm wondering if I should add a little bit of yeast. This time of year, temperature the my biggest enemy. Sunny California can get real cold if all you have is a small wall heater.

[Lufah]

Try to warm it up some and swirl the yeast to get it back in solution.

Travis

[linuxelf]

Hrm. if you've already put it in secondary, you've separated it from a lot of your yeast. I'm no expert, but I'd probably look at repitching. Especially if warming it up and swirling what you've got doesn't help.

[Big Chooch]

With an OG of 1056 and a FG of 1024 you're looking at 4.22% abv. which may be right if your ratio of unfermentables/ fermentables is too high. I know you said it was an extract recipe. Did you use any adjuncts? That may be a shot in the dark but because you said you had vigorous fermentation at first; I'm inclined to think that your ferm temp may be close enough to get the job done.

Also, take a look at your yeast. What kind are you using? Look at the attenuation and the tolerance to alcohol. Might be a factor.

[photoguy]

The yeast was WL 002 English Ale, there was about a pound of grain that we steeped along with the extract.