Beer Gravity Not Changing

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s20Merlin

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Hey everyone!

I bought a Cooper home brew kit. 7 days ago when I did the mixing and all, the gravity was at 14. Today, 7 days later, the gravity is still at 14. I tasted it, and it tastes bitter. The temperature has been stable at 22 degrees Celsius and away from sunlight.

Should i keep it in the fermenter for another week and keep taking samples? I would of thought that it would of changed in the past 7 days.

Any help would be great :)

Thanks!
 
whats did you use? What was the volume? What was the OG?
 
Hey everyone!

I bought a Cooper home brew kit. 7 days ago when I did the mixing and all, the gravity was at 14. Today, 7 days later, the gravity is still at 14. I tasted it, and it tastes bitter. The temperature has been stable at 22 degrees Celsius and away from sunlight.

Should i keep it in the fermenter for another week and keep taking samples? I would of thought that it would of changed in the past 7 days.

Any help would be great :)

Thanks!

Hi Merlin, welcome.

When you say the gravity was at 14 when you mixed everything up I assume you mean 1.014? What exactly did you put in as that is a very low gravity reading.

Cheers,
Mut
 
did you add the yeast when you topped the fermenter up or with the can to the boiling water?
 
Some basic questions...

Is there any condensation on the inside of the lid? Is there any crud (Krausen) on the surface of the wort and the side of the fermentor at the liquid level? And at the risk of offending the memory of Butters, was your airlock bubbling?

Are you using a hydrometer to measure gravity? If so I assume you are using the plastic tube to hold the liquid and just letting the glass hydrometer float in the liquid in the tube. Have you given the hydrometer a spin?

If you answer the above questions from me and the the other users it will help troubleshoot.
 
Some basic questions...

Is there any condensation on the inside of the lid? Is there any crud (Krausen) on the surface of the wort and the side of the fermentor at the liquid level? And at the risk of offending the memory of Butters, was your airlock bubbling?

Are you using a hydrometer to measure gravity? If so I assume you are using the plastic tube to hold the liquid and just letting the glass hydrometer float in the liquid in the tube. Have you given the hydrometer a spin?

If you answer the above questions from me and the the other users it will help troubleshoot.

Thanks everyone for such a quick response. I see I have left out a lot of info.

I bought the homebrew kit with the kit inside it. I just opened it, put the hot water, mixed the white stuff. Then filled up to the 23L mark with cooler water, to get the temp down from 32 to 24-25ish. I then added the yeast on it and let it sit since. Temp then went down to 22 after a few hours or so and has been at that level since. At 4 day i removed the hosen collar.

As for what it looks like now, yes, there is a little bit of bubbles on the top, the lid has condensation, and at about the level of beer there are residue on the sides of the container.

Yes the reading is 1.014. I followed the instructions pretty much to the letter, having the video play and repeat right beside me as I was doing it.

The readings came with the plastic tube and float that comes with the package. I had not given it a spin. After giving it a spin it still reads the same.

Does the residue have anything to do with that? If so, what can I do?

Thanks again everyone!
 
Thanks everyone for such a quick response. I see I have left out a lot of info.

I bought the homebrew kit with the kit inside it. I just opened it, put the hot water, mixed the white stuff. Then filled up to the 23L mark with cooler water, to get the temp down from 32 to 24-25ish. I then added the yeast on it and let it sit since. Temp then went down to 22 after a few hours or so and has been at that level since. At 4 day i removed the hosen collar.

As for what it looks like now, yes, there is a little bit of bubbles on the top, the lid has condensation, and at about the level of beer there are residue on the sides of the container.

Yes the reading is 1.014. I followed the instructions pretty much to the letter, having the video play and repeat right beside me as I was doing it.

The readings came with the plastic tube and float that comes with the package. I had not given it a spin. After giving it a spin it still reads the same.

Does the residue have anything to do with that? If so, what can I do?

Thanks again everyone!
not sure what you mean by hosen collar.

The residue on the sides is generally a good thing. It shows your wort has been fermenting. My guess is that something went wrong with your first hydrometer reading. 1014 seems about right after fermentation maybe a little high. It depends on exactly what your original ingredients were.

If it didn't ferment your wort would taste sweet and sg would be higher. Given that it's bitter now I say give it a other few days to a week and if your gravity readings are constant then if it tastes ok bottle it.

Some pointers for hydrometers-
check it in water. It should read about 1000 at 20 degrees.
Always ditch the first bit of wort that's been sitting in the tap as this can throw your reading
. You'll need to adjust if the temp is much off 20
Always give it a spin.

Sorry for dodgy phone response
 
There's a high probability that the first reading was not a true representation of the wort. I've had a few kit brews that read either way too high or too low - all due to not mixing the goop properly as it does a good job of settling on the fermenter bottom.

This is going to sound rude but it would really help if you did a little research to find out the names of the equipment and ingredients you are using - the float is a hydrometer. It needs to float freely in the tube, if the tub is just for carrying the hydrometer rather than for measuring the gravity the readings are going to be difficult to get. White stuff will be brew enhancer (probably #2). I didn't read anywhere that you had a tin of hopped extract (can of goo), maybe it's inferred by "I just opened it, put the hot water, mixed the white stuff." Although 1kg brew enhancer in 23L is about 1.016, if a can was also added then it will be about 1.040.
 
Thanks for the helpful answers! The actual ingredients were this :
1.7kg Coopers Lager Beer Kit Concentrate with Yeast
1 kg Coopers Brew Enhancer 1

That is probably what happened, my first reading was off. As for the hosen collar it is the Krausen Collar, kinda sounded the same and I didnt have my equipment list in front of me.

I will leave it there for a few more days and then I'll proceed to bottling then!
 
I will leave it there for a few more days and then I'll proceed to bottling then!


NO! bottle when the reading is the same for 3 days straight and it will only benefit if you leave it for a few more days after that as the yeast are still working but not eating the sugars just cleaning up so even if its the same reading few days in a row it wont hurt (infact will make it better) to leave it a few more days.
 
You were right the 1st time, the correct term is Hosen. They are the pants that come with your kit. You must wear them if you are making a german style lager. If you are making an Indian Pale Ale, it isn't necessary, but it doesn't hurt to wear them. Here is a picture of me wearing my Hosen.

hosen2.jpg :D

Sorry, I'm on holidays and have been having a few beers while watching the cricket. (Go pup)
welcome to the forum
 
You were right the 1st time, the correct term is Hosen. They are the pants that come with your kit. You must wear them if you are making a german style lager. If you are making an Indian Pale Ale, it isn't necessary, but it doesn't hurt to wear them. Here is a picture of me wearing my Hosen.

View attachment 51466 :D

Sorry, I'm on holidays and have been having a few beers while watching the cricket. (Go pup)
welcome to the forum
Next kit feel free to dip the can in the pot too to get all the goo (pre-hopped liquid malt extract..LME )out.

The white stuff was likely a mix of mostly dextrose (Dex) and some maltodextrin.

To speed things up... A few hours before you start putting the beer together you can mix 15g of the white stuff with a pint of water and boil it. Let it cool to 22C. Then pour that into a sanitized jar and mix it with the yeast. Put the cap on tight and shake the snot out of it. Loosen the cap, keep it out of the light, check it every now and then so it doesn't foam over. Swirl it occasionally to knock down the foam. (Similar idea to punching down bread dough)

When you do Cooper's "no-boil" method your sanitation is critical. Also make certain your sanitizer is either a "no rinse" type and you mixed it right. (Sodium Per Carbonate is very popular here. I like Star-san). Too strong of a sanitizer residue and you could kill all the yeast. Don't trust anything to be clean from the factory. Always sanitize your thermometer, hydrometer, testing jar (sample tube) or anything that touches the cooled down wort/beer. I like wiping these down with Rubbing Alcohol and let it evaporate before using them.

If you bottle, remove all the labels and glue residue. Use the bottle brush till every speck of crap is gone. Feel free to put the bottles in the dishwasher on sani-temp shortly before bottling. Let them cool of course. Even after all that, I still dunk my bottles in Star-san for a few minutes then tip to drain for a few minutes to get any excess foam out. If there is a little in there...don't fear the foam. Don't worry about it.

Don't use sucrose for bottling. It doesn't taste good. Use dextrose or DME (dried malt extract). Your kit likely came with priming sugar for bottling. It will be dextrose. If you have a bottling bucket mix all of the required sugar in there. (Individual bottle priming sucks, when you need to do 50 of them.) The filling stick takes some getting accustomed to. Press down...beer flows...lift up...flow stops. Stop filling just at the base of the neck of the bottle, then lift the stick up to the top of the neck and press the inside of the bottle neck near the top. Slowly fill up to 40mm to the top of the bottle. Fill 12 at a time and keep them in a crate or divided box so they don't tip. Then cap all of them (Repeat until you a finished). Between batches...Lift the filling stick above the bottling bucket and let the beer drain back into the bucket. Press the hose shut-off clamp. I like to jam the stick between the bucket and the bale wire pointing up so it doesn't drip or get dirty. You can use a turkey baster to get the remaining beer out of the bucket that you couldn't attain by tilting the bucket. If at the end you can't fill a bottle at least halfway up the neck. Dump it, cook with it, drink it..just don't bottle it. You could top it off with any beer, then cap it...but what's the point of that?

You'll figure out
 
1.5kg coopers lager with 1kg BE2 in 23L should be 1.038-1.042. And by should be, I mean IS. Your original gravity reading (if you actually took a reading before adding the yeast?) of 1.014 is wrong - for whatever reason.

1.014 is probably still a little high for a final gravity, but still acceptable if it is definitely finished. My advice is to take the lid off the fermenter and gently stir the beer with a sanitised spoon without causing any aeration (no splashing, swooshing etc) and fit the lid and airlock back on and take another reading in a few days. If it still does not go any lower, consider the above advice.
 

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