Brew Stopped Bubbling, But Gravity Is Rather Crazy!

[chartster]

Hi all,

I am a *very* new brewer and I am glad I found this site. Had a good look around and chuckled over some of the threads and have been impressed by the knowledge on offer!

Anyway, doing my first brew at present - a Coopers Lager K&K (one that comes with the kit). Started last Saturday evening, yeast went crazy and made a fair bit of froth (came out the airlock a bit etc). Beer does not appear to be infected to my knowledge, but over the last day the bubbling has ceased completely.

The brew has been sitting at about 22 degrees (certainly no higher than that) but is now down to 20 degrees. I put some in the hydrometer and it registered that the gravity was about 1.012. According to the scale, this means the alcohol level is about 1.9%??? :blink:

Pls advise as to what I should do next, I'm proud of the fact I haven't managed to stuff anything up yet - but don't want to jinx myself!!

Cheers

 

[frasertag]

I am a newish brewer aswell bout 10 kits under my belt

You need to take a gravity reading before you pitch the yeast
Aswell as daily ones, I usually start on the 2nd or 3rd day and continue from then taking a daily reading. After 3 days of the same reading you are ready to bottle or rack it. Your kit would have the formula needed to get the Alcho %
So test it tomorrow and so on..

1012 sounds about right if you made it with the kits brewing sugar.

 

[domonsura]

Good advice Frasertag, right on the money. An Original Gravity reading would help with the calculations.
Test for the next few days, if no further drop, bottle her up with some priming sugar!

 

[chartster]

Wow thanks for the quick reply. I was an idiot and forgot to take a reading from the get-go as I was so excited to actually be making some beer haha! Will test it again tomorrow and see what it says. The Instruction leaflet is a little deceptive as I thought it was 7 days and THEN you make sure the gravity is stable. Had no idea that I should be keeping an eye on it so soon.

PS - I used the sugar that came with the kit, was just normal Coopers brewing sugar.

The beer is still pretty cloudy, but doesn't smell off or look bad (from what I can see through the top, only a ring of bubbles around the sides). I initially thought something had gone wrong - until I realised I was not used to smelling 23L of beer in my kitchen!

Test for the next few days, if no further drop, bottle her up with some priming sugar!

Many thanks for the reply, I won't make that mistake again. I slapped my head the next morning when I realised that I had forgotten to do it in amongst all the excitement

 

[0M39A]

first off, welcome to ahb

great to see another new homebrewer starting off, and youve come to the right place to get on the path of making amazing beers at home thats for sure!

firstly, i think you are making the mistake of reading your hydrometer wrong, as you may be looking at the potential alcohol reading.

what you need to do to get your alcohol estimate is take a gravity reading before you start fermenting the wort, and then one once fermentation is over.

(OG - FG) / 7.46 = the estimated alcohol level.

add another +.05% if you are using priming sugar as well.

1012 is a little high for a lager can and 1kg dextrose. give it a few more days and see if it drops any more. its only been going for what... 4 days? you need to make sure you have a stable (not changing) gravity over 24 hours before you think about bottling it.

a few more tips for a new brewer:

hygiene is of the upmost importance. if your kit came with sodium metabisulphate, throw it out, its worthless. get yourself some no-name nappysan (sodium percarbonate) for cleaning everything with, and some no rinse sanitizer from your homebrew shop (brewshield, one shot, neo pink etc.)

keep your temps nice and low. between 16 and 20 for an ale is spot on (dont worry about whats on the front of the can, 90% of kits come with an ale yeast no matter what it says).

speaking of yeasts, the coopers stuff isnt much good, get something like safale s-04 or us-05, or some danstar nottingham. all are great dried ale yeasts you can use exactly the same way, but will taste much better.

dont use dextrose or table sugar. they wont add anything to your brew but alcohol. use malt extract and you will get a much nicer tasting beer.

keep those few tips in mind, and read the wiki and you'll be making decent beer in no time. then you can start playing with hops and grains, then you'll be doing extract brews, and before you know it, all grain its an addictive hobby.

cheers.

 

[chartster]

first off, welcome to ahb

great to see another new homebrewer starting off, and youve come to the right place to get on the path of making amazing beers at home thats for sure!

firstly, i think you are making the mistake of reading your hydrometer wrong, as you may be looking at the potential alcohol reading.

what you need to do to get your alcohol estimate is take a gravity reading before you start fermenting the wort, and then one once fermentation is over.

(OG - FG) / 7.46 = the estimated alcohol level.

add another +.05% if you are using priming sugar as well.

1012 is a little high for a lager can and 1kg dextrose. give it a few more days and see if it drops any more. its only been going for what... 4 days? you need to make sure you have a stable (not changing) gravity over 24 hours before you think about bottling it.

Wow thanks for the huge reply! What a friendly bunch of brewers we have here.

I would say that it is quite likely that I am reading the hydrometer wrong, you are correct with the Potential Alcohol thing. I looked at it and first said "What the..." and then figured it out to get the 1012 gravity reading... I wasn't too fussed over the alcohol thing as I at least know the gravity is the thing to watch for. Nonetheless, I have learned from my ways and will be sure to check the gravity from the get-go and avoid this dilemma in future.

Now I will probably let it run until about Friday anyway, I am in no hurry at all to bottle - I want it to be somewhat sane so when I do drink it I won't be chucking the lot

As to your hints, I live in Melbourne (St Kilda) but I think my local HBS is in Oakleigh, near Clayton. Might have to go looking around for local HBS to see to this yeast information and malty-goodness. I am already thinking about my next brew and I have Coopers Bavarian Lager can and some Coopers BE1.

PS - I used normal bleach to kill any nasties in the equipment and washed it out pretty well before starting. I have some of the Cooper sanitising powder (in a little medicine bottle) too.

 

[0M39A]

i wouldnt advise going the bavarian lager, its one of the few kits that do actually come with a real lager yeast

that means having to keep your brew around 10C-12C and doing things like diacetyl rests and lagering to get rid of the sulphur byproducts.

stick to ales for a bit longer before you go tackling that

btw, a kit of coopers lager, 1kg dextrose made up to 23 would give you an original gravity of around the 1040 mark iirc.

 

[citizensnips]

Chartster welcome to ahb.
The coopers bavarian lager is a great kit but be carefull with the yeast as it is a true lager yeast. This means it will ferment at lower temperatures around 10-12 degrees is ideal, so if you cant ferment at those lower temps your better of going to your lhbs and getting a good ale yeast.
I go to oakleigh brewcraft......there great guys down there and they will help you out and give good advice. Although if its any good to you i believe there is another store in Richmond which could be closer....not sure.
Cheers
-eddy-

 

[chartster]

Chartster welcome to ahb.
The coopers bavarian lager is a great kit but be carefull with the yeast as it is a true lager yeast. This means it will ferment at lower temperatures around 10-12 degrees is ideal, so if you cant ferment at those lower temps your better of going to your lhbs and getting a good ale yeast.
I go to oakleigh brewcraft......there great guys down there and they will help you out and give good advice. Although if its any good to you i believe there is another store in Richmond which could be closer....not sure.
Cheers
-eddy-

Ah Richmond you say? I might dig around for them, you wouldn't happen to know the name of the shop by any chance?

EDIT: I think I found them, they are a LOT closer than Oakleigh for me, there are just on Church street. A tram ride or two from my place. Excellent!

Thanks for the tips on the Bavarian Lager. Looks like I will have to do some yeast augmentation, as I can't possibly brew it at 10-12 degrees (I cant clean out the fridge and live on beer for a week haha!). The Safale 04 or US05 are good alternatives?

dont use dextrose or table sugar. they wont add anything to your brew but alcohol. use malt extract and you will get a much nicer tasting beer.

Sorry for the silly question, but the can has malt extract in it right? Does this mean I should use another of these in place of the dextrose (aka brewer's sugar)? Or is it something different, i.e. an unhopped malt extract?

Cheers everyone

 

[0M39A]

Thanks for the tips on the Bavarian Lager. Looks like I will have to do some yeast augmentation, as I can't possibly brew it at 10-12 degrees (I cant clean out the fridge and live on beer for a week haha!). The Safale 04 or US05 are good alternatives?
Sorry for the silly question, but the can has malt extract in it right? Does this mean I should use another of these in place of the dextrose (aka brewer's sugar)? Or is it something different, i.e. an unhopped malt extract?

Cheers everyone

if you made the baverian lager with us-05 or s-04, it would still turn out great.

and you can buy unhopped malt extract, in both liquid (coopers + morgan make it in cans), or dried form (coopers make it, but you'd be better off getting it at a homebrew shop)

dried is the most common.

remember, that liquid extract is pretty much the same thing, but is about 20% water, so for a recipe that calls for 1kg of dried malt extract, you would have to use 1.2kg of liquid (i think it comes in 1.5kg cans anyway. i just use dried).

 

[citizensnips]

Ah Richmond you say? I might dig around for them, you wouldn't happen to know the name of the shop by any chance?

It's Brewcraft, same franchise as oakleigh

 

[chartster]

Wow I'm so pumped with excitement now. Thanks for the tips 0M39A, I think I saw the Coopers Pale Malt in a bag (500g?) at BigW the other day. I assume this is the stuff you were referring to.

I will be sure to visit the shop in Richmond and see what they have on offer, I will be making/planning beer quicker than I can drink it. lol.

It's Brewcraft, same franchise as oakleigh

Thanks for the clarification eddy22, must be the ESP working as I was literally just looking at it on WhitePages just then.

 

[0M39A]

you'd be better getting it from the homebrew store, as chances are it will be cheaper

that, and the coopers malt ive seen is white in colour, which puts me off a little.

 

[chartster]

Hahaha...I noticed that on Coopers site. Tally ho to the bottle-o home brew shop then!

 

[chartster]

Wow...checked the gravity today and it seems to have gone up? Noticed the hydrometer floats higher in the tube now than before :S

 

[Stuster]

It's probably just CO2 in the sample. Are there bubbles in the sample? Give it a stir and a spin and see what you get then.

 

[chartster]

Thanks Stuster, when I get home again this evening I will look at it again and see. It will have been fermenting for a week as of tomorrow, so it should be very close to bottling now.

 

[Fents]

either your hydrometers broken (check it in room temp water it should read 1.000) or the gremlins have landed are coming to get us all.

 

[chartster]

hahaha...no the hydrometer is not busted. Must have been CO2 bubbles on it, it seems a stable reading now. Not very fizzy, but it was pretty fizzy about 2 days ago.

Bottled and hoping for the best now. Will see in about two weeks then!