Regarding Fg With A Coopers Scotch Ale Recipe

[Squishcow]

Hi there Brewers, first post after lurking for a short while...

I am a brewing novice and am currently in the process of putting down my second kit. Having picked up a great deal of good pointers from other threads, I find myself still unsure about one or two things.

The kit I'm currently working on is a Coopers Scotch Ale recipe commonly available. It's in the primary fermentation stage and all seems to be going well, but I've just done a calculation of the ABV and it seems a little low. Here's what I used:

Ingredients
1.7kg Thomas Coopers Sparkling Ale beer kit
1.5kg Thomas Coopers Amber Malt Extract
500g Dark Brown Sugar
Brew Cellar English Ale yeast or Sparkling Ale kit yeast

The first flaw I encountered was that at the point where I pitched the yeast, I realised that the recipe called for the 7g Sparkling Ale yeast that comes with the kit, but the pack pictured was in fact a 15g Brew Cellar English Ale yeast. Since I'd already used the 7g pack before this realisation, I took a risk and added half the English Ale yeast too, reasoning that although it might be disastrous I would rather have too much yeast than too little. So... will this cause major problems? Have I screwed my brew?

OG was 1.051
pitched yeast at 18 deg.
first day saw temp 12-14 deg, used heat belt and blanket to raise to 14-16 deg.
fermentation set in with vigour, temp maintained 18-20 for next 3 days.
day 4 saw no visible fermentation at all
3 days of hydrometer readings since then show a constant 1.018

With these readings I calculate that my beer will be around 5 per cent... that's surely too low, even for this recipe's lower than usual interpretation of the style.

I figure at this point that I'm all good to bottle, but a lot of people say that they give the primary an extra week to allow for settling and conditioning, so I will give that a shot.

So... any feedback would be an absolute godsend at this point, I'm not sure whether I'm headed in the right direction!

 

[Tanga]

Too much yeast is always better than too little. Good choice. Definitely on the right track with this one. Nice job with the temp control. Sounds yum. Time for the yeast to clean up is a good idea too, no matter how tempting it is to get it into bottles. I am in the same boat atm. My Porter is ready to bottle, and I want to get it out and use the fermenter... but, it needs a little rest. 1.018 is a pretty high finish. Have you checked your hydrometer? It might be out. Not sure what the brown sugar does though, as I haven't used it. It might push you up a couple of points. Either way, leaving it another week or so isn't going to hurt. It will end up being a nice beer.

 

[yum beer]

By my calculations you FG should be around 1011...way lower than where you are...I would try swirling your FV to try and kick the yeast on a bit...
last thing you want are bottle bombs.....other than that if you let it sit for a few more days it might kick on itself, but I would try to getting it going again before
thinking about bottling.


If you are in a rush to get at your fermenter for another batch I would seriously consider buying another one so you can have two on the go and let each batch sit as long
as it needs to.



As for yeast always better to go a bit over and use a better yeast than the kits if you can...read up on reusing your yeast...makes using quality yeast far more affordable.

 

[Guysmiley54]

It's good practise to rehydrate dry yeast too. It increases their viability by a large number. (I read a figure once but can't remember...)

 

[Squishcow]

Wowzers, thanks for the speedy replies people Every time I visit this board I become more convinced I'm in safe hands...

1.018 is a pretty high finish. Have you checked your hydrometer? It might be out. Not sure what the brown sugar does though, as I haven't used it. It might push you up a couple of points.

I have checked my hydro and it is reading correctly even after a nasty drop last night. When you say that 1.018 is a high finish, is that in comparison to other beers which are supposed to sit around 6 per cent?

By my calculations you FG should be around 1011...way lower than where you are...I would try swirling your FV to try and kick the yeast on a bit...

I forgot to mention that I had already tried to rouse the yeast by swirling/ turning the fermenter... was too scared to raise the temp too, that seemed to give my first brew an odd cider flavour which I'm anxious to avoid here. Rousing this time seemed to do pretty much nothing, bubbled for a minute or so and then went back to sitting quietly, and that was after a 5 min cardio session .

Is there a formula that allows you to predict that this beer should be around 1.011? Or are you just guessing based on attributes you know the ingredients have? I've been looking for something to help me predict the FG for this beer, but the only thing I can find is the notion that I should put my trust in my hydrometer readings. After 3 days of the same reading I thought I was all good... damn being a noob is frustrating at times.

Sorry for all my obvious questions, I'm just keen to soak up as much as I can and start turning out great beer! Thanks again for the kind words and advice.