Stalled stout? Best course of action?

[TheBlackAdder]

Ive had a stout kit (famous Irish stout aka guinness) I put down with OG of 1.051
Had it on for 3 weeks at a stable temp of 14-18C
Lots of airlock activity, good krausen, good size yeast cake after it all settled down - looks like a good fermentation

Take my final readings a few days before bottling time...1.033 <-this seems too high

Ok I think, lets kick up the temp because maybe thats the problem, plus a d-rest is always good anyway

24h later, its still 1.033

This seems way too high and I thought ild get around 1.015-1.020 max but maybe thats wrong.

Has it potentially stalled and whats my best course of action?
I have cold crashed it anyway, and now its in a Melbourne garage in winter.

Given that I'm going away for 2 weeks after this weekend, my options as I see them are to transfer to a secondary and see whats happened when I come back; if I do this should I add some sugar to kick start again?
Or bottle anyway, probably with a half measure of sugar to be safe?

Whats best in this situation? Or am I worrying about nothing and already at my target gravity?

 

[luggy]

What yeast did you use, 14 is pretty low it could have put the yeast to sleep. I'd try to keep it at a consistent 18 next time.
Definitely wouldn't bottle, there is still a lot of residual sugar in there. Try warming and keep it at a steady temp

 

[TheBlackAdder]

The d-rest at 22C for 24h threw me off that scent, but maybe it does just need longer and warmer

Looks like I'll shift to the secondary tomorrow morning and hope theres enough suspended yeasties to keep at it

Going away for 2 weeks definately throws a spanner in the works haha



edit: I stupidly didnt write the yeast down, but it was in the kit and not the yeast from the tin
my memory says it might have been a nottingham ale yeast (I hope thats a real brand or I'm embarrassing myself haha)

 

[luggy]

I wouldn't bother racking to secondary, you'll end up with less yeast than you already have. Give it a gentle swirl and keep it in a warm place while you're away, it wont hurt to be in primary for that long

 

[TheBlackAdder]

Update after a nice big break:

Racked to secondary before I read your response - glad to know it wasnt really necessary because its a pain to do

"a warm place" is a challenge during Melbourne winter - I think it was pretty cold while I was gone but I warmed it up to 24C for the last 3 days then bottled at a FG of 1.018

I think the FG is probably OK but I was conservative with carb drops anyway (plus, who wants fizzy stout?). With a mix of 330ml 500 660 and 750ml bottles, only the 750's got 2 drops (small ones when I could find them...I know...got to move to bulk priming).

Still a slight fear of bottle bombs so I put all the full bottles in a bit plastic tub, sealed the lid and put some weights on top - hopefully in three weeks all is good, but Im hanging for a taste so bad

I will update the thread again and note how it came out despite my long and cold hiatus.

 

[TheBlackAdder]

Final update: had my first proper bottle last night after 2 weeks conditioning and it all turned out great

Carbonation is normal, if not a little lower than normal (which is great for stout ) so I dont think theres any risk of any bottle bombs and tastewise, its actually better than I expected, so no ill affects from all the stuffing around

 

[luggy]

Good to hear glad it all worked out

 

[beermeupscotty]

Glad to hear it all turned out well. I agree with luggy's solution to this problem though - a gentle swirl with temps kept warm should do the trick to get it going again.

I recently had my first stalled fermentation. After days of vigorous fermentation, I measured my RIS (OG 1080) which I found had apparently stopped at 1030 (the SG was constant over 2 days). It was my first AG and I was convinced that because (1) I mashed high (68C), (2) it was fermenting so well prior to stalling and (3) it's a medium-low flocculating yeast, it had gone as far as it would. Nonetheless, I bumped up the temp to 22C and left it for another week before bottling. At bottling I found it had dropped to 1024, which I was happy about. However, I decided to harvest some yeast after bottling and found that the solution was still fermenting after I put it into some jars - uh-oh!

By my calculations, with attenuation for this yeast being 73-76%, the max FG is 1018-1022; so I don't think I was too far off, but in future I will also give it a swirl