First brew, first ever post and suspected dormant yeast

[KindnessAndBeer]

Hi all,

I am new to this forum and hope I am posting in the right place with an appropriate problem.
I have just put together my first ever brew and hit problems! Here is the lowdown;

Putting together a 3 grain, 1 hop "red IPA", the mash and that process went without a hitch, when it came to adding the liquid yeast however, I set aside some of the wort which cooled to 21 degrees cel' and then added it to my fermentation bucket full of the remaining 20l of wort which was about 30 degrees cel'

The first day went fine and a very lively and vigorous fermentation occurred and a nice thick yeasty bed formed on the top, on about day three however this had all sunk to the bottom and fermentation seems to have stopped (OG was 1044 and it's stopped at 1010 after a few days) - I'm aware ale yeast is supposed to float to the top and suspect it has gone dormant in sinking to the bottom; how can I resolve this?

Apologies for the long post, I hope someone can help me and I can start contributing to the forum and would appreciate being told if I should have posted this somewhere else

Thanks guys

 

[pittsy]

You pitched at 30 c , what was the temp of the brew after this ? You should pitch the yeast at around 18/20 c . It sounds like it was way too hot and has finished fermenting very fast . It ain't gonna be a good 1 sorry to say . This will be full of off flavours and will be hangover fuel . :cry:

 

[NickW]

You pitched at 30 c , what was the temp of the brew after this ? You should pitch the yeast at around 18/20 c . It sounds like it was way too hot and has finished fermenting very fast . It ain't gonna be a good 1 sorry to say . This will be full of off flavours and will be hangover fuel . :cry:

Here's hoping the brew came down to a reasonable temperature below 24c during fermentation. But as pittsy says it's likely it may have even pushed 30c+ as the yeast does get excited during the initial stages and generates heat.

Please say you were using some kind of temperature control :pray:

 

[Borrovan]

Like everyone says, chances are there's nothing wrong with your yeast and it's just fermented a little (a lot) quicker than would be ideal. Whip out your hydrometer to be sure - if it's somewhere around 1010 measure again after another day and if it's stayed the same then it's done.

It's not the end of the world though - for a first brew something's bound to go wrong, so I say just bottle/keg it, give it a try in a few weeks and learn from your mistakes!

 

[Duxuk]

Even with a stable gravity reading for a few days, I wouldn't bottle/keg 'til it's been in the FV for at least a fortnight. This way the yeast can drop out and you'll end up with a clear , easy to pour beer, without too much yeast to disturb in the bottom of the bottles. Once you're sure it's finished you should move the FV somewhere cool, like a garage at this time of year. This will help the clearing. :thumb: