2nd brew - stuffed it?

[David]

Hi all,

2nd brew in and probably too early for experimenting, but my curious mind got the better of me. I've brewed a Mangrove Jack's Robber's Gold kit (Golden Ale), and added 250g dark DME plus 250g dextrose to try and up the body and ABV a bit. The standard kit is supposed to come out at 4% or so. I used the kit yeast - Burton Union M79.

OG 1.048. Aerated by stirring well and pitched at 23C, dropped to 18C in the first 24 hrs. Stayed at 18-19 for about 5 days and there was plenty of airlock action till day 6. I don't have temp control yet and the ambient temp pushed it up to around 20C from day 7 to 9. At day 9 SG was at 1.016 and there's been no action since.

The kit says FG should be around 1.008 but when I did my first brew it ended at 1.012. I bottled that and had no problems. Would the addition of DME and dextrose have changed the expected FG significantly? I guess there's some level of non-fermentable material in the DME but wouldn't have thought it would pushed it up that far. 

Safe to bottle or have I got a stuck batch?

[Sam DT]

It probably needs more time in the primary - 2 weeks minimum but ideally three.

Yeasts are generally rated on their % attenuation so if you bump up the OG  by adding more sugar you're going to end up with a bump up in FG regardless.

Best way to find if it's hit FG is to take hydrometer readings three days in a row - if the gravity is static then you're likely done.

If you're worried about a stuck fermentation then it probably wouldn't hurt to slosh it around a little to stir yeast back in suspension but I'd wait a few more days yet.