She's Stuck!

Ingredients
1

argh, a stuck fermentation.  I brewed up an all grain batch of Blonde Ale, re-using some WLP090 SD Super Yeast (3 cycle on the yeast).  Fermentation started fine…continued fine, seemed to stop about the right time, but never cleared up.  I’ve tried dropping the temp (in a converted fridge/fermentation chamber), I finally even added some US-05 I had.

all i can figure

  1. I aerated when the wort was still warm (high 70’s) before chilling to fermentation temp of 70.  That might have squeezed out the O2?
  2. I did not add any yeast nutrients (dumb mistake)

at this point, I can’t aerate it (right?) but I suppose I could add some yeast nutrients, should I just boil and add? or?
Thanks,
Brian.

2

forgot to mention, OG: 1.046, current SG: 1.016

3

Recipe? Might be done

4

no, should get lower ~1.010 or less, 1.016 is too high.  Also, tasted the beer after measuring the gravity, can still taste some wort

5

“Should” doesn’t mean much.  How do you know it should?  It’ might be done.

6

software predict 1.009, every time I’ve brewed this recipe it  comes it at 1.010 or less.
to go from 1.045 to 1.016 is just not far enough for yeast, esp. WLP090
also, taste wasn’t there yet, still some malt to burn through.
I added some yeast nutrients today, if that doesn’t work, I’ll try racking to secondary…just for the O2 (as weird as that sounds)

7

I wouldn’t necessarily rely on the software, but your past experience is a solid indicator.

Your original post says you dropped the temp.  That won’t help the yeast finish and will actually do the opposite by dropping them out.

Before you do anything else, I would rouse the yeast (swirl to fermenter or stir with a sanitized spoon) and raise the temp of the beer to something close to 70.  You can also do a fast fermentation test to see if there’s anything left to ferment out.

8

Brett will eat it.

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”

9

yeast nutrients (and maybe the S05) seem to be having an effect. I can see the beer now beginning to clear, working it’s way down top to bottom - hopefully it continues!

10

Are you trying to get the yeast to clear or for the beer to attenuate more?  If the yeast is dropping out, it’s not fermenting.

As others have said, it’s done when it’s done.  It might still be fermenting slowly, and warming it up would help.
If it stopped, maybe the wort wasn’t as fermentable because the mash temperature varied, or the ingredients changed, or the pH was different due to seasonal water variations.  It could be that the yeast wasn’t healthy, but at this point it’s hard to fix.  Chilling will make it clear but that doesn’t affect the FG.  If it tastes sweet and there are fermentables sugars that the yeast failed to use, pitching a large active starter can help.