Fuller's Yeast Creeping Attenuation

[MTW]

Thorbz (OP), if you're still around...

I mentioned above that I was planning a bottled batch with WLP002, which I did. Despite all my own best advice above, and that of others, but contrary to the earlier keg I'd done, this one has now overcarbonated in the bottles. So I now share your concerns.

The beer itself was very good... good enough in fact to get placed 2nd at the recent Wishbone Brewery competition with the Northern Craft Brewers. The yeast certainly added a lot to the flavour. I mashed high (70) with this one, and there was a lot of Cara, making a roughly-intended FG of around 1.018 if I recall; lots left for the yeast to chew through, if it ever decided to. As I say, no infection (hopefully as proven by the expert tasters), careful priming, roused, raised, very stable FG etc.

[Thorbz]

Well done on the 2nd place, shame about the carbonation issue . Have you degassed a sample and taken a gravity reading ? I haven't done much brewing lately ( just a couple of 1/2 size stovetop BIAB's, as I'm waiting for cooler weather ), but I do have a bitter made with some yeast cultured from Bengal Lancer due to be bottled sometime soon. I'm loathe to give up on such a good yeast, and I've done pretty much the same as you as regards rousing, raising the temperature etc, and I think I'll just prime really low this time.

There's plenty of chatter on the Homebrewtalk forum, Perfectpint blog and elsewhere mentioning overcarbonation with this yeast, so these aren't exactly isolated incidents. I'm looking forward to trying the dried form of this yeast so I can get the full house (slant,liquid,re-cultured and dried) !

[MTW]

Well done on the 2nd place, shame about the carbonation issue . Have you degassed a sample and taken a gravity reading ? I haven't done much brewing lately ( just a couple of 1/2 size stovetop BIAB's, as I'm waiting for cooler weather ), but I do have a bitter made with some yeast cultured from Bengal Lancer due to be bottled sometime soon. I'm loathe to give up on such a good yeast, and I've done pretty much the same as you as regards rousing, raising the temperature etc, and I think I'll just prime really low this time.

There's plenty of chatter on the Homebrewtalk forum, Perfectpint blog and elsewhere mentioning overcarbonation with this yeast, so these aren't exactly isolated incidents. I'm looking forward to trying the dried form of this yeast so I can get the full house (slant,liquid,re-cultured and dried) !

Good idea on taking a new gravity reading. It's pretty much possible to convert any additional points dropped into equivalent grammes of priming sugar, so I will crack a bottle open later (if it hasn't cracked itself open ) and save a sample to test. Will report back.

Where's the dry form of the strain available please? That sounds interesting. I'm sure I read once that there is something about dry yeast manufacture that tends to make the strain more attenuative, but don't take that as gospel.

[Thorbz]

The soon-to-be-released Danstar/Lallemand London ESB is supposedly Fuller's ( their head brewer has been promoting it, and ESB is a Fuller's trademark ). I agree about the over-attenuation of dried yeasts, which is why I'm trying to get away from Notty and SO4, and there's such a great variety of liquid English strains with more interesting flavour characteristics.

[MTW]

Thanks for that. If the new ESB yeast throws off the same esters, attenuates a little further, and then drops and sticks like sh*t as per the WLP002, then I'd give it a go. [WLP007 is a great strain too, but I've only fermented fairly cool (in APAs), not pushed it higher for the Englishness that can apparently come to the fore.]

I just took an SG on a degassed sample tonight... down 4 points in the bottle (1.019 was my FG, 1.015 now)!!! Eeek. No wonder it's over carbed. Even if I allow a point or so (???) for the thinning effect of any intended alcohol from the 3.1g/L priming, that's the equivalent of a further 7 or 8 grammes per litre priming (and 0.4%ABV), by my maths. Feck. I could have given it zero priming and it would still have been more carbed than I wanted! needless to say, all SGs were read at the correct temperature for my hydrometer, which is a tested 1-point finishing hydrometer.

Maybe with a lower mash and very few potentially-fermentables left in the beer, things would be better, but the WLP002 has appeared to slowly wade through the longer chain stuff in the bottle, and betrayed any usual rule of thumb about "3 days at a stable SG" or whatever you may see around. A very long secondary may be in order next time.