RIS help needed!

[lord groan]

Hi all,
I decided to clear out my bits and bobs of malt and hops, basically anything leftover from other brews and either out of date or very nearly! So I put together a leftovers RIS of sorts using:
pale malt 3000g
roast barley 1100g
wheat malt 375g
chocolate malt 350g
caramalt 300g
carared malt 250g
oats 250g
crystal malt 225g
black malt 210g

2Hr mash at 63c to try and keep it as fermentable as possible with 12l water, stepped sparge at 72c using volumes of 4l,4l,3l,4l. This gave me 22L at boil. Boiled 45 mins, then hopped with 30g Bramling cross, 30g magnum,11g northdown.
Boiled another 45 mins, volume down to 15l, aroma hopped with 54g fuggles,14g goldings,25g WGV, 40g Willamette.
15 min boil, then chilled to 25c

wort volume is 12l, OG is 1100

Nottingham Danstar used to ferment, rehydrated according to instructions. Fermentation fridge set to 20c, 2 days along gravity is down to 1030 ish, 200g black treacle added lifting gravity to around 1035. 5 days in and the fermentation has pretty much stopped at a shade over 1030sg. I have stirred the wort to lift the yeast a couple of times.

The nottingham data sheet suggests it can ferment to around 1008 and is fairly alcohol tolerant. I thought it would get lower than 1030. I realise the varied malts will put it higher but...
I mashed lower than normal (66) to try and minimise the more complex sugars as i knew getting the final gravity low would be tricky. I'd like to get it lower than this though and I'd like to get a little carbonation going too when I bottle.

Can anyone with more experience advise? Is it worth trying a wine yeast with more alcohol tolerance to get lower?

[Normski]

Give it some time. It will probably go a bit lower, but not much.
I wouldn’t add any yeast or even stir any more, just give it time.
Norm

[BrannigansLove]

I would make up a yeast starter, and pitch at high krausen. In future, you might want to consider using a yeast cake from a previous brew for fermenting a beer as big as this.

[lord groan]

Interesting ! Thanks for the suggestions

I've upped the fermentation temp to 22.5c to see if that'll do anything. Ive got a couple of other yeasts I might try, some SO4 and SO5 as i have them to hand but I'll need to check what they can cope with first.
Still, no rush, my last (and first) RIS has now been in the bottle for 2 1/4 years and is really rather nice now.

[GrowlingDogBeer]

I doubt it will go much lower than it is now. 1100 to 1030 is quite good. Adding more yeast now will do nothing as the high alcohol content will just kill it. The only yeast surviving now is what has become used to the high alcohol. Give it another couple of weeks and it will have gone down as far as it will go, in a couple of years time it will be sublime.

[McMullan]

If you really want to dry it out, you could pitch some WLP099. I wouldn't just bung it in there, though, as it might shock even this strain. I'd get it ready in a high gravity starter. Next time you brew an RIS, you might want to ferment with 'IPA's Courage strain'. There's a thread on here somewhere. I believe it's available (on a slope) from BrewLabs.

[Deebee]

From experience with RIS they tend to stall. You need to pitch enough yeast and as much as i love Notty i would have pitched 2 packs for \sure on this one.

1100 to 1030 gives you a beer of around 9.3, but again i would give it at least 3 weeks to drop. patience my friend, patience:)

[Sadfield]

I have read advice about using a lager strain in secondary at temperatures lower than one would for Ale yeasts in order to complete attenuation. Anyone tried this?

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[Padalac]

I did a similar OG batch to yourself with nottingham and it stopped at around 1.027. It tasted great so I wouldnt worry.

Does it taste underattenuated?

[lord groan]

Haven't tasted it yet padalac, only my second ris and the last one finished in the high 20,s so I guess it's OK.
Next question - has it finished high because there's only unfermentable sugars left, or because the yeast gave up?
I'm thinking about the conditioning now, I'd like to get some fizz into the bottle, should I prime with some very fermentable sugars, or just leave the residual sweetness to do it's thing in the bottle?
Cheers

[Deebee]

I mash a ris at 64 ish.
Stout should not be fizzy but normal table sugar is fine.
Just let ut be for a while. It will drop a little more. Notty manages 10% with absolute ease

[Hanglow]

Interested to hear what it tastes like with such a huge amount of roast barley and other grains. Only 50% base malt

[micmacmoc]

It'll be a bewdy, do hide some bottles away and have one every xmas day or whatever, I did a similar RIS three years ago, still looking forward to my xmas after dinner treat. Its astounding. Must do another. I used the yeastcake from a previous brew, worked lovely. Still took about 10 days or something to get down to around 1016 if I remember correctly.

[orlando]

Interested to hear what it tastes like with such a huge amount of roast barley and other grains. Only 50% base malt

And that's your clue, not enough diastatic malt. Still wouldn't worry about it, seems to be coming along lovely.

[IPA]

If you really want to dry it out, you could pitch some WLP099. I wouldn't just bung it in there, though, as it might shock even this strain. I'd get it ready in a high gravity starter. Next time you brew an RIS, you might want to ferment with 'IPA's Courage strain'. There's a thread on here somewhere. I believe it's available (on a slope) from BrewLabs.

Here it is.

posting.php?mode=quote&f=2&p=788900