HELP Required - Stuck Fermentation or something else

[bossdrums]

Help needed please, I brewed the following recipe the other weekend, see below link;

recipeview.php?recipe_id=1325

...when I measured the OG I only got 1038, after 2 days of constant bubbling on the airlock things died down... I left it for a total of 10 days and then syphoned it last night into my bottling bucket and took the FG reading of 1018...2.7%ABV?!?!? this should be a lot closer to 4.5% ( which is what Beer Smith tells me it should be based on a 3 gallon brew pot etc).

I was confused and in my haste I added some more yeast into the bottling bucket last night, another packet of Nottingham yeast...should I have done this?

Can anyone explain why my original OG reading may have been so low and why my FG is so high??

Thanks in advance

One very worried brewer...

 

[RobWalker]

Probably hasn't finished fermenting properly. Give it some time and was the until fg is constant. Og is usually off because of stirring with extract so go on your calculations.
Adding more yeast doesn't really matter but in the perfect world you would pitch the correct amount, so they 1) cost you the right amount and 2) clean up after themselves better.

 

[dizidave]

My Brewfrem Triple stppoed at 1.020 also.

Ive bottled it now.

 

[bossdrums]

Thanks for the advice, I'll see if it's bubbling again when I get home, if not I'll take a reading and see if anything has changed...

Not sure if I should bottle at 1018,. isn't it a little high, could I be creating ticking time bombs??

 

[bossdrums]

Well...it didn't start bubbling, I even added a little more sugar to see if I could get the extra yeast I put in to activate...but nothing. Measured it again on Sunday and it was still 1018...so decided to bottle it...hopefully there won't be any bottle bombs in there...

I'm thinking/hoping that my first measurement of 1038 was wrong, perhaps I didn't mix the water & wort enough before taking the reading...who knows, at least it seemed to taste all right before it went into the bottle....fingers crossed.