A friend of mine called me last night to ask me a homebrew question. His FG was 1.022 and he was wondering why it was so high. The red he was making had been in the fermenter for 3 weeks and he was all ready to bottle when he realized the gravity. I told him to leave it for another week and see if it drops anymore. Then I asked what his OG was and he said 1.045. I thought that was very low. That would make his red around the 2-3% range. He used 11 lbs of extract. Now I am thinking that the OG was wrong. By his discription, he is not doing anything different than I do, so I don't know how he is getting a false reading if in fact he is. I have had his beers before and they have all been just fine. Any ideas? Thanks. BTW- He was using an English yeast.
If it was liquid malt extract and 5 gallons, the OG should have been around 1.077. If DME, then even higher. If your friend did a partial boil and topped off with water, and then measured the OG before mixing well, then he could have obtained a reading that was much too low.
Also if the FG seems high then you have the question the yeast. What strain of English yeast as the attenuation can vary greatly? Was a starter made? How old was the yeast? I think the OG questions asked by utahbeerdude are also very valid and more than likely coudl lead you in the right direction.
When he told me that he used 11 lbs of extract (I don't know if it was dry or liquid) I thought it should have been around the 1.075 mark as well. I will ask him about the mixing. I don't know what strain of yeast was used.
You could always have him taste the beer and see how strong it is. 1.075 to 1.022 is going to be over 7% ABV, which should be noticeable. That way you could prove to him that his OG reading was off, even if he can't tell you why.
Honestly, when I did partial boils with extract I simply gave up on taking OG measurements and just calculated it instead, because I got wildly unbelievable numbers most of the time (presumably due to poor mixing)
