Wyeast French Saison 3711 no activity

By no activity do you mean no airlock bubbles or no sign of krausen forming or no motion in the carboy? My experience with 3711 is that it's somewhat ninja like- not an explosive fermentation, but it will annihilate all sugars/starches in the wort.

I'd check again tomorrow morning, everything should be going by then.

 

Gravity reading wont lie

 

Nah, I tend to like it better at cooler (for a saison) temperatures. It'll get the job done.

 

Did you do a starter? This is some pretty old yeast that is likely only about 20% viable so it's not surprising that you're getting a lag phase. Letting the pack expand would have helped to see just how viable the yeast is. It'll likely still get going you'll just end up with some more esters so like said above wait a few days and see what the gravity tells you.

 

Liquid yeast will take time to show activity. The yeast needs to uptake oxygen.
Dry yeast is packaged after the oxygen uptake phase and it will begin fermentation much quicker. This is why you should not make a starter with dry yeast btw; just add more packages.

The nutrient pack does not do all that much except proof your yeast. If the package swells then you know there are active yeast.

Saison yeast is notoriously unreliable, the Belgian in particular is flaky. Expect the yeast to go on strike for no good reason.

If nothing happens after a full day and then some, then it could be an issue.
Cheers

 

So, just so we're talking a common language, efficiency is about how much of the total potential carbohydrates make if into the kettle (mash efficiency) or all the way into the fermenter (brewhouse efficiency). What I think you're talking about is Apparent Attenuation, which going from 1.060 to 1.010 is about 83% ((60 - 10) / 60), and isn't really directly related to efficiency.

With Wyeast 3711 and a typical Saison wort, you can most likely expect that it's not done at 83% apparent attenuation.

 

It's not done till it hits at least 1.003, and maybe even lower. In my experience it takes about 3.5 weeks to get all the way there.

 

I agree that at 1.010, this beer is almost certainly not done. It would actually be hard to make a wort where 3711 wouldn't get more than 83% apparent attenuation. But personally I would never pick an FG number and say that yeast strain "x" always hits at or below that number, ignoring the OG and wort fermentability.

 

Like @dmtaylor and @VikeMan said, you're not done. When you think you're done with 3711 (and most other saison yeasts), take a gravity sample, and then wait a week instead of the normal 3 days to check stability. Even if it's just down another.001, wait a week and check again.

 

I have used 3711 multiple times. FWIW I have always obtained very low FG values (e.g.,1.001) and I reached those values in less than 7 days of primary fermentation.

YMMV.

Cheers!

 

Fire away.

 

Really the only way to stop it would be to use potassium sorbate in conjunction with potassium metabisulfite (Camden tablets) or pasteurize. Home pasteurization is possible, but tricky, and I wouldn't recommend it, unless you like the flavor of cooked beer if taken too far, or gushers or exploding bottles if you don't take it far enough. Chemicals would work if you are force carbonating in a keg.