So as the title suggests, I noticed the bubbles had stopped when I got home this evening and decided to take a gravity reading to see where I was at and what my next options were. I began with a 1.056 gravity and low and behold when I took my hydrometer reading this evening I was down to .998. From everything I had read I was under the impression that my ferment should take about 2 week? Any input as to why this happened, wether or not it's bad for a fermentation to happen this fast, and what my next steps should be would be greatly appreciated.
While the yeast were very active to bring the FG so low that quickly, it takes a little longer for the yeast to clean up intermediate products of fermentation. That should be done in another 24 hours or so. From then on they yeast are flocculating and settling out as is the trub they stirred up during fermentation.
I have bottled at one week from pitching yeast and I have waited for 9 weeks before bottling a batch. Guess which had a 1/4" of trub in each bottle and which one was the best when bottled and carbonatedl
So as with all things patience will go a long way here. Thanks a bunch for your input, will give it a week or so and see how much has settled to the bottom of my Fastferment. Any thoughts on clearing packets like Turbo Clear or Dual Fine?
I had my last batch really finish at 48 hours. As in the Windsor yeast were DONE, absolutely zero fermentation after 72 hours. It sat the rest of this week and I kegged it Friday after 10 days. Still has to settle in keg another week or two to get good and clean....lots of time it isn't needing further fermentation, the beer needs time for the solids that will settle to do that
72 hours is plenty of time to ferment all but the last point or two of specific gravity out of beer. My last batch did that. But it took about 8 more days to loose that last 0.001 of SG.
Remember that fermentation is only about converting sugar to alcohol. Other stuff happens after that. One being that you need to give some time for your yeast to flocculate out of suspension so you don't serve me a nasty tasting murky brew.
I had planned to let it reach complete dryness then stabilize and sweeten to taste right before bottling. I plan on letting it sit until this saturday then rack off the lees, then add some Turbo Clear and give it another week before stabilizing and bottling. I realize now that I didn't say what I was making in my OP, it's a hard apple cider.
It's alright, easy to correct.
And understandable, yes, you're a beginner. But... your post was not about beer. Hence you got questions and comments on the final gravity of 0.998 ( which is very low for beer) and "dry-a$$ beer."