First Partial Mash off by .011 points Why?

**Brew-boy** · 10-09-2006, 10:35 AM

I followed these instructions to the "T" and was off by .011 points.

http://www.byo.com/feature/1536.html

Can someone tell me what I might have done wrong? This is a real bummer to me, makes me not want to try it again.

**jma99** · 10-09-2006, 10:59 AM

How sweet did it taste?
I had the same thing happen, I had forgot to correct my hydromator for temp.
Beer turned out fine, I may need glasses.....

chillHayze · 10-09-2006, 01:32 PM

Grains are not grains. Think about it. One crop of grain has different characteristics than another. More diatastic power, protien, starch content and many other factors that influence conversion. Also, it's impossible for your method to be exactly the same as the BYO guys. Don't worry about being off on one batch. If you are consistently off from the projected OG then you may have issues.

Brewing isn't like sex. When you screw up, you get to drink the mistakes not put them through college. Relax, don't worrk, and try it again.

I'll bet you will make some good beer!

**EdWort** · 10-09-2006, 04:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chillHayze

Brewing isn't like sex. When you screw up, you get to drink the mistakes not put them through college. Relax, don't worrk, and try it again.

Amen Brother

**david_42** · 10-09-2006, 04:35 PM

Which of the five recipes are you talking about?

Teedocious · 10-09-2006, 04:40 PM

Quote:

Adding the grain to the water is the point in the procedure you need to be most careful about. Lower the grain bag very slowly into the hot water and use your spoon to vigorously poke at the bag. You may even want to bob the bag up and down slightly as you lower it into the hot water. If you just dunk the bag quickly, and are too dainty with your spoon, it is very possible — almost guaranteed, really — that pockets in the crushed grain will not be in contact with water. If this happens, your extract efficiency can be greatly diminished. So, go slowly — it should take a couple minutes to lower the grain into the water. And, wield your spoon like you mean it.

That's from the BYO article you referenced. Think this is possible? What about correcting the hydrometer reading for temperature? Was your grain bill mostly base malt? or were there a bunch of adjuncts? What about mash temp? Did you hit it like you wanted to?

Try it again - since it is batch sparging in a grain bag, you can grind the crap out of your grain & whip it with a spoon in that cooler to make sure all the grain is wet & immersed in water.

**Brew-boy** · 10-09-2006, 04:44 PM

It was;
Huxley’s ESB
(5 gallon/19 L, partial mash)
OG = 1.045 FG = 1.011
IBU = 34 SRM = 13 ABV = 4.4%

I used 4 lb of LME instead of the 3.3 and still came out low. Of course I corrected for temp prior to taking a hydrometer readng. I think maybe my cooler didnt hold the temp good maybe?

clayof2day · 10-10-2006, 01:17 AM

Did you do a full boil? Partial boil? Is it possible that you did added too much top up water? Is it possible that your bucket/carboy is not calibrated properly to 5 gal. and you have more volume than you thought?

All just possibilities, thought I would throw them out there.

**Bsquared** · 10-11-2006, 02:45 AM

This is just my experience, when I first started AG brewing I used a grain bag because I thought it would be easier and cleaner, but I consistently was falling short of my predicted SG. I tried a few different approaches with the sparge to rinse to spent grain's but was getting off flavors, added to the brew and was not increasing my SG much. Then I stopped using the grain bag, and used the old Zundap Turn and a cheesecloth filter. Vola! SG got in line and off flavors did not get in. I think a lot of this problem was due to me useing the small grainbag I use to use with extract brewing, so it was a little full.

**Brewing Clamper** · 10-12-2006, 03:10 AM

I did the exact same thing, I did the cream ale recipe from that article and also came out 11 points short. I'm not really worried about it.. I'm still looking forward to drinking it since it was the first time I used cracked corn (...and I don't care) in a brew.