4lb vs 3.3 lb

volvodude · 05-31-2009, 11:48 AM

Hello. New to HB and to this forum. I plan to brew an APA from a recipe in a book and it calls to 3.3lb of pale LME. All I can find at my HB store is a 4lb can. Will this mess up my recipe considerably? Thanks for any input.

SteveM · 05-31-2009, 11:57 AM

It will make your beer slightly stronger, maybe slightly darker, that's about it. Weird, though, I have NEVER seen a four lb. can of LME. If it was me, I simply dump it in. I routinely punch up my recipes with a little extra fermentables.

boydak · 05-31-2009, 12:26 PM

+1 on dump it in and don't worry

The Pol · 05-31-2009, 12:35 PM

Yah, Id say use it... I cannot imagine it hurting anything, just a slightly higher OG. Looks like an increase of about .006 or so for ya.

volvodude · 05-31-2009, 12:50 PM

Thanks for the input. I figured it was probably OK, but it is good to have those more experienced agree with you.

**ajf** · 05-31-2009, 05:17 PM

Pol's arithmetic is different than mine. I calculate a gravity increase of 0.005 (assuming a 5g batch).
I guess that your recipe also calls for some other fermentables (presumably sugar). If that was a good guess, you could reduce the amount of sugar in the recipe by the amount of extra LME that you added. That should leave the gravity almost unchanged, but would result in a more malty beer.

-a.

The Pol · 05-31-2009, 05:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ajf

Pol's arithmetic is different than mine. I calculate a gravity increase of 0.05 (assuming a 5g batch).I guess that your recipe also calls for some other fermentables (presumably sugar). If that was a good guess, you could reduce the amount of sugar in the recipe by the amount of extra LME that you added. That should leave the gravity almost unchanged, but would result in a more malty beer.

-a.

.05, whaaaa??

If you have 4 pounds of LME in 5 gallons of water, in ProMash anyhow, it shows an OG of 1.027

If you have 3.3 pounds of LME in 5 gallons of water, in ProMash anyhow, it shows an OG of 1.022.

So I guess I was off by .001... It is actually .005.

I dont see where you are getting .05... I hope that is a typo!

**ajf** · 05-31-2009, 06:16 PM

Duh!

My bad. I corrected the missing 0.
If I could get a gravity of 1.050 out of 0.7# LME, I could give up my day job.

-a.