gtpro

Recipes 

I'm brewing http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f71/austin-homebrews-belgian-white-beer-135187/ right now, hit my mash temp right on, sat it for an hour, sparged and filled the pot.

The wort looks very light in color compared to anything I've brewed before, my pre-boil gravity is like 1.020, what the eff just happened and what should I do about it?

Bernie Brewer

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My guess is that your temp is about 130-140, right? You're probably fine. You need to adjust for temperature and boiloff, both of which will give a more accurate reading.

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weirdboy

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OK first off what temp did you take the reading at? Higher temperatures will read lower on a hydrometer and you cannot really trust the readings. If you used a refractometer, did you calibrate it first?

Second, pre-boil gravity is going to be lower than final gravity, because you boil off volume. What are the preboil volume and target final volume?

Third, are you sure you got all the wort you can out of your MLT? Even another 1/2 gallon of wort in the MLT is going to make a difference in your gravity.

FireNightFly

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Here is a good calc. for determining you OG and FG allowing you to enter the temp and reading.
http://dd26943.com/davesdreaded/tools/convert.htm

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gtpro

Recipes 

could have been as hot at 150F when I took the reading, I know that does account for some points, I'm only about .5-1gal over my target volume. The wort just "feels" thin.

gtpro

Recipes 

thanks for the calculator, it looks like I could actually be more around 1.038 with the temp difference, but thats still .01 off from where I want to be, AHH first brewing disaster yet!

Bernie Brewer

Recipes 

This calculator isn't bad. Otherwise Beersmith or Promash will help a lot for things like this, but they cost $.

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I like to squeeze the nickle until the buffalo craps-mt rob

"Why don't we get drunk and screw?" Jimmy Buffett

Yuri_Rage

Recipes 

Ok, given that data, do nothing. Corrected for temp, your pre-boil gravity is 1.039. If you boil off a gallon, you'll be at 1.043 into the fermenter (assuming a 5 gallon batch).

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wildwest450

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SOME points? try 19! If you were at 1.020 at 150f, your actually at 1.039. I call panicky pete on you.

slowbie

Recipes 

Assuming you have a 5 gallon final batch size and 1 gallon of boiloff (so six gallons as of measurement) then you're right on by my math.