Hydrometer question & others

This is my first time brewing so abunch of noob questions follow. I did search the forum but still have a few questions.

1) So I forgot to take OG of the beer so is there anyway to figure out the alcohol content by using the FG ?

2) Also I'm having a hard time with the hydrometer touching the sides of the container I use to take the readings. Is it ok to just barely touch ? I spin the hydrometer around so it should be free of bubbles.

3) Taking a reading the fluid rasies abit around the hydrometer do I read at the raised level or the lower level ?

4) The scale shows 1.000 the below that says 10 then 20. Are these showing hundreths such as 1.010 for the 10 mark ? So one line above 10 would be 1.009 ?

5) The guy at the beer store told me it was ok to take a reading at 70F. I would just have to move the scale up or down a point, but I didn't write down what he said and have forgotten. So at 70F my reading was 1.019 if I read it correctly and its been fermenting for 10 days at about 63F. It shows 1.019 two days in arow so I believe its ready to move into another bucket prime with sugar and bottle.

I am using a sealed plastic bucket with a air lock on top. Everything has been cleaned with bleach.






I'm brewing a Honey Brown Ale.

http://www.ebrew.com/primarynews/ct_hydrometer_temp_correction.htm

Here is a link to a conversion chart for your temperature variances for your gravity readings. There are many different types of hydrometers out there and I really only know how to read mine. So I'm not sure on yours. Your beer looks great. 1.019 sounds like a good final gravity reading. Since it's been in the primary it's time to either rack it to a secondary, or like you said, put it in the bottling bucket, add some sugar and stick it in the bottles.

hth, good luck


loop

In order:

1: No.
2: Yes.
3: Top.
4: Yes.
5: Yes.

Thanks for the info. Got everything bottled last nite now I wait.

In regards to this question:

Dead Weasel said:

3) Taking a reading the fluid rasies abit around the hydrometer do I read at the raised level or the lower level ?

Click to expand...

'Squatch answered:

Sasquatch said:

3: Top.

Click to expand...

But I'm not sure what you were asking. I *think* you were talking about the "miniscus", which is a curving of the liquid caused by adhesion of the liquid to the hydrometer:

It looks kind of like this, and you should take your reading at the LOWER liquid level, not at the point where the liquid actually touches the hydrometer.



-walker

Walker said:

In regards to this question:

'Squatch answered:


But I'm not sure what you were asking. I *think* you were talking about the "miniscus", which is a curving of the liquid caused by adhesion of the liquid to the hydrometer:

It looks kind of like this, and you should take your reading at the LOWER liquid level, not at the point where the liquid actually touches the hydrometer.

-walker

Click to expand...

Where you read the level on the hydrometer depends on the hydrometer. Mine instructs me to read the UPPER meniscus, not the lower one.

bikebryan said:

Where you read the level on the hydrometer depends on the hydrometer. Mine instructs me to read the UPPER meniscus, not the lower one.

Click to expand...

I think that's also whay I read in the New Brewing Lager Beer book.

I just checked mine with 60F water and it seems to be correct at the lower meniscus.

Kai

As far as having trouble with the float staying centered, I lift mine up off the counter and hold it in the air so that it centers. Probably the surface it's on or maybe the actual container itself is not level. I am a definitely a nub to brewing beer but have taken thousands of readings of battery acid with a hydrometer. The hydrometers that I used were designed so that they could NOT be be set on a flat surface and had be hand held.


Temperature correction question for the forum:

Sorry to hijack the thread but the instructions that came with my hydrometer are kind of obscure regarding temperature correction. I remember temperature correcting anything other than 80F. Does this sound right? Every 3 degrees over 80 add 1 point. This might vary I don't know.

"1) So I forgot to take OG of the beer so is there anyway to figure out the alcohol content by using the FG ? "




If you didn't use a kit where you don't know exactly what all was in the recipe, you should be able to figure out the alcohol by volume. Plug all of your ingrediants in here:

http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator

BrewBrothaRick said:

Temperature correction question for the forum:

Sorry to hijack the thread but the instructions that came with my hydrometer are kind of obscure regarding temperature correction. I remember temperature correcting anything other than 80F. Does this sound right? Every 3 degrees over 80 add 1 point. This might vary I don't know.

Click to expand...

There's a little widget here that you can use to get the correct adjustment:

http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator/hydrometer.html

-walker