wierd efficiency

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400d

400d

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I brewed a stout couple of days ago. After I sparged, I took a sample and my pre boil gravity reading was 1.032. I expected more, of course....

So I put it to boil, and after it boiled for 60 minutes, I chilled it and took a reading and it was 1.060

The water loss during boil was not high...

How is this possible?
 
yes, you are right.

my wort was hot after sparging, and by the calculator instead of 1.032 it should have read 1.048...

now, is it possible that 1.048 raised to 1.060 after 60 minutes of boil?

I repeat that my water loss was not big. I probably lost 0.5 gal of water from the kettle
 
After the boil I chilled the wort to 68 F and took a reading which was 1.060. So this reading should be fine, I guess the temperature was fine...

I wanted less ABV so I added 0.5 gallon of boiled water to already boiled wort and lowered 1.060 to 1.052

Do you think I made a mistake? Is this going to affect the final product?
 
could be thinner gravity wort from the sparge sitting on higher gravity wort from the initial run off and you measured the lower gravity stuff then the action of the boil mixed it all together.
just a thought:mug:
 
martinworswick said:
could be thinner gravity wort from the sparge sitting on higher gravity wort from the initial run off and you measured the lower gravity stuff then the action of the boil mixed it all together.
just a thought:mug:
Click to expand...
I suspect this is the most likely culprit, you must mix your preboil wolume well before grabbing your sample, and you should chill your sample to the temp your hydrometer is calibrated to get an accurate reading.:mug:
 
I routinely get a 10 or so point increase from pre to post boil but I also have about a gallon of boil off on a three gallon batch and close to two gallons on a five gallon batch.
 
do you think I made a mistake by adding some boiled water to wort after boiling to lower the efficiency from 1.060 to 1.052?
 
I always take more than one pre boil reading on the wort. No matter how well I think I mixed it the first time, it's almost always higher on the second reading. No big deal if you're using a refractometer. It's something I would never have done with a hydrometer.
 
400d said:
do you think I made a mistake by adding some boiled water to wort after boiling to lower the efficiency from 1.060 to 1.052?
Click to expand...

If your readings are good and you wanted an OG of 1.052 then no, why would that be a mistake? A lot of people do that if they overshoot their OG.
 
I find my refractometer gets confused by hop particulate. I use it to ensure sparge doesn't drop below 1.008. Post boil I use my hydrometer with temp compensation in Brewsmith.
The trouble with adding water post boil to lower gravity is it reduces bitterness at the same time.
400d - theres nothing you can do now so don't stress. Have you taken another sample since to check gravity ?
 

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