Too much wort... Boil down to volume?

After my sparge I've ended up with too much wort by about 2 gallons (lack of experience in all grain and some miscalculation)... Can I just boil it down to my desired boil volume? That would turn it on to a 2 hour boil time.. Is that doable or would that ruin something. Also, if I did do that, would I just start my normal "60 minute" boil schedule after the first hour?
Thanks!

Yep, that's the way I do it. You'll be fine.

and if you have a way to measure, or make a measure stick, you can find what your boil off rate is for future brews with this extended boil

Thanks a lot, good idea!

With a few batches you'll start to get a feel for your system and know what you need. I don't even use calculators. Just kind of wing it and I'm usually where I want to be with volume and temperature. But I'm not really shooting for consistency.

rs3902 said:

After my sparge I've ended up with too much wort by about 2 gallons (lack of experience in all grain and some miscalculation)... Can I just boil it down to my desired boil volume? That would turn it on to a 2 hour boil time.. Is that doable or would that ruin something. Also, if I did do that, would I just start my normal "60 minute" boil schedule after the first hour?
Thanks!

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It won't ruin anything, but you may end up with a higher SRM beer than you intended and a caramel/biscuity kind of taste.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maillard_reaction
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/kettle-caramelization-maillard-reaction-fermentability-123029/

Start your hop addition at the 60 min mark.

bwomp313 said:

With a few batches you'll start to get a feel for your system and know what you need. I don't even use calculators. Just kind of wing it and I'm usually where I want to be with volume and temperature. But I'm not really shooting for consistency.

Click to expand...

I use all kinds of calculations, but mostly in my head and on the fly. I work off of a spreadsheet/brewing "software" (really, just a fancy spreadsheet some guy wrote 10 years ago that I've customized to my system)...but I monitor actual numbers as I go and make on-the-fly adjustments all the time.

I think I've found that my absorption is less than I've been expecting lately. I'm coming out slightly high on volume and slightly low on gravity. Boiloff is pretty much on though. Only other place to lose water is absorption.

I usually FWH, but after I get all runnings in kettle and take gravity sample, that's when I decide how long I need to boil. I start the timer accordingly for flavor and aroma hops, but the bittering hops are already in there and generally come out pretty spot-on.

tre9er said:

I usually FWH, but after I get all runnings in kettle and take gravity sample, that's when I decide how long I need to boil. I start the timer accordingly for flavor and aroma hops, but the bittering hops are already in there and generally come out pretty spot-on.

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I also usually FWH and I'll take a refractometer sample and if it's lower than expected I'll do a 90 min boil, if it's higher or normal I'll do a 60.

i did this same thing the other day, BUT didn't know it until i chilled and put it into my fermentor. is there anything i can do now??? sugar?? DME??? it was NB Phat Tyre clone and i was over shooting my mash temps. put cold water into tun to hit temps and must have had 7 gallons rather than 6. suppose to have a 1.052 OG but undershot at 1.042 this was two days ago. any ideas??

Hockeyhunter99 said:

i did this same thing the other day, BUT didn't know it until i chilled and put it into my fermentor. is there anything i can do now??? sugar?? DME??? it was NB Phat Tyre clone and i was over shooting my mash temps. put cold water into tun to hit temps and must have had 7 gallons rather than 6. suppose to have a 1.052 OG but undershot at 1.042 this was two days ago. any ideas??

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You can boil some extract and cool, add. Find a good calculator online that tells you how much. I'm guessing it won't take too much