Why am I only getting 42 bottle

When doing a 5 gallon brew I'm only getting 42 bottles? My last brew I got 42 too. Don't understand what I'm doing wrong. Thank you for the help

are you starting brewing with 5 gallons water, or are you starting with more like 6.5? sounds like you might be starting with less water than you need to. have you measured the gravity?

You will lose some brew to trub in the bottom of the fermenter. What is the recipe, is it a kit with pre measured ingredients. or your own all grain recipe? plus generally you will lose about .75 gallons in a 1 hour boil.

A lot of the water during the boil evaporates and more does the same during fermentation. Did you add more water to the batch when you put it into the fermentor? May be the problem. Hope that helps.

lumpher said:

are you starting brewing with 5 gallons water, or are you starting with more like 6.5? sounds like you might be starting with less water than you need to. have you measured the gravity?

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I have been filling it up to the 5 gallon line.

I got 42 bottles only once. I had used the 5 gallon carboy for the primary rather than the 6 gallon. the rest of the times I got 50 or so.

dmashl said:

You will lose some brew to trub in the bottom of the fermenter. What is the recipe, is it a kit with pre measured ingredients. or your own all grain recipe?

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Kit

Normal, make a 5 gallon batch and expect less.

JohnGonk said:

A lot of the water during the boil evaporates and more does the same during fermentation. Did you add more water to the batch when you put it into the fermentor? May be the problem. Hope that helps.

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I only have a 5 gallon pot. So I do a 3 gallon boil then fill my fermentor to the 5 gallon line.

Can I make a 6gallon mark on my fermentor will that work?

A couple possibilities come to mind:

* Are you topping up in the fermenter and relying on its markings? Those aren't the most accurate in the world.
* If you're starting with 5 gallons in the kettle, by the time you leave kettle trub behind, transfer to the fermenter, and leave the trub and yeast behind in the fermenter, you're reduced by those volumes. If you're starting by measuring hot wort, there's a little shrinkage as it cools.

Basically, there's probably a measurement error somewhere, or trub loss, or both.

Hmmmm. Not sure. Ive always gotten 48-52 bottles per batch. Sounds like you did it correctly.

Brew2 said:

Can I make a 6gallon mark on my fermentor will that work?

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I've done a few 6 gallon batches. As long as you have adequate head space and/or a blow-off, no reason you can't do bigger batches. Not sure why you're coming up so short though. Could just be bad markings on your fermenter??? Do your gravity readings end up higher than expected?

What size bottles?

16oz or 12oz?

SpottedDogBrewing said:

What size bottles?

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12oz

Anyone have an idea to check the markings?

Brew2 said:

Anyone have an idea to check the markings?

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Pour water, a gallon at a time, into your fermenter. Use a sharpie to mark where one gallon is. Then two, three, four, etc.

If you're making 5 gallons of beer, that's 640 ounces. It's not uncommon to lose about 1/2 gallon, give or take, to trub in the fermenter.

That means that 575 ounces or so to bottle. That's about 48 bottles.

If you have less, that's fine if the beer tastes great.

But you can figure out where your loses are, if you want. See how much you're leaving behind in the fermenter, by measuring it. If you're using a clearing vessel ("secondary"), maybe you're leaving 50 ounces behind there. That would explain the lower volume.

But really- if the beer is good, who cares?

Brew2 said:

12oz

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How much trub at bottom of fermenter?
Are you filling bottles to high?

This is why a lot of recipes are 5.5 gallons. I never cared and i'd rather cull a couple at the end rather then end up with a sediment overload.

Do you use a pickup tube? Get a 90 degree PVC elbow instead of the nut inside your bottling bucket.