Giving up on testing the gravity

I Checked my beginning Gravity and it was 1.030 and My final Gravity was way low at 0.998. I tasted it and it was OK not as flavorful as I expected. Bottled it any way and now I will wait a few weeks to Try it again I hope it gets better with age. Any words of encouragement or advice? Can I do anything at this point?

brew more

That's like wine dry. Did you use a lot of sugar? If you just use malt I can't see how it could get below 1.000 without a misreading.

Make sure your hydrometer is reading correctly, and any temp corrections have been made. Keep tracking each brew to see if it is consistent, then you can begin to make adjustments to the recipe depending on your efficiency.

i had similar readings and i finally found out my hydrometer was bad.

Take that hydrometer and throw it! Eyes ears smell and taste. What do you think bootleggers did back in the day? Play mr wizard? I come from a long list of bootleggers from grandparents on back. They didnt have these gadets they be lucky if they had shoes or food! Use your judgement...thats what i say. A lot going to agrue and yes i use hydrometer sometimes but not like its some winning ticket. I hate that damn thing! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

sounds like a bad hydrometer; you can check it by floating in water, it should read 1.000 at the calibration temp (usually 60F). Maybe the paper inside is loose.

what was the recipe you used?? 1.030 seems a very low SG to have to begin with.

Try seeing if your hydrometer is accurately calibrated by testing it in plain tap water. It should read close to 1.000. If that's way off the mark then the rest of your readings were, too.

I Checked my beginning Gravity and it was 1.030 and My final Gravity was way low at 0.998. I tasted it and it was OK not as flavorful as I expected. Bottled it any way and now I will wait a few weeks to Try it again I hope it gets better with age. Any words of encouragement or advice? Can I do anything at this point?

Sum Sing Wong

What are you checking with?

i have been having a hell of a time taking readings, i'm still new at this, and i blame my oddly low sg this time around to topping off my carboy with water and not getting it mixed enough. I guess i need to shake the hell out it next time before taking a sample, or get a bigger boiling pot.

First off; check your hydrometer if that's what you're using. Put it in some water and it should read 1.000. If it doesn't that is how much it is off by and how much you should add/subtract from gravity readings.

Secondly; did you do extract in which you topped off your boil with some water? If so did you mix it well? Because if you didn't you would have gotten a gravity reading likely with more water than wort resulting in a lower OG reading.

Third; no you cannot do anything at this point. Ride it out and wait.

Caleb1980 said:

i have been having a hell of a time taking readings, i'm still new at this, and i blame my oddly low sg this time around to topping off my carboy with water and not getting it mixed enough. I guess i need to shake the hell out it next time before taking a sample, or get a bigger boiling pot.

Click to expand...

Since you said Carboy, I'm assuming that you're not going to use a secondary fermenter..? If so, why not use a bucket? It's much easier to stir the wort or use any number of contraptions to aerate the wort as opposed to shaking it in a Carboy. Once you're ready to pitch your yeast, take the SG reading, pitch your yeast and seal the bucket.

Granted, I'm still a noob as well so feel free to correct me if I'm way off