Batch size vs. Estimated post boil volume

For a typical 5 gallon batch, why does beersmith kick out a post boil volume of 6.24 gallons? And then after it says to transfer to fermenter, it says to add water to achieve 5 gallons?

Beersmith attempts to take into account losses caused by your equipment profile and shrinkage. IE: Boiling wort will shrink 4% when cooled. There's is also trub in the bottom of the kettle that's a part of the post-boil volume, but should not be part of the fermentor volume. If you have a spigot on your kettle, and there's dead-space below it that doesn't get transferred, you loss that too. If you have a counter-flow chiller, you may loose some wort in the pipes. Etc.
The amount of loss is dependent on your equipment profile in BS. You should look under the profiles available, and find the one that most closely matches your set up. Then copy it to a new profile, and tweak it until the numbers are right.

I do not understand why I ended up with so much beer. Beersmith made our preboil volume 8.24 gallons and we ended up with over 6 gallons of beer in the fermenter. Ive tried adjusting beersmith with our specific details in the equipment tab and such and it still kicks out a preboil volume of 8.24. My preboil volume should have been way less than the 8.24 it was kicking out. This has screwed up our entire batch/efficiency and will probably taste like crap just like all the rest of our beers we have tried to make. Very frustrating.

Just adjust the equipment profile to reflect less boil and/or trub loss. Or, un-tick the box for BeerSmith to calculate the boil volume automatically. It's just a matter of dialing in your system. You're actually only about a half gallon off of what you want going into the fermenter. I calculate my recipes for 5.5 gallons to compensate for losses in the fermenter.

dmbnpj said:

I do not understand why I ended up with so much beer. Beersmith made our preboil volume 8.24 gallons and we ended up with over 6 gallons of beer in the fermenter. Ive tried adjusting beersmith with our specific details in the equipment tab and such and it still kicks out a preboil volume of 8.24. My preboil volume should have been way less than the 8.24 it was kicking out. This has screwed up our entire batch/efficiency and will probably taste like crap just like all the rest of our beers we have tried to make. Very frustrating.

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Just like downtown3641 said, you have a couple of choices here. One is to click into the "equipment tab" and adjust the amounts- the boil off, for example, and the amount to start the boil with, and adjust until you get the "correct" amount. The other choice is to uncheck the "calculate preboil volume" on the recipe design area and put in your own numbers. That is what I do! I just start with 6.5 gallons there, to finish with 5.25. Then it calculates the other things for me.