Missed my OG by 16 ...... or did I?

I brewed a mini-mash batch last night and I missed my OG by 16. However, I'm wondering if I really did? Here's the recipe and what I did:

1/2 lb 60 crystal
4 lb light DME
2 1/2 lb dark DME
2 oz. Tettnanger (bittering)
1/2 oz. Tettnanger (aroma)
1/4 oz. Hallerttau (flavor)
1/4 oz. Hallerttau (dry)

My boil was right around 2 1/2 gallons. I chilled the wort down to around 80. I had 4 gallons of spring water in jugs that I had on standby in the freezer (they had been in there for about two hours). I first added a gallon of the spring water to the primary fermenter and then poured the 2 1/2 gallons of wort on top of the gallon of spring water. I then added more spring water to bring the total volume up to 5 1/2 gallons. I now realize that I took the hydrometer sample prior to shaking the fermenter to aerate the wort.

According to my recipe on Brewmaster's Brew Builder my OG should be 1.056. The sample I took had a SG of 1.040. Could it be that my sample was just more spring water than wort? The spring water was also colder than expected and brought the temp of the wort down to around 54. Would the cold temps effect the gravity?

I think what happened was your water wasn't fully mixed with the wort and you got a bad reading. With extract, you can't really screw up your OG by too much. I could see getting 1.054, but 1.040 is way off. I'm sure you hit it close enough.

i had the same sort of thing happen, mi OG was 1.038 when it should have been 1.055, realized that it was a major error after it went in the bucket, but eh, it should turn into beer

Try wait a few days and take another sample. You might want to give the carboy a gentle shake as well. The same thing actually happened to me recently. The OG should have been over 1.080, but the first reading was only 1.050. A couple of days and some stirring later, it was 1.070. Close enough, and the sample I took when I bottled turned out great.

It looks like you just had a bad reading. There is no way possible 1/2 pound of Crystal malt would raise/lower the OG by 16 points. Even if you got no fermentable sugars out of the Crystal malt, your OG would still be within 4 points of your target gravity. Did you actually mash the crystal malt, or steep it?

Newbeerguy said:

It looks like you just had a bad reading. There is no way possible 1/2 pound of Crystal malt would raise/lower the OG by 16 points. Even if you got no fermentable sugars out of the Crystal malt, your OG would still be within 4 points of your target gravity. Did you actually mash the crystal malt, or steep it?

Click to expand...

I steeped it in 150 degree water for 20 minutes and then sparged it with a half gallon of 150 degree water. In a last minute effort to try and get some more fermentables in the wort after taking such a low reading, I boiled up 1 cup of brown sugar and a half cup of table sugar in a little bit of water. I added this to the wort, but it was after I had already pitched the yeast. Therefore, I didn't take another gravity reading.

It sounds like I'll be alright. If anything I guess I'll have a little bit of a sweeter beer form the sugar I added.

Yep sounds like it will be just fine

I did the same thing last thursday. OG was supposed to be 1.090, but I got almost ALL wort and very little water, so the gravity read 1.120. I was pissed until the next morning when I woke up and realized that I hadn't mixed the water with the wort properly before sticking the thief into it.

1/2 lb 60 crystal = 10 points
4 lb light DME = 168 points
2 1/2 lb dark DME = 105 points

total....................283 points
divided by 5 (gallon batch) = 56.6 or 1.056

You have a false reading. It is extract you can't screw it up. You would have had to make a 6 1/2 gallon batch with the ingredients you have in order to reach 1.040.

Rest assured that if you are making an extract batch with specialty grains and you gravity is low, you have a false reading. The only real exception is that they didn't give you the ingredients listed or you added way too much water. Chances are niether of those happened.

Extract with specialty grain is foolproof. All grain is another story for another day.

Forrest