"Watering" down beer at bottling?

I really have no intent on doing this, it just popped into my mind while playing with BeerSmith this morning. Let's say one really needed to make more than five gallons for an event, occasion, etc. They only have room, equipment, etc. for a single five gallon setup. The recipe is made up to make a beer with say 1.086 OG. They choose a yeast based on great attenuation of high gravity beers. The beer ferments out to maybe 1.011 and they get ready to bottle. Now, since they need more than five gallons, but couldn't do a larger batch, they add water to the bottling bucket.....two gallons with the priming sugar and 2.5 gallons of the high gravity beer, and then do the same with the other half to come up with nine gallons from a five gallon brew day.

Would this result in terrible beer, ok beer, beer? Inquiring minds want to know.

If I recall correctly alot of the big BMC type breweries do this to maximize product output without increasing the primary fermenting vessel.

On a homebrew scale Im not sure about the maximum amount of dilution you can use, your example is talking about almost doubling your batch size. I would say that if you added up to 25% you would be fine without the beer tasting ‘watered down’. But you have to look at other things than just gravity – IBUs, color, etc.

If the intention is to double (or at least increase by some factor, say, 1.5x ??) the output of the fermenter, then perhaps you could mash/steep (not sure of proper terms here, as I'm currently an extract-only brewer) some rice, corn, oats, or wheat in another kettle with 5 gallon of water.

Let that cool, then mix 50/50 (or 75/25, whatever) in the bottling bucket.

I started a thread about how BMC brewed such consistent beers. Consistent process + Reliable Taste Testers + Rice Adjuncts + Lots of Water + Blending the Off Batches = BMC CONSISTENCY

grndslm said:

If the intention is to double (or at least increase by some factor, say, 1.5x ??) the output of the fermenter.

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Yeah, I was basically saying you brew a 10 gallons recipe with just five gallons of water (say 5.5) in the fermenter, and then add the other five gallons of water at bottling. Why would that not be feasible?

One potential issue is that a high gravity beer has a little different fermentation characteristics. Some yeast cant handle the high alcohol. It could take longer for the beer to mellow (but then again maybe if you dilute it after fermentation that could be perceived as mellowing).

befus said:

I really have no intent on doing this, it just popped into my mind while playing with BeerSmith this morning. Let's say one really needed to make more than five gallons for an event, occasion, etc. They only have room, equipment, etc. for a single five gallon setup. The recipe is made up to make a beer with say 1.086 OG. They choose a yeast based on great attenuation of high gravity beers. The beer ferments out to maybe 1.011 and they get ready to bottle. Now, since they need more than five gallons, but couldn't do a larger batch, they add water to the bottling bucket.....two gallons with the priming sugar and 2.5 gallons of the high gravity beer, and then do the same with the other half to come up with nine gallons from a five gallon brew day.

Would this result in terrible beer, ok beer, beer? Inquiring minds want to know.

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1.086 down to 1.011 sounds like cheap malt liquor with lots of corn or rice. And then you would be at 1.006 after dilution. Right?

badbrew said:

1.086 down to 1.011 sounds like cheap malt liquor with lots of corn or rice. And then you would be at 1.006 after dilution. Right?

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right, but that's 1.006 from an equivalent 1.043.

5 gallons of 1.086 --> 1.012 = ~8% ABV

10 gallons of 1.046 --> 1.006 = 4% ABV.

As KPR noted, this is something that the big boys do to increase output.

You need to ensure your initial beer is balanced when diluted to the larger volume (IBUs, sweet malts, FG, etc).

The other issue is that you really need to control the fermentation temperature and keep it as low as you can for the yeast to work. Big beers are more prone to produce higher alcohols, that are part of the profile, but would be very harsh in a 'thinner' beer. Also, higher gravity beers create a disproportionate amount of esters (yeast flavors) that would make a 'thinner' beer taste strange. From everything I have read, if you double the OG, you get 4X the esters, so when you dilute the beer you get more than you would with a standard beer. If making a fruity Belgian you might prefer it, but for Pale Ales, it is just going to be out of place.

I have thought of doing it for a Belgian, fermenting high, to try and get more yeast flavors in a smaller beer, but haven't tried it yet.

i've also read you have to do something to the water you add or it'll oxidize the brew... boil and cool it maybe? i don't actually know though

markg388 said:

i've also read you have to do something to the water you add or it'll oxidize the brew... boil and cool it maybe? i don't actually know though

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That seems like the number one reason to avoid this all together. It sounds like you would need to pump nitrogen into the water.

markg388 said:

i've also read you have to do something to the water you add or it'll oxidize the brew... boil and cool it maybe? i don't actually know though

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badbrew said:

That seems like the number one reason to avoid this all together. It sounds like you would need to pump nitrogen into the water.

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Now that seems to make sense. Distilled water maybe?

Though its not exactly what you're suggesting, I would switch the order of things:
Mash to a high OG, then treat it as a partial boil (at ~5 gallons) in a calculator with a 10 gallon batch size to figure out how much more hops you'll need to reach target IBUs (since bittering efficiency will change in a high og). After boil, dilute and pour into 2 fermenters and pitch normally.

Yeah, you'd need a second fermenter bucket/carboy, but that's relatively cheap and small compared to the kettle/other equipment needed to brew 10 gallons of worth at once, and your yeast will behave more predictably.

Boiling water drives all the gas out. Then if you fill a container and cool it covered it won't pull in much air. I don't think you'd have to purge with nitrogen or CO2.

In fact theres a thread on here right now about how long to deoxygenate water, and the guy said pretty much what I did.

I am far from an expert on this subject, but I have tried this with three batches in the past. I wanted to ferment in a corny to save space so I fermented 4 gallons in one keg. The second keg I purged with co2, carefully poured in a gallon of distilled water that I had boiled for 20 minutes (I added it hot right after boiling), sealed the keg, purged again with co2 and allowed to cool. I then transfered the beer into the keg with water and force carbonated. All three of these beers tasted slightly oxidized, especially the helles. Later I heard on an episode of the session a brewer who had worked for one of the big breweries that did this. He said that boiling does not remove enough oxygen and the big breweries use a different process. I think this might work better for naturally carbonating than force carbonating since the yeast will consume some oxygen.

Cerevisaphile said:

I am far from an expert on this subject, but I have tried this with three batches in the past. I wanted to ferment in a corny to save space so I fermented 4 gallons in one keg. The second keg I purged with co2, carefully poured in a gallon of distilled water that I had boiled for 20 minutes (I added it hot right after boiling), sealed the keg, purged again with co2 and allowed to cool. I then transfered the beer into the keg with water and force carbonated. All three of these beers tasted slightly oxidized, especially the helles. Later I heard on an episode of the session a brewer who had worked for one of the big breweries that did this. He said that boiling does not remove enough oxygen and the big breweries use a different process. I think this might work better for naturally carbonating than force carbonating since the yeast will consume some oxygen.

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Thanks for the input, and welcome to HBT - a very nice first post! One comment I had about your process is that I would have racked the water instead of pouring it, that could possibly minimize the oxygen exposed to the beer.

I think that’s a good point about not being able to expel all the oxygen. I ferment in cornies once in a while and always thought about adding water to the brew to get a full 5.5 gallons but haven’t done it yet, I just deal with the slightly smaller volume (or blend with other batches if I’m feeling frisky).

Like you said maybe if you naturally prime and allow the yeast to use up some of that oxygen it would be best. Or maybe it would be best to add the water before the yeast get to FG, waiting till the majority of the krausen has subsided in order to avoid blowoff.

What we are talking about is different than what the OP had in mind of essentially doubling the fermented volume, but your anecdotal evidence shows that there could be issues with adding even a small amount (~20%) of water post fermentation. Sounds like under normal circumstances its just not really worth it.

kpr121 said:

Thanks for the input, and welcome to HBT - a very nice first post!

Sounds like under normal circumstances its just not really worth it.

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I would agree with both of these comments.

If you were going to water down a beer, it would be much better to do so before fermenting rather than after.