am i drunk or is a hydrometer f-d!

Just finished an ancho chile pale ale. Only used 6 pounds of light dme, 8oz honey malt, 4oz 20L crystal, 2oz ancho chiles. Thought hydrometer read 1.084 shook my head and assumed it read 1.064 still to high for the recipe.
Did I do something wrong. Its gotten to the point where the last 2 recipes I made I didn't even take an OG reading just used www.brewcalculus.com
Is it just me?

You could put it in some distilled water and see if you get around 1.000.

bingotem said:

You could put it in some distilled water and see if you get around 1.000.

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I pointed this out in another thread and I got jumped on. I mean for folks that spend thousands of dollars coming up with a thousand contraptions to accomplish the same thing that a simple infusion can do, for them to jump on my butt for even suggesting using 2 cents of distilled water for verifying a hydrometer - it was like I committed a felony or something.

Use distilled water as the previous poster pointed out.

If the hydro read is correct it could be the wort wasn't completely mixed

Tested hydrometer with water... it's fine.
Shook the hell out of the primary before taking a reading.
How much mixing is enough for a partial boil extract brew?

I'm tempted to get a power drill an agitator fitting. Like you you would use for mixing drywall mud or epoxy.

have you pitched yet?

Positive you had enough wort in the tube? Maybe the hydrometer was bottoming out. Bubbles sticking to the hydrometer can cause significantly high readings too.

Annoying question, I know, but was this a 5 gallon batch?

Dude, I don't know. Just when I think I'm getting the hang of this stuff my hydrometer seems to throw me a curveball too. I just brewed yesterday and my hydro reading was 1.055 (sposed to be 1.051). So, after seeing no activity after 24+ hours I took another and......1.060!! What is going on??

I used the yeast activator from AHS for the first time. I shook the hell out of the fermenter and so far nothing!! So, you're not alone man.

I think this is just the nature of the homebrewing beast.

Is this an extract batch?????

It is really hard to fully incorporate wort and water easily in extract batches without several minutes of vigorous stirring...the wort will tend to sink to the bottom....A lot of new brewers have their OG readings off...you've simply been lucky so far in previous batches. You must simply not have stirred as vigoriously as before. I used to set a timer for 5 minutes and whip the sucker constantly for the entire time.

It's one of the most common new brewer issues/questions we get on here...I'm pretty dissapointed that in 12 responses noone asked or mentioned it.

upside down hydrometer, no?

I pitched the yeast and had activity within 4 hours.
I used nutrient. I love that stuff!
I guess it is what it is. Whatever the OG was the beer is made.
Relax Don't Worry Have Another Home Brew!

In response to what Revvy said the last 2 batches I didn't even bother taking a hydrometer reading. Due to being way too drunk on brew day. The 2 batches one Graff and the other an Amber Strong Belgian ended up finishing gravity right where they should. Graff 0.098 Belgian 0.010 I guess I just need to stop stressing the details.

LSDracula said:

In response to what Revvy said the last 2 batches I didn't even bother taking a hydrometer reading. Due to being way too drunk on brew day. The 2 batches one Graff and the other an Amber Strong Belgian ended up finishing gravity right where they should. Graff 0.098 Belgian 0.010 I guess I just need to stop stressing the details.

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Verify the accuracy of your hydro as suggested & make sure that you're thoroughly mixing your wort and top off water before taking OG readings. With extract batches, if your water volumes are correct, you have no worries on the OG but you'll still find value in hydro measurements as you monitor fermentation.


Stressing the details and being too drunk to take a reading sounds kinda contradictory

Revvy said:

It is really hard to fully incorporate wort and water easily in extract batches without several minutes of vigorous stirring...the wort will tend to sink to the bottom....A lot of new brewers have their OG readings off...you've simply been lucky so far in previous batches. You must simply not have stirred as vigoriously as before. I used to set a timer for 5 minutes and whip the sucker constantly for the entire time.

It's one of the most common new brewer issues/questions we get on here...I'm pretty dissapointed that in 12 responses noone asked or mentioned it.

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Revvy - Won't this result in a lower than expected reading? The OP's was much higher than expected.

I'm thinking the higher reading could be from extracted sugar from the ancho chiles that I used but 0.005 seems like alot from 2oz of chiles.

If you did a partial boil you have a false reading. You have to really mix the wort with the top off water.

Extract has 35 points per pound per gallon
Base grain has 28 points per pound per gallon
specialty grain has 20 points per pound per gallon

Extract 6x35 = 210
specialty grains .75x20 = 15

divided by the number of gallons in the batch 225/5 = 45

You should have 1.045

The only way you would have got a reading of 1.084 is of you made a 2.5 gallon batch instead of 5 or you put in twice as much ingredients as you listed.

Forrest
www.austinhomebrew.com

I had the same problem yesterday on a full boil extract + steeping grains. Target in BeerSmith was 1.059 and I hit 1.066 - 1.067. I'll go over the recipe again and see if I can find something that explains the difference.

JLem said:

Revvy - Won't this result in a lower than expected reading? The OP's was much higher than expected.

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It could depend on where he grabbed the sample from, if he used a sipgot on a fermenter bucket, or drew deep with his wine theif and pulled up mostly the extract from the bottom.

Or like forrest said, he failed to top off enough.

My experience is that ANY errors in gravity with extract, whether higher or lower than expected are a result of either improper mixing or improper amount of top off water.

Extract recipe gravities are foolproof if you've added the correct amount of water for your recipe..Of course some folks have measured imperial gallons when they meant regular gallons, or liters instead of gallons, or toped of to 5 gallons, when their recipe was actually one of those that was meant to be 5.5 gallons...there are a few recipes out their calibrated for 5.5 rather than 5.

The good news is that the beer and water mixed itself fine during fermentaion....

Austinhomebrew said:

Extract has 35 points per pound per gallon

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With all due respect, DME yields 46 points per pound per gallon, not 35

Revvy said:

My experience is that ANY errors in gravity with extract, whether higher or lower than expected are a result of either improper mixing or improper amount of top off water.

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Or incorrectly weighing the ingredients.

-a.

ajf said:

With all due respect, DME yields 46 points per pound per gallon, not 35


Or incorrectly weighing the ingredients.

-a.

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True, but most of the folks who make this mistake are usually brand spanking new brewers who are brewing kits..and kits are usually pre measured. You know, 2 cans of malt, maybe a 2 pound baggie of dme, 2 ounces of hops, and that little 5 ounce bag of cocaine..er priming sugar. Pretty straight froward.

OK! To settle the confusion this was not a tried and true recipe. I made this up on the fly. It was basically my first attempt at my own recipe. I don't know know why the OG was off but the blowoff is bubbling.
www.brewcalculus.com said I should expect 0.059 I'm only a few points off I don't care that much. As long as I finish at 0.010-0.012 I'll be fine.
Thanks for the concern tho.