Low OG from lots of hops? Break in fermenter?

Brewed my third batch a week or so ago, an APA. The first two batches' OGs were close or right on the expected reading. However, this batch was considerably lower (1.048 when expecting 1.062).

General info: Extract with specialty grain brewer, partial boil, pour cooled wort from boil pot through strainer into fermenter and top up with water to 5 gallons.

Things I did differently this time compared to first two: Twice as much hops in the boil pot (4oz vs. 2oz); rather than pouring to-up water over hops in the strainer I used the handheld sprayer on the kitchen sink. I'm wondering if a lot of the sugars got stuck in the hops (which is why I wanted to try spraying it).

Another thing that was different: There was a lot of gunk at the bottom of the fermenter prior to adding yeast. Also, the hydrometer sample had a lot of floating, hazy stuff. Did using the sink sprayer force the hot and/or cold breaks into the fermenter?

What's the best way to get all of the potential sugars off the hops while minimizing break in the fermenter?

JiveTurkey said:

Brewed my third batch a week or so again, an APA. The first two batches' OGs were close or right on the expected reading. However, this batch was considerably lower (1.048 when expecting 1.062).

General info: Extract with specialty grain brewer, partial boil, pour cooled wort from boil pot through strainer into fermenter and top up with water to 5 gallons.

Things I did differently this time compared to first two: Twice as much hops in the boil pot (4oz vs. 2oz); rather than pouring to-up water over hops in the strainer I used the handheld sprayer on the kitchen sink. I'm wondering if a lot of the sugars got stuck in the hops (which is why I wanted to try spraying it).

Another thing that was different: There was a lot of gunk at the bottom of the fermenter prior to adding yeast. Also, the hydrometer sample had a lot of floating, hazy stuff. Did using the sink sprayer force the hot and/or cold breaks into the fermenter?

What's the best way to get all of the potential sugars off the hops while minimizing break in the fermenter?

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If it's an extract batch, and the volume of water added is correct, it's not possible to miss the OG. There are only so many sugars present, and they don't go away. Most of the time, inaccurate hydrometer readings are the cause of too-high or too-low readings. Even with stirring and shaking, it's very hard to mix up the top up water evenly with the wort from the boil. The heavier extract laden wort sinks, while the lower gravity water wants to float. It mixes some, but it's notoriously difficult to mix it prefectly.

That's fine- the yeast know where to find the sugar, and it will mix up in primary. If you used extract as your fermentable sugars, and used the correct volume of water, the OG will be what the recipe says.

Your hops absorbed some wort for sure, but the amount is negligible. Not enough to drop you 14 points. Did you dilute too much? Are you sure you added all your fermentables? Was this a kit? Get yourself a reusable hop sock/bag and wring it out of you like. (Never wring out steeped grains) Was your top up water mixed in well?

YooperBrew said:

If it's an extract batch, and the volume of water added is correct, it's not possible to miss the OG. There are only so many sugars present, and they don't go away. Most of the time, inaccurate hydrometer readings are the cause of too-high or too-low readings. Even with stirring and shaking, it's very hard to mix up the top up water evenly with the wort from the boil. The heavier extract laden wort sinks, while the lower gravity water wants to float. It mixes some, but it's notoriously difficult to mix it prefectly.

That's fine- the yeast know where to find the sugar, and it will mix up in primary. If you used extract as your fermentable sugars, and used the correct volume of water, the OG will be what the recipe says.

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I was about to edit the post saying I mixed it up well before taking the reading, but based on your post, I guess it could have still been incompletely mixed.

So, there isn't much concern for making sure the sugars get washed off the hops?

chrisknight said:

Your hops absorbed some wort for sure, but the amount is negligible. Not enough to drop you 14 points. Did you dilute too much? Are you sure you added all your fermentables? Was this a kit? Get yourself a reusable hop sock/bag and wring it out of you like. (Never wring out steeped grains) Was your top up water mixed in well?

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I topped up to 5 gallons, though it may have been a touch too much (less than a quart).

Not a kit; my own recipe (7lbs DME, .5lbs specialty grains, 4oz hops).

I think I will use a hop sack for the next batch.

No, the hops will steal some of your wort but they absorb the whole mixture, not just the sugars preferentially. Were you a little under your target volume, and topped-up with plain water in the fermenter to get 5gal?

Edit: You replied while I was composing my reply. 14pts would be a lot to lose by topping-up with a bit over a quart of extra water. I would guess that the extra quart wasn't fully mixed with the rest of the wort, and you ended-up taking a diluted sample for testing.

JiveTurkey said:

I was about to edit the post saying I mixed it up well before taking the reading, but based on your post, I guess it could have still been incompletely mixed.

So, there isn't much concern for making sure the sugars get washed off the hops?

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No, no worries. I don't usually strain my wort, so it all goes into the fermenter. But I can't imagine that too much wort stuck to the hops to make any difference. Unless you dumped out a couple of quarts of wort, you're fine. (Even then, you'd be fine but have less beer).

GNBrews said:

No, the hops will steal some of your wort but they absorb the whole mixture, not just the sugars preferentially. Were you a little under your target volume, and topped-up with plain water in the fermenter to get 5gal?

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Still new to brewing, so making frustrating mistakes.

I've been doing a partial boil, then topping up with however much is necessary to get to 5 gallons in the fermenter. For the first two batches, I didn't realize boil volume mattered and was just shooting for 2 to 3 gallons.

This time, I wanted to have a boil volume of exactly 3 gallons to best estimate my IBUs. My mistake was that I steeped the grains in 3 gallons and didn't think about the fact that the volume of the DME would be added to the volume of the water so ended up with too big of a boil volume. The electric stove burner couldn't bring the wort up to boiling, so I boiled part of the batch in another pot (but only added the hops and misc. ingredients to the main pot).

YooperBrew said:

No, no worries. I don't usually strain my wort, so it all goes into the fermenter. But I can't imagine that too much wort stuck to the hops to make any difference. Unless you dumped out a couple of quarts of wort, you're fine. (Even then, you'd be fine but have less beer).

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I'm tempted to just throw everything--hops, break, and all--into the fermenter. But how would I know how much top-up water to use? Shouldn't it be more than 5 gallons to compensate for the volume of hops, etc.? If so, how much?

The only ideas I can think of is guessing and checking with the hydrometer, but that seems risky sanitation-wise and apparently it can't be perfectly mixed anyway. Maybe I should try to estimate my percentage of boil-off and add a pre-calculated amount of top-up water?

GNBrews said:

Edit: You replied while I was composing my reply. 14pts would be a lot to lose by topping-up with a bit over a quart of extra water. I would guess that the extra quart wasn't fully mixed with the rest of the wort, and you ended-up taking a diluted sample for testing.

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To clarify, I topped up with about 2 gallons of water, then shook the hell out of it for several minutes. I thought I mixed it up well. I thought I did an even better job than on my first two batches and those OGs were very close or right on.

JiveTurkey said:

I'm tempted to just throw everything--hops, break, and all--into the fermenter. But how would I know how much top-up water to use? Shouldn't it be more than 5 gallons to compensate for the volume of hops, etc.? If so, how much?

The only ideas I can think of is guessing and checking with the hydrometer, but that seems risky sanitation-wise and apparently it can't be perfectly mixed anyway. Maybe I should try to estimate my percentage of boil-off and add a pre-calculated amount of top-up water?

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Well, if you add more than 5 gallons, you'll "dilute" your batch. Many of us who make our own recipes (not from kits) make 5.25 or 5.5 gallon batches so that we have 5 gallons at the end of fermentation. That really doesn't matter, though- I mean, what difference would it make if you have 4.80 gallons of finished beer at the end vs 5 gallons, if the 4.8 gallons tastes great?!? We just all seem to like round numbers at the end.

If you're making a 5 gallon batch, with a specified OG, adding more water will give you more beer but a lower OG. If you're making a kit, just top up to 5 gallons and be done with it. You could use a marker and mark 5 gallons on your fermenter, so that you get the right amount.

I wouldn't worry too much about this. Your beer will be good either way.

I understand that more water = less dense/lower gravity reading.

But let's say I have two identical batches, except for one (#1) I strain the hops and the other (#2) I do not strain the hops.

Topping up to 5 gallons in both fermenters, I would think, would lead to different OGs because fermenter #2 would have some of the 5 gallons taken up by hops, not wort, so the wort would be denser. Though they both ended up at 5 gallons, I actually used more top-up water in #1.

I would think that to get to identical OGs, fermenter #2 would need greater than 5 gallons total (of everything: wort and hops), even though I would use identical amounts of top-up water.

So, my question is, what's the best way to estimate the top-up water needed in #2, since the fermenter volume could vary based on how much hops is in there.

(And, yes, I know I'm over-thinking this. )

JiveTurkey said:

I understand that more water = less dense/lower gravity reading.

But let's say I have two identical batches, except for one (#1) I strain the hops and the other (#2) I do not strain the hops.

Topping up to 5 gallons in both fermenters, I would think, would lead to different OGs because fermenter #2 would have some of the 5 gallons taken up by hops, not wort, so the wort would be denser. Though they both ended up at 5 gallons, I actually used more top-up water in #1.

I would think that to get to identical OGs, fermenter #2 would need greater than 5 gallons total (of everything: wort and hops), even though I would use identical amounts of top-up water.

So, my question is, what's the best way to estimate the top-up water needed in #2, since the fermenter volume could vary based on how much hops is in there.

(And, yes, I know I'm over-thinking this. )

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If you fill up to the five gallon line in both batches, the extra hop debris will fall in #2 to the bottom anyway, and you'll still have 5 gallons in both. The debris falls out with the trub, and compacts down. You're talking about insignificant differences.

JiveTurkey said:

I understand that more water = less dense/lower gravity reading.

But let's say I have two identical batches, except for one (#1) I strain the hops and the other (#2) I do not strain the hops.

Topping up to 5 gallons in both fermenters, I would think, would lead to different OGs because fermenter #2 would have some of the 5 gallons taken up by hops, not wort, so the wort would be denser. Though they both ended up at 5 gallons, I actually used more top-up water in #1.

I would think that to get to identical OGs, fermenter #2 would need greater than 5 gallons total (of everything: wort and hops), even though I would use identical amounts of top-up water.

So, my question is, what's the best way to estimate the top-up water needed in #2, since the fermenter volume could vary based on how much hops is in there.

(And, yes, I know I'm over-thinking this. )

Click to expand...

If you add more water to fermenter # 2, you'll wind up with a lower OG. The total amount of sugar remains constant. The volume taken up by the hops is negligable. I guess you would have to add more water to #2 to get the EXACT same OG, but that amount of water would be measured in ounces. And the difference in gravity wouldn't be able to be measured on a hydrometer. I mean, you lose way more volume to yeast material in the end anyways. Don't worry about hop volume.

And no, you're not overthinking it. You're thinking like a homebrewer

Hops absorb wort, but they do not selectively absorb sugars. They only impact the volume of wort. If you top up to compensate, that will lower the gravity a bit. You lose approximately 4 oz of wort per ounce of whole hops.

david_42 said:

You lose approximately 4 oz of wort per ounce of whole hops.

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Thanks for all the responses folks. I'll lock away the above quote.

What I think I may do for my next batch is dump everything from the brew pot into the fermenter and top up to slightly above 5 gallons based on the amount of hops used (for a typical batch with 2 oz of hops, that's only one extra cup of water, so as you've all been trying to tell me that is pretty insignificant).

Even though it is small, I still feel the need to compensate for the material at the bottom of the fermenter taking up space. It's akin to adding, say, marbles to the fermenter. They take up volume that displace the wort so to have the right volume (and therefore, density) of the wort, the total volume of everything would need to be above 5 gallons in order to actually have 5 gallons of wort in the fermenter at the beginning.

I like the idea of just throwing everything in without worrying about straining wort off the hops. However, is there any downside to this? What about leaving the hops so long in the fermenter and all the hot and cold breaks? Does this material add off-flavors or do any flavors settle on the bottom with the material?

Oh and PS: When I started this thread yesterday I was away from home and did not have Beersmith. Turns out my measured OG was 1.053, still off from the expected, but not by as much. I'm going to chalk it up to a not thoroughly mixed wort.