Did I just get the best efficiency ever?

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

slym2none

"Lazy extract brewer."
Joined
Apr 3, 2015
Messages
7,294
Reaction score
2,460
Location
Durham
So, I did a partial-mash with extract brew - an Oktoberfest ale - and using one of the beer-recipe calculator sites, my recipe (I'll post it all later) which calls for 2 pounds of base malts, 3/4 pounds of specialty grains, and then 3 pounds of DME late in the boil, should have had a 1.071 OG and a 1.017 FG, with Nottingham yeast, with an ABV of around 6.7% - my actual FG was 1.087, and if it gets down to even 1.020, I am looking at around 8.8% ABV!

Did I really get that good of efficiency from less than 3# of grains? By the calculator, the grains were only giving me 1.6% additional ABV, but it looks like I got almost 3.5!

I used the a BIAB bag, but not really the method - I used 1 gallon of water to mash with, for 90 minutes. Then I used an additional gallon of water to sparge with, giving the bag a light squeeze after it stopped dripping. I did have my LHBS give the grains a double-crush...

:confused:
 
Was this a full boil or partial boil then topped off? Also what was the batch size? I'm assuming this was a pretty small batch...

Assuming that the reading is indeed accurate, possible you got a few extra points of efficiency, but I'd sooner look to being either under on the batch size (or in the recipe calculation), or that you added more extract than you think you did.
 
Yeah, pardons - it was a 2.4 gallon batch, and I ran it through the calculator as such. I had to add a few quarts of water at the end to get it up to that. And no way I added more DME than I thought, it came in a 3-pound bag that I emptied, and that's all the extract that was added.
 
here's my recipe, a modified version of BierMuncher's:

Oktoberbeast Ale
-----------------

2.4 gallon batch, 2.0 gallon boil
Est. OG: 1.071 *(1.082); actual OG: 1.087
Est. FG: 1.017 *(1.019); actual FG:
Est. ABV: 6.66% *(8.23%); actual ABV:
IBUs: 21
SRM: 14

1# Vienna
1# Munich Dark
0.50# Caramunich III
0.25# Carared
Mash (in 1 gallon water) at 154 degrees for 90 minutes.
3 lbs Light DME (late addition)

0.25 oz. Nugget 14% AA at 50 min.
0.33 oz. Hallertau 2.8% AA at 22 Min
0.33 oz. Hallertau 2.8%% AA at 7 min
0.33 oz. Hallertau 2.8%% AA at flameout

Nottingham yeast (washed from Centennial Blonde & re-used)

*actual corrected numbers due to using the wrong efficiency ratios

Me dumb.
 
Last edited:
Ok, adding a couple quarts of water to a 2.4 gallon batch is certainly enough to cause a gravity spike if it wasn't mixed right. I'd say you're probably closer to where you thought you were going to be in the recipe.
 
Actually now that I'm doing a little math, looks like your gravity is probably going to be closer to accurate. What was the efficiency on the recipe? It'd have to be low to work for that gravity, unless you had the wrong batch size.
 
I used "brewhouse" efficiency of 75% in the recipe.

*EDIT* I just looked back at everything again, and noticed everything was set for 35% efficiency. If I set it to 75%, I get numbers of 1.082, 1.019, and 8.23%

My bad... noob error, mistake made, lesson learned.

:eek:

I did make sure to mix/stir the wort well after adding the water and before taking a gravity sample. Trust me, it was not because of that.

:)
 
Well, something's wrong the in recipe formulation. 3 lbs DME at ~45 ppg, 2.75 lbs grains at ~35ppg (averagish for the grain bill), 75% efficiency and 2.4 gallons, and I get 1.086. If you're looking for a 3 gallon batch, then that's a little closer to what I'd expect. In which case, you were just under volume.
 
Back
Top