zzARzz
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2012
- Messages
- 410
- Reaction score
- 52
So my girlfriend and I decided to have some friends over Saturday night to clear out my aging stock of home brew, grill out and generally have a good time.
Now the mistake comes into play when, on the past 3 brews I've done, I wasn't coming anywhere close to my final gravities. They tasted great (not too sweet), but my refractometer would show my finals being anywhere from 10-20 points above where they should be.
So there were 7 of us at the party and we drank around 50 bottles of beer. By hour 3 we were acting like a bunch of college kids on spring break and by hour 5 I was worried we were going to live our own version of The Hangover the next day. I knew, according to my gravities, the beer I made shouldn't be doing us in like THAT.
So yesterday I decided to start researching what could be wrong with my fermentation process. Everything is always monitored, kept very clean and sanitary and my brew room stays a constant 69F. I even have a temp controlled fermentation chamber if I need it. I'd coddle all my beers, trying to squeeze out those precious few points of SG to reach the finals, but always came up short.
So I come to find out I'd been making the rookie mistake of not compensating for the alcohol content when measuring final gravities with a refractometer. I found oneberr.net's calculator for final gravities on refractometers here: http://onebeer.net/refractometer.shtml
When I plugged my numbers in from my notes I started laughing. Not only did I reach my final gravities, but far exceeded them with all my TLC. So I was giving my friends ginger beer at 9.5% ABV, honey-wheat ale at 6.5% and Scottish Heavy at 4.2%
The moral of the story? I need to learn how my fancy-schmancy equipment works. Yeah, I screwed up, but it was the best mistake I've ever made.
Now the mistake comes into play when, on the past 3 brews I've done, I wasn't coming anywhere close to my final gravities. They tasted great (not too sweet), but my refractometer would show my finals being anywhere from 10-20 points above where they should be.
So there were 7 of us at the party and we drank around 50 bottles of beer. By hour 3 we were acting like a bunch of college kids on spring break and by hour 5 I was worried we were going to live our own version of The Hangover the next day. I knew, according to my gravities, the beer I made shouldn't be doing us in like THAT.
So yesterday I decided to start researching what could be wrong with my fermentation process. Everything is always monitored, kept very clean and sanitary and my brew room stays a constant 69F. I even have a temp controlled fermentation chamber if I need it. I'd coddle all my beers, trying to squeeze out those precious few points of SG to reach the finals, but always came up short.
So I come to find out I'd been making the rookie mistake of not compensating for the alcohol content when measuring final gravities with a refractometer. I found oneberr.net's calculator for final gravities on refractometers here: http://onebeer.net/refractometer.shtml
When I plugged my numbers in from my notes I started laughing. Not only did I reach my final gravities, but far exceeded them with all my TLC. So I was giving my friends ginger beer at 9.5% ABV, honey-wheat ale at 6.5% and Scottish Heavy at 4.2%
The moral of the story? I need to learn how my fancy-schmancy equipment works. Yeah, I screwed up, but it was the best mistake I've ever made.
