How is this possible?

[tavernpuzzler]

I am on my third batch. So far its only gotten as complicated as extract with specialty grains. The beer is just brewed is an IPA. For fermentables, I used 6 lb amber LME and 5 lb golden LME from Northern Brewer. These are said to get 36 ppg. I started with 5.5 gal of water and did not need any top off water.

Estimated OG: 36ppg*11lb/5.5 gal=72

Brewtarget calculated starting with 5.5 gal, boiling off .25 gal, losing .5 gal in brew pot I should have an OG of 1.075.

I read 1.060 @ ~75F -> corrected to 60F I get 1.062

How can I be over 10 points off?

Is it possible that the LME is really 31 ppg? I did an imperial stout before this and it came out pretty close to expected. Brewtarget said 1.078 and I read 1.080, so I don't think its my reading of the hydrometer or the hydrometer itself.

Is there something major that I am missing here?

 

[bgrayson726]

I read this one quickly, but did you do a full or partial boil?

 

[bonzombiekitty]

I read this one quickly, but did you do a full or partial boil?

Full boil, he said he didn't need top up water. So it's unlikely that he drew a sample from a lower concentration of wort.

You can't really miss an OG with extract. So there's four possible issues:

1. Your measurements are off. You either did not add all the extract you think you did and/or you added more water than you think you did.

2. You misread your hydrometer.

3. Your hydrometer got wonky - test it in plain ol' water.

4. The LME is not actually 36 PPG.

 

[Yooper]

It's possible that the LME you used is 31 ppg. I think it comes in bulk, without a label, so I'd just ask Northern Brewer what the ppg is for the LME they sell.

 

[tavernpuzzler]

Thanks for the responses.

I added the 5.5 gal from 1 gal jugs. I counted five and estimated the 1/2. There is certainly a slight error here.unfortunately it's in the wrong direction. The half gallon that I eye balled was 2.7 cups under so my starting volume was 5.33 gal.

It says on Northern Brewer's website that their LME is 36 ppg. I'd assume that this could vary a bit, but 5 points seems like a lot. I added the entire 6 lb of amber (1/2 gal) and rinsed it several times to get everything out. The 5 lb of golden was measured into a SS pot that was tared out. Scale capacity is 6.6 lb so it should be fairly accurate.

I thought I might have misread the hydrometer so I took another reading. I kept the sample because this is driving me nuts. Now knowing that it is at room temp (73F), I read 1.058 (corrects to 1.059). I also just checked with some bottled water and read .0995. I'm thinking that it must be a cooky hydrometer with the remainder of the error coming from how much boiled off and some variation on the ppg of the LME.

I'm glad that it looks to be the hydrometer because that means my beer will be closer to what I was shooting for. Yay!

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

What was your final volume after boil? If the kit called for 5.5 gal, and that's what you started with, you probably boiled off enough to get your gravity that much higher than expected.

 

[tavernpuzzler]

The problem I had was having too low of an OG, though.

I didn't use a kit this time. I did some research on what hops were suggested to make a Smuttynose IPA clone. A standard yeast was recommended and I played with the extract to get the color and ABV that I wanted. I plan to keg it for a party but would also like a couple bottles so I thought since I was basically making it up, I'd scale it up slightly from the typical 5 gal. I put about 5.25 gal in the carboy. Unfortunately, I did not measure what I left in the brew kettle. Starting with 5.5 gal and adding almost a gal of LME would bring it to almost 6.5 gal. If I put 5.25 in the carboy, that leaves me with 1.25 gal that was boiled off and left in the brew kettle, which seems reasonable to me.

I need to make a dip stick that will tell me now much is in the kettle so I can get a quick measurement on how much is boiling off and how much I have just before I transfer to the carboy.

At this point I don't trust the hydrometer and will get a new one with the next ingredient order. This probably means that all my readings have been low by about 5 points thus far.

 

[gingerdawg]

Brewtarget calculated starting with 5.5 gal, boiling off .25 gal, losing .5 gal in brew pot I should have an OG of 1.075.

I read 1.060 @ ~75F -> corrected to 60F I get 1.062

How did you account for the "losing 0.5 gal in the brewpot"? The brewpot losses will be sugars and water, not just water so they will not concentrate the wort.
Also, how/where did you take your sample? Extract brews are notorious for being thicker at the bottom and thinner at the top of the batch.

 

[tavernpuzzler]

Good point. I realize that what I lose to the brew pot also loses me sugars. Assuming no losses of any kind I'd have added 11 lb of LME to 5.5 gal of water. Boiling losses would further concentrate the wort, and there are some volume losses because of what is left in the brew pot.

I took the same from the middle of the pot as I was transferring to the carboy. I basically stopped mid way and let some drain into the hydrometer sample cylinder.

 

[tavernpuzzler]

Got the new hydrometer the other day and it reads 1.000 on tap water after temp correction. Tested the imperial stout that was last measured at 1.020 with the old hydrometer and got 1.025. This pretty much confirms that the old one was always reading 5 points too low. The reading for the first 2 brews were close enough that I didn't question the readings.