Spirits added to beer- Can you calculate ABV?

I have made a couple of brews now that have had rum and bourbon additions to achieve a flavor profile. Even vodka 'extracts' used at bottling.

Is there a way to calculate how much the ABV goes up from the booze additions?

Example: 5 gallons of a 5% beer had 6 ounces of bourbon added to the secondary along with the spices that had been soaking in that bourbon. That beer isn't going to be 5% anymore, so is there a way to calculate what the bourbon/rum/vodka/whatever adds?

 

Yes










What abv was the bourbon?

BTW 6 oz of puregrain wouldn't do much.

 

I need to double check. Say 35% abv.

 

You need to find how many ounces of alcohol are from each liquid and then divide their sum by the total volume. You'll probably kick yourself after you see it. You could also take a weighted average.
First get everything in the same units.

Code:

5 gallons x 128 ounces / 1 gallon = 640 ounces

then figure out how many ounces ( by volume in this case) are pure alcohol

Code:

 [Ounces of Beer] x [ABV of beer] = 640  x 0.05 = 32 

Next do the same for the spirit you're adding( assuming 80 proof liquor, or 40% ABV)

Code:

 [Ounces of spirit] x [ABV of spirit] = 6 x 0.4 = 2.4

Now we take the average

Code:

([ounces of alcohol from beer]+[ounces of alcohol from spirits]) / [Total volume of liquid] 
= (32+2.4)/(640+6) = 34.4/646 ~= 0.053 = 5.3% ABV

So it's a bit involved but not impossible.

 

But when you find that it added .03% alcohol, you will kick yourself for wasting all of the scratch paper.

 

Thanks for that. Yeah, feeling kind of silly for wanting to know.

Based on taste, you would think it added way more than that, but the math doesn't lie, right?

 

Bourbon has a TON of flavor. I found it overpowered any brew I did. Kinda lost my taste for bourbon beer.....

 

Subtly is the key. Generally we're trying to make bourbon barrel beer, not bourbon beer. The only bourbon added is what's left in the wood. Less is more, IMO.

 

Thanks! Yeah I burned myself on it. "More is more" being my general MO.....

I will get back to it, need a while to recover.

I actually have 1 low hop PA , a bastardized apfelwine and a blonde kegged, 2 pale ales (low hop) on deck.

Need to get right with my tastebuds!

 

Oh I agree. The recipes I've done booze on have had rum soaked oak cubes and bourbon soaked oak cubes. When I add the cubes, I go ahead and transfer the booze that wasn't soaked up too. It's worked well, as it's usually just a couple of ounces, but this last one had a bit more, which is why it is more pronounced.

As a bottler, I'm hoping the taste mellows a bit over time.

 

Man that is a point....

As a bottler I was patient too. As a kegger, it is SO freaking tempting to free up the fermenter and put gas to it.

 

2013 should be the year I get a kegging setup. I still share a ton with people at work, so I don't see bottling going away completely for me.

Then again, I could just fill some bottles off the tap. Does the carbonation stay ok or do you need to add more?

 

THAT.....is complicated.

They make a "beer gun" that purges the bottle with Co2 and then fills carbonated and you cap it and lose a little.

Only good method I have found is prime the whole batch and bottle the whole batch from the keg.

Carb tabs might be a good option. Fill the bottles with flat beer as soon as you fill the keg.

 

Nope! do a quick search for "biermuncher bottle filler" "BMBF" or "we don't need no stinking beer gun" for a quick, easy, and ultra-cheap way to fill bottles from the keg with no loss of cabonation and no oxidation at all.

I regularly bottle large numbers of beers this way and store them for months without any oxidation problems.

 

I had the same question a couple months back.
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/so-who-good-math-324876/
I went with 375ml of Makers Mark in a RIS came out perfect IMO.

 

I figured someone had, but I couldn't locate a thread. The information cheezydemon3 provided helped my figure out my Spiced Bourbon Amber bumped from 6.5% to 6.9%. I was guessing 7%, so wasn't far off.

Tasted it last night and it was quite good, but I swear that little bit of bourbon somehow makes you feel it quicker. Anyone know if that's the truth?

 

No.

 

I'm feeling a bit annoying, so I'll nitpick. Your math is slightly off. You didn't factor in the 6 oz to the total volume. So it's (32+2.4)/646= ~.05325, as oppose to .05375 as you've got it listed. Rounding to 5.3 or 5.4 respectively.

 

Good point! Thanks for that Qhrumphf. That 5 thousandth could be difference between getting drunk 1 drop sooner or 1 drop later. :cross:

 

Obviously in this instance it's not a major difference. If you're adding 20oz to a 2 gallon batch the difference will be more pronounced at 8.1% vs 7.5% (not that I'm saying it's a good idea to do that). So if you're going to do the math, do it right.:fro:

 

Thanks for the correction. Funny thing is I had 646oz in my excel sheet but somehow missed it when I posted. I'll edit it so people who don't get to this page and are adding more liquor don't get the wrong answer