adding water post fermentation

[Sheldon]

We brewed an Old Ale which was supposed to yield 5.25 gals. We plan to bottle this weekend (after a couple weeks in primary and almost a week with a secondary). The problem is that after all the fermentation and transferring, there is just about 4 gals of wort in the carboy now with an ABV of about 6.5% and a nice red color. The beer tastes pretty good at this point, but we were wondering if we could add some water to bring the volume back up to at least 5 gals without ruining it.

Thoughts please.

Sheldon

 

[Yooper]

We brewed an Old Ale which was supposed to yield 5.25 gals. We plan to bottle this weekend (after a couple weeks in primary and almost a week with a secondary). The problem is that after all the fermentation and transferring, there is just about 4 gals of wort in the carboy now with an ABV of about 6.5% and a nice red color. The beer tastes pretty good at this point, but we were wondering if we could add some water to bring the volume back up to at least 5 gals without ruining it.

Thoughts please.

Sheldon

You can. BUT, if you have 4 gallons of it and add 1 gallon, you've diluted the beer pretty significantly, as the beer will now be 25% water.

I guess I'd pull a sample. Use 4 ounces of beer and an ounce of water and see how much you like the result.

I'd be inclined to leave it alone, unless the beer needed diluting.

 

[JoePro]

I boil half gallon mason jars full of filtererd water, use my thermal gloves to screw on the lids with the boiling water still inside, and toss them in the fridge. They make things like this wonderfully convenient.

Adding water will dilute your wort, for sure, so abv% isn't your primary concern (or is it?)

Taste will be negatively affected. Scale it down with some samples, and if the water you add produces a good beer in a higher volume, then absolutely. Just make sure your water addition is sanitized.

 

[JoePro]

You can. BUT, if you have 4 gallons of it and add 1 gallon, you've diluted the beer pretty significantly, as the beer will now be 25% water.

I guess I'd pull a sample. Use 4 ounces of beer and an ounce of water and see how much you like the result.

I'd be inclined to leave it alone, unless the beer needed diluting.

Darn you, Yoops! Beating me to the punch!

 

[reidjoshua]

Gonna chime in here as I was the reason for the post.

What I was asking is what's/when's best for adding water to hit FG. Add water pre, during, or post boil, but not after fermentation.

If you add it post boil, as I read in BYO, as they do in Mr. Wizard's brewery, does the water have to be sanatized/pre-boiled? I'm guessing so since you wouldn't be boiling it at all. They add post boil to hit their FG for their beers.

The reasoning for not adding it pre/during I believe was said was because of energy waste/having to boil that much more water during the wort boil.

I'm guessing they add filtered water post-boil because most breweries use water that gets filtered and that would in the end be easiest for them.

 

[VonMessa]

Gonna chime in here as I was the reason for the post.

What I was asking is what's/when's best for adding water to hit FG. Add water pre, during, or post boil, but not after fermentation.

If you add it post boil, as I read in BYO, as they do in Mr. Wizard's brewery, does the water have to be sanatized/pre-boiled? I'm guessing so since you wouldn't be boiling it at all. They add post boil to hit their FG for their beers.

The reasoning for not adding it pre/during I believe was said was because of energy waste/having to boil that much more water during the wort boil.

I'm guessing they add filtered water post-boil because most breweries use water that gets filtered and that would in the end be easiest for them.

I have bumped up to 15 gallon batches.

I have 15 gallon keggles (1 for HLT, 1 for Boil) so obviously I can't boil 17-18 gallons down to a 15 gal batch

I make recipe for 17 gallons (~ 1/2 gallon extra per 5 gallon batch to account for cooling/trub/fermentation/system losses) as I primary in separate buckets still.

I conduct mash as normal and refill HLT completely before sparge. I heat to sparge temp, conduct sparge as normal (getting as full as reasonably possible in the boil kettle) and while heating boil kettle, I also heat what is left in HLT til it just boils.

After the wort is finished boiling, I am usually at about 12-13 gallons. I top-off boil kettle with water from HLT to 15.5 gallons. I then run (through plate chiller) 2 gallons into each bucket (leaving me with 9.5 gallons)

I then add another gallon from HLT and equally distribute the remaining wort into (3) fermentors winding up with about 5.5 gallons in each bucket.

I have been hitting my final volume and OG for about the past year, now.

 

[reidjoshua]

I conduct mash as normal and refill HLT completely before sparge. I heat to sparge temp, conduct sparge as normal (getting as full as reasonably possible in the boil kettle) and while heating boil kettle, I also heat what is left in HLT til it just boils.

Cool, thanks for the info. During your boil do you turn off the heat on the HLT once it boils for a few minutes and cover or do you keep the HLT boiling the whole time you are boiling your mash up until you add the HLT water back to the boil kettle?

 

[VonMessa]

Cool, thanks for the info. During your boil do you turn off the heat on the HLT once it boils for a few minutes and cover or do you keep the HLT boiling the whole time you are boiling your mash up until you add the HLT water back to the boil kettle?

Kill heat and cover it

 

[ayoungrad]

Why is the volume so important? Was 6.5% the expected ABV? It is is, leave it as is.

It is fairly common to actually bottle less than the expected volume given trub losses, etc.

 

[VonMessa]

Why is the volume so important? Was 6.5% the expected ABV? It is is, leave it as is.

It is fairly common to actually bottle less than the expected volume given trub losses, etc.

Beyond having less beer than you expected, you mean?

 

[ayoungrad]

I mean if you read brewing books or look on this site before brewing, you understand that there are volume losses involved. The 5.25 gallons may even refer to the pre-bottle volume without other considerations.

I never expect 5 gallons from a 5 gallon recipe. Occasionally I get close, but I usually use tons of hops so I'm nowhere near 5 gallons. And this never takes me by suprise.

This is just part of homebrewing. If you actually need 5 gallons of beer, you'd better factor in expected losses. Or, dilute your beer and therefore the beers flavor.

 

[VonMessa]

I mean if you read brewing books or look on this site before brewing, you understand that there are volume losses involved. The 5.25 gallons may even refer to the pre-bottle volume without other considerations.

I never expect 5 gallons from a 5 gallon recipe. Occasionally I get close, but I usually use tons of hops so I'm nowhere near 5 gallons. And this never takes me by suprise.

This is just part of homebrewing. If you actually need 5 gallons of beer, you'd better factor in expected losses. Or, dilute your beer and therefore the beers flavor.

Like this explanation I posted < 3 hrs ago?




I have bumped up to 15 gallon batches.

I have 15 gallon keggles (1 for HLT, 1 for Boil) so obviously I can't boil 17-18 gallons down to a 15 gal batch

I make recipe for 17 gallons (~ 1/2 gallon extra per 5 gallon batch to account for cooling/trub/fermentation/system losses) as I primary in separate buckets still.

I conduct mash as normal and refill HLT completely before sparge. I heat to sparge temp, conduct sparge as normal (getting as full as reasonably possible in the boil kettle) and while heating boil kettle, I also heat what is left in HLT til it just boils.

After the wort is finished boiling, I am usually at about 12-13 gallons. I top-off boil kettle with water from HLT to 15.5 gallons. I then run (through plate chiller) 2 gallons into each bucket (leaving me with 9.5 gallons)

I then add another gallon from HLT and equally distribute the remaining wort into (3) fermentors winding up with about 5.5 gallons in each bucket.

I have been hitting my final volume and OG for about the past year, now.

 

[Sheldon]

we use Beersmith and always have a pre boil volume on excess of 6 gal. for some reason, this batch comsumed a lot of our wort and the resutling beer is is just about 4 gals. when I transferred to secondary for dry hopping, it tasted really good and I would be reluctant to diluting, but wanted to get some opinions anyway.

 

[ayoungrad]

Like this explanation I posted < 3 hrs ago?

I wasn't trying to be a smart-ass. My comment was directed toward the OP. It just sounded to me like they were concerned with low volumes without having adjusted for expected losses.

But it sounds like, from the most recent posting, that they did in fact miss their FG?

 

[HawkATP]

I wasn't trying to be a smart-ass. My comment was directed toward the OP. It just sounded to me like they were concerned with low volumes without having adjusted for expected losses.

But it sounds like, from the most recent posting, that they did in fact miss their FG?

Using Beersmith or other software will ensure that the losses you have in your system are accounted for and you still hit your target volume, eg. 5 gallons

 

[reidjoshua]

The point of the post was about adding beer during/post boil, not after fermentation and about hitting out gravity not really about the volume.

I think, without having the numbers in front of me, our (Sheldon and I) OG was a higher than we planned so I was looking at the feasibility of adding water to dilute the mash to hit OG we were trying for.

We might have to plan for a higher evaporation rate for our system.

Either way it sounds like we can add boiled water during/post boil to get the OG we were looking to hit.

 

[Sheldon]

Est OG 1.069, actual OG 1.075, prob could have added more water during boil, but the sight glass indication had us within close proximity to target volume. We must have lost more in the 2 oz of hops, or maybe some grain dust that got into boiler.

 

[Homercidal]

We brewed an Old Ale which was supposed to yield 5.25 gals. We plan to bottle this weekend (after a couple weeks in primary and almost a week with a secondary). The problem is that after all the fermentation and transferring, there is just about 4 gals of wort in the carboy now with an ABV of about 6.5% and a nice red color. The beer tastes pretty good at this point, but we were wondering if we could add some water to bring the volume back up to at least 5 gals without ruining it.

Thoughts please.

Sheldon

I would not.

But if you want to add water and dilute the beer and affect the flavor and mouthfeel, You'll definitely want to figure out how to drive the oxygen from the water before you add it.

 

[wired247]

I would not.

But if you want to add water and dilute the beer and affect the flavor and mouthfeel, You'll definitely want to figure out how to drive the oxygen from the water before you add it.

Boil the water. It will take the Oxygen out.