Beersmith 20 Gal batch turned out to be a 15 gallon batch

[goodwood]

Hello,

I have a really weird issue that happened last Saturday. This is my first time doing a big 1058/1060 batch. That's my typical gravity. I ended up getting 1058 OG which is weird. We have been hitting our gravity every time. Regardless, I think that has some easy tweaking.

Here is my main issue. I sparged to hit all my volume and after boil and transfer,only 3 buckets were filled. We actually got roughly 17 gallons as we put a little extra in each bucket because we knew towards the end that we were not going to meet volume.

What do you think happened?

here is my recipe:
http://beersmithrecipes.com/viewrecipe/530218/foutre-je-men-fou-

 

[Yooper]

Did you use the same pot you always do, and boil off the same amount as always?

 

[goodwood]

Yooper,

Boiling off roughly 5 gallons? We used a 30 gallon pot as opposed to our 20 gallon pot. I guess I will look in to boil off on blichmans. It's weird though. We check pre boil brix and it was on, we end up .008 short on gravity and lose 5 gallons. Something happened.

 

[brewfun]

Something happened.

Indeed, something did.

In the equipment profile, your boil off was a mere 0.5 gallons (~1 liter). Is this what you expected? Just 2.2% evaporation?

The recipe doesn't help much because it doesn't seem to reflect your actual measurements.

Your original post said you checked your preboil gravity "and it was on." I can't see that from your recipe, since you show a gravity of 1.050, with a target of 1.056. You recorded 5 gallons but targeted 22.76 gallons (86.16 liter).

The recipe also states that you yielded 5 gallons at 1.046, considerably less than stated.

Could you post the recipe with your actual recorded volumes and gravity?

When I correct for the time and evaporation you stated, you should have been closer to 24 gallons, preboil and a gravity of 1.053. This would crate a mash efficiency of about 75%, which seems normal.

Post boil, you should have been closer to 1.071, if the yield was 17 gallons and trub was 1. This is based on your brewhouse efficiency number. To get the gravity and volume you described, your brewhouse efficiency was closer to 50-60%.

 

[goodwood]

brewfun,

I am going to look in to equipment profiles again and check my past profiles. For some reason, I made this profile quick and didn't pay attention. I now think it is the evaporation rate. What the heck was I thinking. I didn't even notice it when I looked at it before posting.

I can't provide actual numbers. I print a sheet out and keep that in our records. That's at the house we brew at. I learned now that I need to record these electronically also haha. Maybe I should start a dang blog. :cross: