Boil off volume - need help dialing in my system in Beersmith

[CadiBrewer]

Just brewed a porter that was supposed to have an OG of 1.054 for the 10 gallon batch. I collected 13 gallons in the kettle and boiled for an hour. I ended up with 11.5 gallons at 1.050. I didn't test the gravity until I transferred into my fermenters, so I didn't boil it down further to increase the gravity. C'est la vie for this batch, but I want to improve for future batches.

Question - I use keggles for my equipment and am using the Beersmith equipment settings for keggles. The boil off rate is 2 gallons per hour in Beersmith, but I ended up boiling off 1.5 gallons. Should my boil be more aggressive to get to 2 gallons of boil off per hour, or should I just adjust the Beersmith setting to reflect my experience? It has been pretty consistent over the past 4 batches.

 

[eltorrente]

Of course you want to adjust it to your own equipment - that's how you dial in your recipes.

 

[CadiBrewer]

I probably should have phrased my question more directly. I know I can adjust the setting in Beersmith. Am I boiling off enough if I go from 13 to 11.5? Is that what most people experience?

 

[Yooper]

I probably should have phrased my question more directly. I know I can adjust the setting in Beersmith. Am I boiling off enough if I go from 13 to 11.5? Is that what most people experience?

Yes. And it's often different seasonally as well.

As an example, I live in a pretty dry climate but we have fairly humid summers. In the summer, I might boil off only 1.25 gallons in an hour, but in the winter I can easily boil off over 2 gallons! So, I also adjust my boil volume based on conditions that way.

I think most people would find in a keggle that they boil off 1.25-1.5 gallons per hour, in a "normal" climate (not the desert, and not in Louisiana swamps).

 

[ronjonacron]

Down here on the gulf coast we boil off about a gallon per decade, true story mug

 

[CadiBrewer]

I'm glad I asked. I wouldn't have thought the season would cause that much deviation.

 

[acidrain]

2 gallons per hour for me in my Keggle.
Now that you know what your boil-off rate is, enter it into your equipment profile (you'll need to update each recipe for it to populate).
And BTW, you can't just boil down the wort after you've added hops... they will all be bitter.

 

[ChuckO]

I set BeerSmith for the least boil off that I normally experience. That way I can add top off water if necessary instead of having to boil longer and change the hops schedule.