I started brewing this summer and am... 7-8 batches in right now. Switched to kegging 4 batches ago. My last three batches - a NE IPA, a west coast IPA, and just today a light IPA/blonde ale - have all been consistently 10-15 points under gravity. I don't have specific numbers for earlier batches on hand, but today my target gravity according to Beersmith was 1.054, and my measured OG was 1.042. Here is my recipe and notes on what I did today:
8# Maris otter
1# flaked oats
1# flaked wheat
.75# cara-pils
.5# 10L crystal
.5# honey malt
.5# vienna malt
.3 oz centennial @ 55
.3 oz centennial @ 35
.3 oz centennial @ 20
.5 oz Kazbek @ 20
.5 oz Kazbek @ 10
1 oz Kazbek @ 0
I took suggestions from beersmith and mashed with 6 gallons of water, sparged with 2.375. This batch was my first attempt at building my water profile from RO water - I targeted 120 ppm sulfate and 80 ppm calcium using Bru'n water. However, I forgot to add my water additions to my mash water until about 10 minutes after my grains had gone in. Rookie mistake, usually just use tap water - salts were properly mixed in my sparge water.
I sparged using my bottling bucket. I placed it with the spigot over a second bucket and the grain bag inside (after the bag had been lightly squeezed out a bit over my kettle). The sparge water was at approximately 165 degF. I poured through over about 10 minutes, although I didn't use all the volume I collected - by the time I had gotten about 2.5 gallons in my bucket it was running really clear so I stopped the sparge.
I had a bit more volume than I wanted in my kettle. Beersmith estimated 7.5 gallons, it looked like I had about 8-8.5, so I did a 75 minute boil instead of 60.
Boil went fine, nothing unusual. Chilled to 70 in under 10 minutes, poured to a bucket, took gravity reading to get the 1.042 number, pitched yeast.
Obviously, something is very wrong in my mash. Consistently missing 15 points is not good. I even set my brewhouse efficiency at 65%, and still got it way under. My grain crush could be an issue, but I do it at my LHBS and don't have room/money for a mill in my apartment - I run it through twice already, but I can't adjust the gap and running it through three times is a bit excessive.
What do I do now to fix this?
8# Maris otter
1# flaked oats
1# flaked wheat
.75# cara-pils
.5# 10L crystal
.5# honey malt
.5# vienna malt
.3 oz centennial @ 55
.3 oz centennial @ 35
.3 oz centennial @ 20
.5 oz Kazbek @ 20
.5 oz Kazbek @ 10
1 oz Kazbek @ 0
I took suggestions from beersmith and mashed with 6 gallons of water, sparged with 2.375. This batch was my first attempt at building my water profile from RO water - I targeted 120 ppm sulfate and 80 ppm calcium using Bru'n water. However, I forgot to add my water additions to my mash water until about 10 minutes after my grains had gone in. Rookie mistake, usually just use tap water - salts were properly mixed in my sparge water.
I sparged using my bottling bucket. I placed it with the spigot over a second bucket and the grain bag inside (after the bag had been lightly squeezed out a bit over my kettle). The sparge water was at approximately 165 degF. I poured through over about 10 minutes, although I didn't use all the volume I collected - by the time I had gotten about 2.5 gallons in my bucket it was running really clear so I stopped the sparge.
I had a bit more volume than I wanted in my kettle. Beersmith estimated 7.5 gallons, it looked like I had about 8-8.5, so I did a 75 minute boil instead of 60.
Boil went fine, nothing unusual. Chilled to 70 in under 10 minutes, poured to a bucket, took gravity reading to get the 1.042 number, pitched yeast.
Obviously, something is very wrong in my mash. Consistently missing 15 points is not good. I even set my brewhouse efficiency at 65%, and still got it way under. My grain crush could be an issue, but I do it at my LHBS and don't have room/money for a mill in my apartment - I run it through twice already, but I can't adjust the gap and running it through three times is a bit excessive.
What do I do now to fix this?