Extract Boil Volume

[Iniquity]

Hello Homebrewers,

I have a question about the amount of water that should be added to the kettle when boiling a batch with extract. I only have a 5 gallon pot so There is no real way to boil a full batch.

What I am really looking to know is if there is some type of formula I should follow based on the amount of extract I am using and other ingredients? Should I just add as much liquid to the pot as it will hold without boiling over? Or is there a calculation as to the amount I should used based on the recipe?

I looked around already and found misc. information on this but nothing definitive. Any info is appreciated

Thanks!

 

[Grinder12000]

Well . . . . you are doing a partial boil so nothing will be exact. I did many partial boils and I just put all the extract in and boiled away. Hops utilization will be a little messed up but seriously I never noticed a huge difference . . .at least until I started doing full boils. It'll taste good if you have done everything else correctly.

I'm not sure there is any definitive answer with the perfect solution.

Like you I was looking for the perfect partial boil but never really found it. I then went to two partial boils and mixed the batches (timing is tricky on that one). Then one big ass boil!!

 

[gtpro]

I wouldn't go any closer than 2 inches from the top of the pot or the hot break will make a huge mess.

 

[Iniquity]

Ok thanks for the info. So it sounds like it doesnt matter how much water I use in the boil.

I should really set my sites on doing a full boil in a big 'ol pot.

 

[Iniquity]

I wouldn't go any closer than 2 inches from the top of the pot or the hot break will make a huge mess.

Thanks, learned that one the hard way from experience!

 

[Yooper]

Most extract recipes are formulated for a certain size boil. For example, my extract recipes usually ask for a 2.5 gallon boil. The recipe (the amount of bittering most especially) usually takes that in to account. Here's one of my recipes, as an example: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f61/my-bock-americanized-maibock-extract-25036/ It tells you to bring up the volume to 2.5 gallons.

If you're changing the boil size, or adjusting the recipe in other ways, then the hopping may need to be adjusted as well. Hop rates vary significantly from a 2.5 gallon boil to a full boil. A full boil might start with 6.5 gallons, and it has a much greater hops utilization rate. The first time I did a full boil, my beer tasted twice as bitter as the partial boil version! (I hadn't taken the hop utilization of a full boil into account!)

It's easiest to do using some brewing software. If you don't have any, you can just post a query here on the forum and one of us will be glad to run it through our software to help you out. In fact, I still post all of my new recipe ideas here, because I like having some input on the recipe. So feel free to do that!

 

[xinunix]

I am in the same boat iniquity, I have a 5.5 gallon pot and do partial boils. I just opted to spend my brewing budget on a kegging system rather than a bigger pot so I will probably be doing partial boils for a while longer...

In general I try to boil as much water as absolutely possible. When I started doing this I really pushed my luck with boil overs and ended up spending most of the boil time holding a fan a few inches over the pot to keep it down. Then I stumbled upon Fermcap-S, greatest thing since sliced bread for an partial boil extract brewer. Just add a few drops as your boil starts and boil overs are completely under control, this has really allowed me to standardize on a boil volume of 4.25 gallons.

Next step is to start taking into consideration hop utilization. Like Yooper said it really does make a difference if the recipe was written for a 2.5 gallon boil and you double the boil volume, doing late extract additions adds to that. You will likely end up with much more bitter beer than you intended. After making that mistake a few times I figured out (mostly from reading on this forum) that a good software program like BeerSmith was what I needed to calculate hop adjustments based on my boil volumes.

Now that I think I finally have that process nailed down, I guess it is time to figure out what the heck I am supposed to do with a kegging system...

All of that being said, the reason I originally increased my boil volumes was b/c of advice given in a post on this forum about ways to improve extract brewing. For the experts out there, does that advice hold true if you can't go to a full boil, meaning is there any reason to boil 4.25 gallons over 2.5 since I can't do a full volume boil?