just brewed an imperial pale ale. it should have an OG of 1.075 but i ended up with 1.052. i have a 1/2 cup brown sugar addition to make in 2 days dissolved in 2 cups of water. should i double the amount of brown sugar to help increase the amount of sugars? thanks for your help in advance!
first batch help please!!!
- Thread starter tcartmel
- Start date
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
Welcome to HBT!
Was this an extract kit? If so, the problem is mixing top off water and wort. They don't like to mix so when you take a reading it is more top off water than wort. It's not a problem as everything get well mixed during fermentation.
Was this an extract kit? If so, the problem is mixing top off water and wort. They don't like to mix so when you take a reading it is more top off water than wort. It's not a problem as everything get well mixed during fermentation.
Thanks for the quick reply. It was an extract recipe but not an extract kit. We added the top off water to the 5 gallon mark per the recipe and then shook the carboy real well to mix. So, you think it will mix together better as fermentation initiates which means our gravity isn't as far off as we think (which means we should just add the amount of brown sugar the recipe calls for and not add more) ??
VTBrewer
Well-Known Member
Did you steep any grains? With JUST extract its pretty hard to miss your OG with correct volumes. With stepping grains you still would be hard pressed to miss it that much. So I'm voting with didn't mix thouroughly as well, and would continue as the recipe calls for.
Even if it's a little low, you're not down in 1.035 land. It will be a fine brew.
Even if it's a little low, you're not down in 1.035 land. It will be a fine brew.
wildwest450
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Dec 27, 2007
- Messages
- 8,978
- Reaction score
- 191
Short answer, YES. If you used the proper amount of extract it's near impossible to be shy on your gravity.
Yeah, it's takes way more mixing that you'd imagine to properly mix wort and water well enough to get an accurate gravity sample. Way more. Fermentation will mix it fine, though. I'd stick with the recipe as planned.
dantodd
Well-Known Member
Post your recipe and tell us how your brew went. How many gallons is the brew? For example, did you do a partial boil and then dump ALL the kettle into the fermenter, or did you siphon it out of the kettle and leave some behind?
