IBrewed my first (i don't know what) ended up with only 3.2 Gallons of wort...

[Braumeise]

So, I finally did it.
Although I guess I screwed up on multiple occasions.

Not sure what part german house wife in me is responsible for boiling down the wort to only 3.2 Gallons but well...
we will see what it tastes like in a couple of weeks!

 

[Jsmtg32]

Did you brew and extract or all gain recipe

 

[slym2none]

Please, post the recipe?

 

[TechyDork]

So, I finally did it.
Although I guess I screwed up on multiple occasions.

Not sure what part german house wife in me is responsible for boiling down the wort to only 3.2 Gallons but well...
we will see what it tastes like in a couple of weeks!

did you brew and extract recipe and then not add in the top off water to the fermenter?

 

[Braumeise]

no. Brewed all grain.
took a gravity reading towards the end of sparging and thought the stuff I am getting out now is getting pretty weak so I wont use it.

I guess I did not boil enough wort initially. by the end of my boil the liquid level had lowered significantly. I might also have boiled at to high of a temp. since measured in degree C I either ended up with 99°C and that is NOT boiling or 102°C so I opted for the higher temperature.

 

[TechyDork]

no. Brewed all grain.
took a gravity reading towards the end of sparging and thought the stuff I am getting out now is getting pretty weak so I wont use it.

I guess I did not boil enough wort initially. by the end of my boil the liquid level had lowered significantly. I might also have boiled at to high of a temp. since measured in degree C I either ended up with 99°C and that is NOT boiling or 102°C so I opted for the higher temperature.

When you sparge your gravity reading of the sparge water will become lower and lower as you sparge as you are rinsing the sugars from the grain and there will be less and less to collect the longer you sparge.

You want to sparge until you have your pre-boil volume. to get 5-5.5g in to your fermenter you want to start with 6.5-7g pre-boil, this will take you a few batches to determine how much you boil off and lose to trub and chilling.

Once you have your pre-boil volume take your gravity reading and that will be your OG reading.

 

[Braumeise]

Thanks. As I thought... started with not enough volume (pre boil).

maybe it will still be drinkable....

 

[Braumeise]

Please, post the recipe?

http://www.brewery.org/brewery/cm3/recs/09_66.html

I did NOT use the Mash Schedule as I have been advised here.

 

[Braumeise]

oh, and I used 5 oranges and no lemon and added some Black pepper seeds to the coriander before crushing it.

 

[Braumeise]

Did you brew and extract or all gain recipe

all grain see recipe in Post above

 

[JGF]

Thanks. As I thought... started with not enough volume (pre boil).

maybe it will still be drinkable....

It might still well be drinkable...only one way to find out.

Not enough volume is probably an issue with water volumes and/or not accounting for losses due to grain and hops. We generally collect 7 gallons to boil down to 5.5 gallons. Brewers Friend or other websites are good for figuring out mash and sparge water volumes. Depending upon grain weights, we typically plan to heat 9 to 11 gallons of water to get 7 gallons of wort into the boil kettle.

Be sure to account for losses due to "dead spaces" too. There is some room in our kettle below the spigot and we lose some water in the hot liquor tank.

Have fun with it!

 

[joshesmusica]

When you sparge your gravity reading of the sparge water will become lower and lower as you sparge as you are rinsing the sugars from the grain and there will be less and less to collect the longer you sparge. True.

You want to sparge until you have your pre-boil volume. to get 5-5.5g in to your fermenter you want to start with 6.5-7g pre-boil, this will take you a few batches to determine how much you boil off and lose to trub and chilling. True.

Once you have your pre-boil volume take your gravity reading and that will be your OG reading. Not True.

Your OG comes post-boil, not pre-boil. Though you should definitely measure your pre-boil volume and pre-boil gravity. Once you know that, and once you figure out your boil-off rate and know all of your losses, then you can determine if you're going to hit your planned OG.

I'm sure this will still be drinkable. Although, it's probably a higher gravity than you expected (did you take an OG reading?), and it's probably more bitter than planned (same amount of hops for quite a bit less volume equates to higher IBUs). But maybe those two will help offset each other a bit.

 

[Braumeise]

Your OG comes post-boil, not pre-boil. Though you should definitely measure your pre-boil volume and pre-boil gravity. Once you know that, and once you figure out your boil-off rate and know all of your losses, then you can determine if you're going to hit your planned OG.

I'm sure this will still be drinkable. Although, it's probably a higher gravity than you expected (did you take an OG reading?), and it's probably more bitter than planned (same amount of hops for quite a bit less volume equates to higher IBUs). But maybe those two will help offset each other a bit.

I did, and I tasted it and it is very bitter for my taste... Gravity did not meet the 1.065 in the recipe... I ended with 1.025 after boiling...

 

[TechyDork]

Your OG comes post-boil, not pre-boil. Though you should definitely measure your pre-boil volume and pre-boil gravity. Once you know that, and once you figure out your boil-off rate and know all of your losses, then you can determine if you're going to hit your planned OG.

I'm sure this will still be drinkable. Although, it's probably a higher gravity than you expected (did you take an OG reading?), and it's probably more bitter than planned (same amount of hops for quite a bit less volume equates to higher IBUs). But maybe those two will help offset each other a bit.

Good catch! I meant to type pre-boil and put OG.

Thank you for clarifying that for the OP.

 

[TechyDork]

http://www.brewery.org/brewery/cm3/recs/09_66.html

I did NOT use the Mash Schedule as I have been advised here.

Where did you get the raw wheat from? It looks like you didn't get any extraction from part of your grains. Did you mill the grains prior to mashing?

I did, and I tasted it and it is very bitter for my taste... Gravity did not meet the 1.065 in the recipe... I ended with 1.025 after boiling...

The recipe calls for 1.046 as your OG prior to fermentation. i would expect your reading to be a bit higher due to less water.

Can you describe your mashing and sparging process?

The recipe calls for mashing the grains with 12 qts of water (roughly 1.5qt/lb), and then sparging with 5.5 g of water to get your pre-boil volume. That is 8.5 g of total water used. Did you keep track of your volumes?

Maybe we can help you pinpoint the hole in your process.

 

[Braumeise]

well.... I dumped a lot of wort (2.5 Gal) that I did not boil because I did a gravity reading and it was around 1.000 so I assumed I will be "watering" my wort.
I also think I used way to much water for mashing since I did not get the mash temperature steady and above 140 I kept adding 170 degree warm water.

After talking to the guys in my hb store I did not use raw winter wheat but wheat malt. They did have the raw wheat though. My grains where milled/crushed in the hb store.

 

[Braumeise]

it is fermenting... *lol... just thought wtf is that strange sound... neighbours strangling their dog? banging their forehead into the kitchen sink? Nope... it bubbles inside my chest freezer...

yeah! tiny success...

will eventually call this "testrun" and redo everything today....

 

[TechyDork]

well.... I dumped a lot of wort (2.5 Gal) that I did not boil because I did a gravity reading and it was around 1.000 so I assumed I will be "watering" my wort.
I also think I used way to much water for mashing since I did not get the mash temperature steady and above 140 I kept adding 170 degree warm water.

After talking to the guys in my hb store I did not use raw winter wheat but wheat malt. They did have the raw wheat though. My grains where milled/crushed in the hb store.

Next time ask them to crush them twice, just to be sure you get a good cursh. Sometimes the crush from a brew shop can be a bit less than you would normally like, mostly due to over use of their mill. A good crush will help you get max conversion of the grains.

Sounds like you found the missing step in your process. Just remember to sparge until you hit your pre-boil volume.

it is fermenting... *lol... just thought wtf is that strange sound... neighbours strangling their dog? banging their forehead into the kitchen sink? Nope... it bubbles inside my chest freezer...

yeah! tiny success...

will eventually call this "testrun" and redo everything today....

It'll still be beer, and probably a good one. It will give you something to drink while you RDWHAHB during your next batches.

 

[joshesmusica]

I did, and I tasted it and it is very bitter for my taste... Gravity did not meet the 1.065 in the recipe... I ended with 1.025 after boiling...

well.... I dumped a lot of wort (2.5 Gal) that I did not boil because I did a gravity reading and it was around 1.000 so I assumed I will be "watering" my wort.
I also think I used way to much water for mashing since I did not get the mash temperature steady and above 140 I kept adding 170 degree warm water.

After talking to the guys in my hb store I did not use raw winter wheat but wheat malt. They did have the raw wheat though. My grains where milled/crushed in the hb store.

Those two sound very suspect. I don't know any calculations to figure it out, but if you only got 2.5 gallons worth of wort above 1.000 then you didn't get hardly any conversion. Did you do BIAB, or did you do a mash tun pouring the sparge water over the top (a fly sparge)?

A 1.025 OG will maybe end up being 2% or so. Very sessionable! haha

Anyways, I'm wondering if your hydrometer is off. Have you calibrated it in water? It should say what temp that it should calibrate to, usually 60F, although the one I bought over here is 20C.

I would do as the other guy suggested and try a double crush, and I would also stir a couple of times during the mash.

Another problem, though, with the 1.000 reading during the sparging, could be that you were pouring the water over the grain bed wrong (if you were doing a fly sparge). This could lead to channeling, which means you were basically only getting water out, which would read 1.000.

If you were doing any other kind of sparge, then your problem is how much conversion you got.

 

[TechyDork]

Those two sound very suspect. I don't know any calculations to figure it out, but if you only got 2.5 gallons worth of wort above 1.000 then you didn't get hardly any conversion. Did you do BIAB, or did you do a mash tun pouring the sparge water over the top (a fly sparge)?

A 1.025 OG will maybe end up being 2% or so. Very sessionable! haha

Anyways, I'm wondering if your hydrometer is off. Have you calibrated it in water? It should say what temp that it should calibrate to, usually 60F, although the one I bought over here is 20C.

I would do as the other guy suggested and try a double crush, and I would also stir a couple of times during the mash.

Another problem, though, with the 1.000 reading during the sparging, could be that you were pouring the water over the grain bed wrong (if you were doing a fly sparge). This could lead to channeling, which means you were basically only getting water out, which would read 1.000.

If you were doing any other kind of sparge, then your problem is how much conversion you got.

Good point about the hydrometer being off and also the sparge method.

I currently do a fly sparge, but when i was doing a batch sparge i would always be sure to stir the mash really well after adding in sparge water. The process looked like this. (assuming mashing in a mash tun and not doing BIAB)

Add a few quarts of boiling water to the mashtun to pre-heat it.
Let that site while the strike water is coming to temp.
Drain the pre-heat water. (You may find you don't need to do this, but it helped me to hit my desired mash temp)
Add strike water to mash tun (usually 10-15 degrees above my desired mash temp)
Add crushed grains to water and stir to remove any grain clumps
check temp and add boiling or cold water to adjust if needed.
Some people will stir a few times during the mash, but I would just leave it.
Once mash is complete vorlouf to set the grain bed
Drain the mash tun into the boil kettle.
Add sparge water to mash tun and stir again to allow any remaining sugars to enter solution. (Some will also split the sparge water and do a double sparge)
I would let it rest for 5-10 minutes, but this isn't really necessary.
Drain sparge into boil kettle to achieve pre-boil volume.

 

[Gavin C]

I might also have boiled at to high of a temp. since measured in degree C I either ended up with 99°C and that is NOT boiling or 102°C so I opted for the higher temperature.

You can't boil at too high a temperature without boiling under increased pressure or breaking the laws of physics.

Boiling temperature of water is dictated by atmospheric pressure. Adding more heat will not increase the temperature of a boiling liquid it will increase the rate of evaporation. This is the latent heat of evaporation. Don't concern yourself with the temperature of your boiling wort. If it's boiling, that's enough data.

Sounds like you had fun brewing. Your measures speak to a variety of measurement errors I fear. I don't subscribe to the view that you've got a dodgy hydrometer. User error is the far more likely scenario. No biggie. First brew and all grain. Hat's off.

An OG of 1.025 is either as a result of almost zero starch conversion or measuring gravity of a very hot sample.

For all grain brewing there are 4 readings on brew day that will tell you a lot about your process.

Mash Efficiency

• Preboil gravity
• Preboil Volume

Brewhouse Efficiency

• Post boil Gravity (OG)
• Volume of wort in the fermentor

Anyway. Well done, first brew under your belt. Next one will be easier and you'll have a better idea of what's going on. Congrats.

 

[Braumeise]

Next time ask them to crush them twice, just to be sure you get a good cursh. Sometimes the crush from a brew shop can be a bit less than you would normally like, mostly due to over use of their mill. A good crush will help you get max conversion of the grains.

Sounds like you found the missing step in your process. Just remember to sparge until you hit your pre-boil volume.



It'll still be beer, and probably a good one. It will give you something to drink while you RDWHAHB during your next batches.

If you could read anything from the nice sound the yeast produces while "chewing through the wort sugars" it might be awesome - but I guess it doesn't apply as an indicator.

I bought the excat same grains, yeast again and will give it a new try this time keeping close track of the amount of water I use.

I'll keep you posted.

 

[Braumeise]

Those two sound very suspect.

lol

It looked very suspect to me and it tasted... well... not flattering

I don't know any calculations to figure it out, but if you only got 2.5 gallons worth of wort above 1.000 then you didn't get hardly any conversion. Did you do BIAB, or did you do a mash tun pouring the sparge water over the top (a fly sparge)?

No, I got over 5 Gallons of wort above 1.000 but - german house wife in me - hmmm... this looks "watery" I need to "reduce" it. So I boiled a total of 3 hours instead of 90 min to get rid of water
While I was doing this I knew this was just another step in my major screw up scheme

I did not use anything bagged or pre packaged (german pride, you know) ... I used naked grains in an austere tun.

Fly sparging, my friend, seamed a bit to advanced for my firts attempt so I simply batch sparged... yet I guess since I messed up the mash with way too much water (instead of adding 12 quarts I prolly ended up adding 25 quarts)

and I knew that this wasn't gonna turn out well but I was torn between a temperature too low or adding hot water... and the house wife brain thought of... ach, sauce too thin, just let it simmer forever and it will reduce to a fine glaze... well...

A 1.025 OG will maybe end up being 2% or so. Very sessionable! haha

Drinking Kronenbourg blanc and Einstök white ale atm so I don't care about season and "it is always sunny in Philadelphia" you just need to turn the heat up and look out the window

Anyways, I'm wondering if your hydrometer is off. Have you calibrated it in water? It should say what temp that it should calibrate to, usually 60F, although the one I bought over here is 20C.

Did calibrate Hydrometer and thermometer - yet I am wondering where the 102 reading for the temperature came from... might have to do that again or make sure it doesnt touch the bottom of the kettle...

my hydrometer reads 20°C for Calibration on the inside slip and it read exactly 1.000 in 20°C warm water.

I would do as the other guy suggested and try a double crush, and I would also stir a couple of times during the mash.

ok. and I will use the exact amount of water and see that I get the temp right and keep it steady.
Bought my self a cooler today to mash in hoping the insulation will keep the temperature.

Another problem, though, with the 1.000 reading during the sparging, could be that you were pouring the water over the grain bed wrong (if you were doing a fly sparge). This could lead to channeling, which means you were basically only getting water out, which would read 1.000.

i dumped it in with a lot of "spin" making sure it made nice waves in the grains

If you were doing any other kind of sparge, then your problem is how much conversion you got.

I truly believe my problem is with the water I dumped in the mash and my Vorlauf looked not nice enough to keep it so I kept pouring back aprox a galon or more Vorlauf until I realized it does not look better only more watery...

so I knew I did something wrong there.


hat I poured back a normal amount of vorlauf, my first at least 3 Gallons should have been fairly okay...

as I said, re-bought everything today and will redo it one of these day maybe tomorrow keeping track of the water usage in the very first place!

Thanks for helping me getting this better sorted...

 

[Braumeise]

Good point about the hydrometer being off and also the sparge method.

I currently do a fly sparge, but when i was doing a batch sparge i would always be sure to stir the mash really well after adding in sparge water. The process looked like this. (assuming mashing in a mash tun and not doing BIAB)

Add a few quarts of boiling water to the mashtun to pre-heat it.
Let that site while the strike water is coming to temp.
Drain the pre-heat water. (You may find you don't need to do this, but it helped me to hit my desired mash temp)
Add strike water to mash tun (usually 10-15 degrees above my desired mash temp)
Add crushed grains to water and stir to remove any grain clumps
check temp and add boiling or cold water to adjust if needed.
Some people will stir a few times during the mash, but I would just leave it.
Once mash is complete vorlouf to set the grain bed
Drain the mash tun into the boil kettle.
Add sparge water to mash tun and stir again to allow any remaining sugars to enter solution. (Some will also split the sparge water and do a double sparge)
I would let it rest for 5-10 minutes, but this isn't really necessary.
Drain sparge into boil kettle to achieve pre-boil volume.

That helps a lot!
Thought about preheating the mash tun with boiling water that I would then dump.

Thanks!

 

[Braumeise]

You can't boil at too high a temperature without boiling under increased pressure or breaking the laws of physics.

lol - in my world the laws of physics are constantly broken... ask my high school teachers and my ex boyfriends about it

my thermometer calibration might be off though, I will double check that.
but yeah, it was boiling!

Boiling temperature of water is dictated by atmospheric pressure. Adding more heat will not increase the temperature of a boiling liquid it will increase the rate of evaporation. This is the latent heat of evaporation. Don't concern yourself with the temperature of your boiling wort. If it's boiling, that's enough data.

but that is what I wanted, thinking reducing the water will make my gravitation not as off german house wife brain... thin sauce? No flour to add? No problem, reduce liquid like a chef and be complimented on your five star cooking skills

Sounds like you had fun brewing.

I did! had friends over the day before helping to assemble the last parts of equipment and I needed one american person to unscrew my propane tank from the bbq (part time vegan, first time bbq grill owner, non experienced gas tank operator here) and screw it to my 72000 btu Blichmann bad ass burner and ignite it once so I could feel save not to blow torch the entire neighbourhood!

I was actually happy to do it all by my self the next day... I had so many things to think about that company would have been distracting. And I enjoyed being on my Patio all day watching what is going on outside. and I found it incredibly fascinating what was going on in my Pots and tuns and how bad ass my home made Equipment worked was very proud of my self even though I knew it was not going to be anything near what I would like to drink... but hey... "testrun" you all told me not to mash hay (which I would have done otherwise)... so all good!

Your measures speak to a variety of measurement errors I fear. I don't subscribe to the view that you've got a dodgy hydrometer. User error is the far more likely scenario. No biggie. First brew and all grain. Hat's off.

Thank you! German pride!
I guess for the amount of water I used I should have used double the grains. so I guess keeping track of my water will solve many if not all issues.

An OG of 1.025 is either as a result of almost zero starch conversion or measuring gravity of a very hot sample.

I did let it cool down...

Mistake
no 1: too much water
no 2: I poured back all of my Vorlauf (did not look nice enough!) *lol and probably everything that had a good gravity.
no 3: water evaporation due to "over boiling" or as Chef Ramsey would call it "reduction"

For all grain brewing there are 4 readings on brew day that will tell you a lot about your process.

Mash Efficiency

• Preboil gravity
• Preboil Volume

Brewhouse Efficiency

• Post boil Gravity (OG)
• Volume of wort in the fermentor

Will totally keep track of these next time.

Anyway. Well done, first brew under your belt. Next one will be easier and you'll have a better idea of what's going on. Congrats.

Thank you! bought a second fermenting bucket to get this done right away because now every mishap is fairly fresh in my brain and I do not want it to stay there so I might be up to my next brew tomorrow

 

[joshesmusica]

Batch sparging is perfectly fine. And if that's the case, then yes, you likely added to much water if you were getting 1.000 in your sparge. Did you stir the grains really well at the sparge?

Don't be scared to use a calculator, like beersmith, in order to help you figure out what volumes are need!

 

[Braumeise]

Redid it today.

Mash Efficiency

• Preboil gravity
• Preboil Volume

Preboil Gravity = 1.020
Volume = 8 Gallons
(looks like I am not capable of measuring in quarts and Gallons just yet)

Brewhouse Efficiency

• Post boil Gravity (OG)
• Volume of wort in the fermentor

Gravity= 1.035.... hmmmm still quite off.
Volume 5.5 Gallons...

maybe this time I did not boil enough?

But it looked, smelled and tasted MUCH better than the first attempt.

Excited to see what they both will turn out like!

 

[Braumeise]

Batch sparging is perfectly fine. And if that's the case, then yes, you likely added to much water if you were getting 1.000 in your sparge. Did you stir the grains really well at the sparge?

Don't be scared to use a calculator, like beersmith, in order to help you figure out what volumes are need!

I did (stir the grains)...

looks like I will be brewing wit beer for a very long time

 

[Gavin C]

Redid it today.



Preboil Gravity = 1.020
Volume = 8 Gallons
(looks like I am not capable of measuring in quarts and Gallons just yet)



Gravity= 1.035.... hmmmm still quite off.
Volume 5.5 Gallons...

maybe this time I did not boil enough?

But it looked, smelled and tasted MUCH better than the first attempt.

Excited to see what they both will turn out like!

This thread may be of use to you. Relates to measurment of important figures like I mentioned. What their use is to the brewer, how to corectly measure these things and relate them to your process efficacy.

Your numbers are low. Speaks to a variety of possible causes.

Number 1 thing you can do is crush finer next batch. Crush as fine as you can without getting lautering problems. Just my 2c.

 

[jmh286]

Redid it today.



Preboil Gravity = 1.020
Volume = 8 Gallons
(looks like I am not capable of measuring in quarts and Gallons just yet)



Gravity= 1.035.... hmmmm still quite off.
Volume 5.5 Gallons...

maybe this time I did not boil enough?

But it looked, smelled and tasted MUCH better than the first attempt.

Excited to see what they both will turn out like!

What temperature are using for your mash? It seems like you aren't getting much conversion. Are you using the 161F for your infusion that is recommended in that recipe? That seems fairly high even for a wit.

5.5 gallons is a good volume to shoot for, because it gives you some leeway with trub in your fermenter, and still end with 5 gallons of beer. Half a gallon isn't going to account for 10 points of gravity though, I would say it's in your conversion.

 

[Braumeise]

What temperature are using for your mash? It seems like you aren't getting much conversion. Are you using the 161F for your infusion that is recommended in that recipe? That seems fairly high even for a wit.

5.5 gallons is a good volume to shoot for, because it gives you some leeway with trub in your fermenter, and still end with 5 gallons of beer. Half a gallon isn't going to account for 10 points of gravity though, I would say it's in your conversion.

I did use 160 !

Will try 150/155 next time!

Thanks for mentioning that!

 

[Braumeise]

This thread may be of use to you. Relates to measurment of important figures like I mentioned. What their use is to the brewer, how to corectly measure these things and relate them to your process efficacy.

Your numbers are low. Speaks to a variety of possible causes.

Number 1 thing you can do is crush finer next batch. Crush as fine as you can without getting lautering problems. Just my 2c.

Mille Grazie!

Will read after I get home from work!

 

[joshesmusica]

I did use 160 !

Will try 150/155 next time!

Thanks for mentioning that!

But was that 160 before adding to the mash tun and adding the grains? Or 160 after all that?

 

[Braumeise]

But was that 160 before adding to the mash tun and adding the grains? Or 160 after all that?

after. I tried to get to 160.

have to say my digital thermometer is obv. off...

It measured constant 180 even when I took it and left it outside...
that explains the 102 °C the other day.

 

[Braumeise]

This thread may be of use to you. Relates to measurment of important figures like I mentioned. What their use is to the brewer, how to corectly measure these things and relate them to your process efficacy.

Your numbers are low. Speaks to a variety of possible causes.

Number 1 thing you can do is crush finer next batch. Crush as fine as you can without getting lautering problems. Just my 2c.

That Post is awesome, thanks man!