Low water volume in primary

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jpaulson344

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Did my first all-grain last night. Had a pre-boil volume of 6.2 gallons.
after a 90 minute boil i ended up with about 3.5 gallons and a gravity of 1.060. was shooting for 1.055. I already pitched the yeast last night and it is fermenting.
Should i add boiled water to compensate for the high gravity reading/low water volume at any point during fermentation? I will be racking to secondary at 10 days. Should i add it then after its done fermenting?

Or should i just relax and let it go its course.

Thanks guys
 
5 points is enough to notice but probably not enough to care, on the other hand adding some water to get your gravity means a few extra pints

Nearly 2 gallons an hour is a pretty healthy boil off rate, you might want to kick down the propane a touch on your next go around.
 
Did my first all-grain last night. Had a pre-boil volume of 6.2 gallons.
after a 90 minute boil i ended up with about 3.5 gallons and a gravity of 1.060. was shooting for 1.055. I already pitched the yeast last night and it is fermenting.
Should i add boiled water to compensate for the high gravity reading/low water volume at any point during fermentation? I will be racking to secondary at 10 days. Should i add it then after its done fermenting?

Or should i just relax and let it go its course.

Thanks guys

A couple of things...

1) Why the 90 min boil? Unless there is a reason such as extra carmelization a 60 min boil is usually all you need and that will reduce your boil off.

2) 1.5 gal short and only 5 points off means you probably got lower efficiency than you planned for (certainly a common experience especially in your first AG attempt) so I would not top off all the way to 5 gal or you will have a weaker than intended brew.

3) You COULD boil and cool an extra gallon of water, but you would have a hard time mixing it thoroughly enough w/o oxygenating the fermenting wort which you don't want to do.

IMHO, just let 'er ride and enjoy a little less of a higher grav brew, call it a learning experience, and adjust accordingly next time. The less you F around w/ it at this point the better!

4) Why are you racking to a secondary? Are you adding something? MANY experienced and accomplished brewers around here (including Yooper, Revvy, John Palmer and Jamil Zainasheff) just leave their brews in the primary, even for dry hopping. Unless you are adding fruit or something, secondary is unnecessary and you will lose more volume in racking multiple times.

5) Even if you DO secondary, don't just rack on an arbitrary timetable (10 days). Take hydro readings and make sure it is finished

Merry Christmas and RDWHAHB :tank:
 
TANSTAAFB you got it backwards. his OG was 5 points HIGHER than expected. but i agree RDWHAHB. just enjoy the extra ABV and be happy.
 
TANSTAAFB you got it backwards. his OG was 5 points HIGHER than expected. but i agree RDWHAHB. just enjoy the extra ABV and be happy.

I got that!!! :drunk:

My point was that he was ONLY 5 pts high while 1.5 gal low on volume so his high boil off rate concentrated his wort somewhat, but if he had ended up w/ 5 gal as he intended he probably WOULD HAVE been a liitle low. If he topped up now to 5 gal, he would be low as well.
 
No needs for apologies my friend!!!

We all have to try to interpret each other via the interwebz...would be cool to throw a big annual HBT party so we could do this in person with less (?) confusion :tank:
 
Thanks for the quick replys guys. I went ahead and added 1 gallon of water to lower that gravity just a bit. continued to ferment fine after the little interruption. I think i will try without a secondary racking. Ill just add the dry hopping after fermentation comes to a slow.
Thanks again!
 
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