Newbie question re hydrometer use

[akrob78]

Hi all, i just mixed a brew of cascade pale ale last night and just before i went to do a hydrometer reading..... I opened the tap and put a sample in the test tube an took a reading fine, but my questions / observations are:
1. if i sample every day unil ready to bottle, that sems like a waste of beer!
2. If i grab a sample each day, wont air get sucked in through the airlock and possibly spoil the beer? Tonight when i got the sample i sucked air in and half the water in the airlock!

Am i doing this right or not??

Any tips appreciated!

 

[venquessa]

Best to lift it out from the top with a turkey baster, wine theft or syringe.

You don't need to sample every day. Once when the activity stops, about 1 week, then again before bottling or in 3 days to see if the reading has changed.

If you buy a graduated cylinder for the hydrometer you only need to take about 70ml, you can drink it. If you sterilize the cylinder and hydrometer, you can also return it.

 

[mvcorliss]

You do not need to check your SG everyday. Did you do a Original Gravity reading?
Wait at least a week, even more is better before even thinking of checking again. As long as you know you have pitched the yeast resonably correctly and fermentation is happening you can (try to) relax and let the little beasts do thier jobs. Are you planning to rack to secondary? If so ... gove good thought to forgetting it! There are some reasons with some beers to rack but right now it really isn't needed and just adds one more risk of infection. Make your first brews as easy as you can. Wait three weeks and check your SG then and again two days later. If it hasn't gone down any, and it probably won't , then rack to a bottling bucket, prime and bottle.
If you are waiting until fermentation is done, or mostly done it won't do any harm removing the airlock from the bucket lid when you tap the spigot. Most of us do not use a spigot and just take off the lid and use a wine thief or turkey baster to get our sample. As long as the surface of the beer is not wildly disturbed there will be little or no air exchange going on. If you do use the spigot make sure you let any trub in your sample settle out well before using your hydrometer.

 

[akrob78]

Thanks guys. I'll try to relax and wait a while and take the samples from the top. Forgot to get the og reading in my excitement!

A pack of brewing drops came with the kit so i won't rack to a bottling bucket this time. I'll stick to this method for a while and think about changing later on if there is good reason to.

 

[mvcorliss]

I've never used them. If you think of it when the time comes drop me a PM and let me know how you like the result. What brand are they?