OG not even close. Thoughts?

[nigel31]

Hey,

I brewed up an extract batch of Northern Brewer Wee Heavy ye(a)sterday. All went great, no troubles. Now, this ale has 12 pounds (yes, 12 lbs.) of gold liquid malt extract in it as well as about a pound of steeped grainage (steeped for the proper amount of time). OG was supposed to be 1.083. It came about (after a couple readings) at 1.060. WAY LOW.

The first one was taken at about 75F, and the second one I chilled to 60. With the first one, I adjusted the OG reading (1.050) using the sheet that came with my brand-new hydrometer--this was a first-time use. With the second one, it was exactly 60F and read 1.060. The hydrometer read 0.00 with plain water in it, by the way.

How can a brew with all that sugar in it possibly be only 1.060?

Any thoughts on what could've gone wrong or what can be done? It's bubbling away like mad in the primary carboy presently, so I won't disturb it. Just kinda stinks that I may never know what the actual final gravity/ABV will be.

Thanks, crew.
Nige

 

[damdaman]

With extract kits it's really hard to miss the OG. The most likely scenario is the reading you took wasn't mixed well. When you pour in the top-off water (assuming you did a partial boil), sometimes the water doesn't mix very well right away. Then you take a sample and it's either too much water or too little, and the OG looks way off.

Mix the liquid thoroughly and take another reading, or wait for the yeast to start swirling and mixing it all up and take a reading (although this one will be slightly off since the yeast have already started working).

the only other thing I can think of that would cause you to miss the OG is if you topped off too much water, i.e. if you have a 6gal fermenter and topped it off to the top thinking it was a 5gal.

 

[Shooter]

Well, I'm not at my computer, so I'm computing this with BrewPal on the iPod, but, for a five gallon batch, 12 pounds of golden LME should give a post boil gravity of 1.082.

Two possibilites:

1) They didn't give you enough extract

2) Was this a partial boil. If so, are you sure you adequately stirred in the top off water. It takes a lot more mixing then people realize and it is VERY easy to get a low reading if you don't.

 

[bknifefight]

I've had this happen because the wort wasn't mixed very well. Now I roll the carboy around quite a bit before I draw a sample. Haven't had a problem with OG since.

 

[nigel31]

Hmmm...that does make sense, and two of you jumped right on it.

It was indeed a partial boil, and it's likely that the top-off water hadn't been propoerly mixed in. Dang. The 12 lbs. was definitely there, however: 2 full 6-lb. jugs of it. I guess I'll just assume that the OG's 1.080 or thereabouts then, and will take the FG reading when appropriate (some weeks/months away).

Thanks a lot. You taught me something.
Nige

 

[gtpro]

I had the same thing happen on the IPA I just brewed, I topped off the fermentor with another half gallon or so of water, thinking it would mix right in, I took a reading and got 1.040, pouted like a little girl for a few minutes, then mixed it around a bit and got 1.059

 

[Revvy]

It's a pretty common issue for ANYONE using extract and then topping off with water (and that includes partial mashes) to have an error in reading the OG...In fact, it is actually nearly impossible to mix the wort and the top off water in a way to get an accurate OG reading...

Brewers get a low reading if they get more of the top off water than the wort, conversely they get a higher number if they grabbed more of the extract than the top off water in their sample.

When I am doing an extract with grain recipe I make sure to stir for a minimum of 5 minutes (whipping up a froth to aerate as well) before I draw a grav sample and pitch my yeast....It really is an effort to integrate the wort with the top off water...This is a fairly common new brewer issue we get on here...unless you under or over topped off or the final volume for the kit was 5 gallons and you topped off to 5.5, then the issue, sorry to say, is "operator error"

it doesn't matter what your reading was.....the "real reading" in an extract batch is what it said it would be in the recipe or beersmith....Whether or not you mixed it up enough before you took the reading it mixed itself up fine during fermentation.

So unless you had a final volume a gallon or so higher than 5 gallons....you recipe will be fine and at the OG it was supposed to be,

I bet your OG is EXACTLY what it is supposed to be.

And during fermentation the wort and water will mix up just fine on it's own.

 

[Joeywhat]

What I've done for the past few batches is to shake the hell out of the carboy after adding the wort and top off water. I also use a 6.5 gallon vessel sos there's room for things to move around for a bit.

I typically place the carboy on it's side on top of my knee (with a stopper of course, I also keep my hand on it so it doesn't fly off) and tilt it like a see-saw for a minute or two. So far every batch I've done this way has come out great, and I nailed my OG reading.

I'm going to eventually start doing full boils to avoid this 'problem' altogether.