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2pugbrews

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OG question

I brewed an ESB back in March and have another ESB in the primary now.
The one in March had an OG of 1.047 with the following ingredients:
6.5 # pale LME
.5 # Crystal Malt - 40L
.5 # Crystal Malt - 75L
.25 # carpils
1.5 oz Kent Goldings 60 min
.5 oz Kent Goldings 5 min
Munton's Dry Yeast. FG 1.020

For the current batch I used a recipe from my HBS. He's a fairly sophisticated home brewer - has been a brewmaster, has all kinds of software he uses. His recipe predicted an OG of 1.067. The batch at pitching came out at 1.047! with the following ingredients:
6.5 # Pale LME
1# Crystal Malt - 60L
.5 # Brown Malt
1 oz Kent Golding - 60 min
2 oz Kent Golding - 30 min
1 oz Kent Golding - 0 min
1028 London Ale Yeast Predicted FG 1.018. Predicted ABV 6.6% (high?)
 
so.... what's the question? :)

2pugbrews said:
OG question

I brewed an ESB back in March and have another ESB in the primary now.
The one in March had an OG of 1.047 with the following ingredients:
6.5 # pale LME
.5 # Crystal Malt - 40L
.5 # Crystal Malt - 75L
.25 # carpils
1.5 oz Kent Goldings 60 min
.5 oz Kent Goldings 5 min
Munton's Dry Yeast. FG 1.020

For the current batch I used a recipe from my HBS. He's a fairly sophisticated home brewer - has been a brewmaster, has all kinds of software he uses. His recipe predicted an OG of 1.067. The batch at pitching came out at 1.047! with the following ingredients:
6.5 # Pale LME
1# Crystal Malt - 60L
.5 # Brown Malt
1 oz Kent Golding - 60 min
2 oz Kent Golding - 30 min
1 oz Kent Golding - 0 min
1028 London Ale Yeast Predicted FG 1.018. Predicted ABV 6.6% (high?)
 
I ran this through a free recipe calculator and came up with a starting gravity of 1.052... this assumes 40% efficiency on extracting goodness from your grains, which is a good guess when just steeping grains.

Even if you got 80% efficiency on the grains, that gives an OG of 1.056.

No way you can get 1.067 out of the recipe (unless you make it 4.25 gallons instead of 5.)

-walker

edit: AH.... if you use DME instead of LME and get 80% efficienty on the grains, I'm seeing an OG of 1.066. Maybe he intended that extract to be dry???
 
I would question you "Brewmasters" credentials.

I ran his recipe through Promash, and came up with a gravity of 1.052.

IMHO 1.067 is too high for an ESB, but 1.052 is about right.

I'd replace the brown malt with an equivalent weight of brown sugar, and possibly add an extra 1/2 lb of LME

-a.
 
2pugbrews said:
OG question

I brewed an ESB back in March and have another ESB in the primary now.
The one in March had an OG of 1.047 with the following ingredients:
6.5 # pale LME
.5 # Crystal Malt - 40L
.5 # Crystal Malt - 75L
.25 # carpils
1.5 oz Kent Goldings 60 min
.5 oz Kent Goldings 5 min
Munton's Dry Yeast. FG 1.020

For the current batch I used a recipe from my HBS. He's a fairly sophisticated home brewer - has been a brewmaster - very knowledgable, has all kinds of software he uses. His recipe predicted an OG of 1.067. The batch at pitching came out at 1.047! with the following ingredients:
6.5 # Pale LME
1# Crystal Malt - 60L
.5 # Brown Malt
1 oz Kent Golding - 60 min
2 oz Kent Golding - 30 min
1 oz Kent Golding - 0 min
1028 London Ale Yeast Predicted FG 1.018. Predicted ABV 6.6% (high?)
Sorry, the last line or 2 didn't make it. I meant to conclude with the question about the difference between actual and predicted. The HBS software predicted 1.067. I came up with 1.047. The predicted OG of 1.067 as well as the ABV 6.6% has to be way high - right? On reflection, I guess it doesn't make any difference as long as the brew is drinkable.
 
I agree. how do you get a higher OG in an extract? Without altering the flavor too much. I love my New Castle clone, but it is weak in ABV. how can I kick it up?:drunk:
 
2pugbrews said:
Sorry, the last line or 2 didn't make it. I meant to conclude with the question about the difference between actual and predicted. The HBS software predicted 1.067. I came up with 1.047. The predicted OG of 1.067 as well as the ABV 6.6% has to be way high - right? On reflection, I guess it doesn't make any difference as long as the brew is drinkable.
I am wondering if the HBS guy used DME instead of LME. When I use DME and the grains in your recipe I get 1.067.
 
Thanks. I guess I wasn't worried about a bad batch - just puzzled about the discrepancy. He probably did enter DME in his program. At any rate, it's in the secondary now - fermented down to 1.011 and tasted pretty good. I've been meaning to call my HBS guy but keep on forgetting. Don't worry, have a home brew
 
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