OG - What's Considered 'Way Off' and Any Way to Fix It?

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THRobinson

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Just brewed a batch of Fat Tire Amber Ale, bought a kit from Austin Homebrew.

Followed everything as accurately as I could, however, it listed that the expected OG would be 1.051 and if I'm doing it correctly, I'm reading 1.064.

My questions are...

1) is the difference of 0.013 considered a lot? what's a 'lot' when dealing with such small numbers to begin with?
2) when the OG is off, how do you fix it? more boiling? more water?

Thanks
 
What was you total volume in the fermentor ? it less than 5 gal yes you could added distilled or boiled and cooled water to make 5 gal total
 
Total vol. is 5.25 gallons... was expecting 5, but instructions said to add water until hits 5.25gal.

Would the 0.013 make a big difference in the end taste wise?

Just overly worried I messed up and will have to wait 3 months to find out. :)
 
Extract, PM or AG? In the first two cases, it may just be a lack of mixing. In the latter, I'm impressed with your brewhouse efficiency!

This is a beer that can handle the extra points without a problem. Call it Balloon Tire.
 
There are a number of differences between extract and all grain. Taste for one, choices of flavors for a second and attenuation for the third. Extract will not be all pale malt just condensed down and you have no control over what other additions the maltster will add. Many times the additions are not all fermentable so you cannot get your beer to ferment out as well as you would like. Since the extract already has some additional grains, you are somewhat limited in your grain choices to get the desired flavor/color. Plus there is that whole "coolness" factor of saying you brew "all grain". I almost forgot the difference in cost. The maltster wants to be paid for his time and the cost of drying/concentrating so the extract is more expensive than the all grain but this is balanced with the time necessary to mash, lauter, and sparge the grain.
 
If part of a kit, where (in this case) it's modelled after a brand name would there be much difference? Since I don't need to worry about changing the taste/colour to my preference.

I was under the impression that the extract (in this instance) would be the same as AG just, some of the work done for me.

If not, I think next time I'll order the milled AG.

So long as it's closer to real beer than the kits I've bought in cans (ie. Coopers). That stuff went down the drain. :S
 
You need some specialty equipment to brew all grain. Do you have a way to mash? Or do full boils?

_
 
umm... i'll let ya know once my book arrives and I read it to find out. :)

I have a 32qt steel pot that I bought with the Fat Tire kit. Plus a basic brew kit, with primary fermenter, carboy, spoon, hydrometer, etc....

They have a milled option, so assuming I won't need any sort of crushing apparatus, beyond that... no idea, haven't gotten that far. I hate reading off the net, prefer a book so, ordered one.
 
You leave it alone.

It's a pretty common issue for ANYONE topping off with water in the fermenter (and that includes partial mashes, extract or all grain revcipes) 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"

If your target volume was correct, then it will be fine.

More than likely your true OG is really what it's supposed to be. And it will mix itself fine during fermentation.
 
Oh... back on topic, the OG....

What's considered way off? Like... at which point should you be concerned?

EDIT
Thanks Revvy... must've been typing at the same time. :)
 
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