Overshot my pre boil volume! HELP!

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CentralFLBrewer

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Hello All,

Today I had my first all grain brew day. Everything went great except I over shot my pre boil volume by about 1.5 gallons thus missing my OG number by about 1 point 1.052 vs 10.62. I used Brew 365 to calculate the numbers.

Pre Boil = 6.37 Gal
Batch = 5 Gal
Grain Bill =12lbs
Mash Thickness = 1.5 qtr per pound
Grain Absorption = .13 gla/lb
Mash Water = 4.5 gallons = 3.6 in the bucket
Sparge Water = 4.43 this is where it went wrong I filled my bucket plus another 1.50 I think I had probably around 4.4 gallons vs 3.6 since the grains were wet.

Basically I produced produced about 8 gallons of wort.. on about 9 gallons of water. I have measured and re measured and my numbers are on. I have a 9 gallon brew kettle so I ended up tossing out about 1.5 gallons. Help?

So I need less mash out water I am thinking. Where do I need to adjust? :confused:
 
You could have just filled your kettle with the 8 gallons and boiled it down to what you wanted. That would give you the OG you wanted
 
You way over thought this.
Gathering the boil volume is easy...
Mash and collect first running (batch sparge I assume?).
Figure out how much you're short for the pre-boil volume.
Sparge with the amount you're short.
If you do happen to overshoot the volume, boil it down until you have the pre-boil volume, and then start the timer and add the hops.
 
Next time after vorlauf collect and measure your first runnings then subtract that volume from your desired pre boil volume and that is how much sparge water you will need. After the mash the grains are saturated so any water that goes in comes out.
 
Man I wish I would have thought about boiling it down..I did batch sparge.. My last running we're still at 1.020. So unless I know my pre boil volume I am sol?
 
Not necessarily - if you know what your boil-off rate is you could eyeball it, I suppose. But you're much better off if you know what the numbers ought to be, and what they actually are.

If it helps any, you're not the first one in this position. I experimented with multi-step infusions a while back - in principle they give finer control - but a couple of times I badly missed the mark on the sparge water, resulting in stove-top boils in the four hour time range, despite having two different boilers going at the same time.
 
" I have a 9 gallon brew kettle so I ended up tossing out about 1.5 gallons. Help?
"

No biggy. You'll have a lower gravity beer, but it still should be fine. You could have boiled down, but based on the boiloff rate you've got there, you would have had to add an extra hour and a half. Even then, it wouldn't have made you hit your intended OG. 1.5 gallons @ 1.020 is 30 points of sugar. That would move you gravity up 6 points in a 5 gallon batch.

For future batches, it looks like you just need to measure your water more carefully and dial back the efficiency a few points on whatever program you are using. Until you have all the kinks worked out of your process, it is better to error on the low side of the efficiency projection. It is a whole lot faster to dilute with a bit of water then it is to boil down.
 
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