Small batch scalability question

[megadave5000]

Hey everyone,

I was going to get my hands on some 1gallon glass jugs to do some sub-5 gallon batches. I understand the scalability of the ingredients, but what about boil times?

For instance, if a recipe called for 10oz of hops in a 5gal batch, you would need 2oz in a 1 gallon batch. Likewise with the malt.

My question has to do with the time of the boils and the additions of hops and other ingredients. If a standard boil is 60min long for 5 gallons, do I figure 60 / 5 = 12 minutes per gallon? So a 2.5 gallon batch should boil for 30 minutes?

Also if you add, say 5 oz of hops at 15 min (standard 5 gallon batch example with 60 min boil), would I add 2.5 oz of hops at 7 min 30 seconds in a 2.5 gallon batch and 1oz of hops at the 3 min mark for a 1gallon batch?

Thanks,
Dave

 

[FastAndy]

You would only want to scale the amounts of each ingredient not the times. The timing of the hops has to do with how much bitterness vs aroma vs flavor you get from each addition.

 

[Hex23]

There should be no reason to scale your boil time to the size of the batch. If you know the boiloff rate of your system, then you can choose a pre-boil volume accordingly and end at the right post boil volume. This is one of the advantages of doing smaller batches - that you can more easily do full volume boils and avoid topping off.

As far as hops additions go, just scale the weights like you scaled the volume. I understand that very large commercial systems do have significantly different hops utilization, but I don't think that phenomenon applies on the scale you're talking about. Hops utilization is largely dependent on the gravity of the boil. But if you are taking a 5G recipe with hops weight set for a full boil, and you want to do a 1 gallon full boil, you should just be able to scale the hops back to 20%. The reason is that you will have adjusted your fermentables the same way and thus the boil gravity will be the same between the 5g and 1g batches.

 

[C-Rider]

Hey everyone,

I was going to get my hands on some 1gallon glass jugs to do some sub-5 gallon batches. I understand the scalability of the ingredients, but what about boil times?

For instance, if a recipe called for 10oz of hops in a 5gal batch, you would need 2oz in a 1 gallon batch. Likewise with the malt.

My question has to do with the time of the boils and the additions of hops and other ingredients. If a standard boil is 60min long for 5 gallons, do I figure 60 / 5 = 12 minutes per gallon? So a 2.5 gallon batch should boil for 30 minutes?

Also if you add, say 5 oz of hops at 15 min (standard 5 gallon batch example with 60 min boil), would I add 2.5 oz of hops at 7 min 30 seconds in a 2.5 gallon batch and 1oz of hops at the 3 min mark for a 1gallon batch?

Thanks,
Dave

IMHO, forget the 1 gallon glass jugs and go to Home Depot and buy a bunch of 2 gallon plastic paint buckets. That way you can do 1.75 gallon batches and get about 16-17 bottles for each brew. And it's probably cheaper buying the buckets than glass bottles.

Of course if you like Sangrea wine Sam's Club has one gallon glass bottles for about $10. LOL

 

[megadave5000]

Got it, I will be keeping the boil / mash times along with the hop intervals and only adjusting the weight / volume of the other ingredients in tandem with the water volume adjustment. Really appreciate it,

Dave