So...What just happened?

[MrEggSandwich]

Had the house to myself today, and decided to make it a brew day. It turned out to be one of those brews days that happen from time to time. I sit here now trying to figure out what went wrong.

Partial mash recipe- Target OG: 1.074ish.....Actual OG: 1.042...

Recipe below, but here's the story:

-Used 50% distilled 50% bottled water (Primo)

-Lots of foam today (more than usual), boil overs.

-I am new to mashing, but before I dumped mashed wort into kettle, OG for wort was 1.023

-Pre-boil OG (with extract) 8.5 gallons pre boil OG= 1.044

-I ADDED 10oz of DME to the recipe below to make up for the large starter (2L) I was dumping (Didn't have time to crash and decant...Almost .5 gallon of liquid).

-As I am chilling, I realize I forgot to add honey, so I dumpy honey in at 160, figuring it will mix in.

-I only get 3 gallons of wort in fermentor (that's all there was), so I top up to 5.5 gallons with bottled (again, accounting for the 2L starter)

-I mix wort, take gravity reading= 1.042


So- Did I not get conversion from grain? Did I screw up by adding honey at 160? A little of both?

I would think the 3 gallons of wort I got into primary would be super high. This just may be the session IPA I've been TRYING to make, lol.

Thoughts are appreciated.





HOME BREW RECIPE:
Title: "The Decleater"
Author: KR

Brew Method: Partial Mash
Style Name: Imperial IPA
Boil Time: 90 min
Batch Size: 6 gallons (fermentor volume)
Boil Size: 8.5 gallons
Boil Gravity: 1.047
Efficiency: 80% (brew house)

STATS:
Original Gravity: 1.073
Final Gravity: 1.012
ABV (standard): 8.02%
IBU (tinseth): 100.04
SRM (morey): 4.77

FERMENTABLES:
4 lb - American - Pale 2-Row (33.3%)
3 lb - Dry Malt Extract - Extra Light (25%)
3 lb - Dry Malt Extract - Light (25%)
1 lb - American - Vienna (8.3%)
1 lb - Honey - (late addition) (8.3%)

HOPS:
1 oz - Summit, Type: Pellet, AA: 17.5, Use: Boil for 90 min, IBU: 60.99
1 oz - Simcoe, Type: Pellet, AA: 12.1, Use: Boil for 15 min, IBU: 19.56
1 oz - Amarillo, Type: Pellet, AA: 8.7, Use: Boil for 10 min, IBU: 10.28
1 oz - Citra, Type: Pellet, AA: 14.2, Use: Boil for 5 min, IBU: 9.22
1 oz - Simcoe, Type: Pellet, AA: 12.1, Use: Boil for 0 min
1 oz - Amarillo, Type: Pellet, AA: 8.7, Use: Boil for 0 min
1 oz - Citra, Type: Pellet, AA: 14.2, Use: Boil for 0 min
2 oz - Amarillo, Type: Leaf/Whole, AA: 10.7, Use: Dry Hop for 14 days
2 oz - Citra, Type: Leaf/Whole, AA: 11, Use: Dry Hop for 7 days

MASH GUIDELINES:
1) Infusion, Temp: 150 F, Time: 45 min, Amount: 7.5 qt, 4LB 2 Row + 1LB Vienna
2) Sparge, Temp: 160 F, Time: 15 min, Amount: 7.5 qt

OTHER INGREDIENTS:
1 each - Whirfloc, Time: 10 min, Type: Fining, Use: Boil

YEAST:
White Labs - California Ale Yeast WLP001
Starter: Yes
Form: Liquid
Attenuation (custom): 83.3%
Flocculation: Medium
Optimum Temp: 68 - 73 F
Fermentation Temp: 67 F
Pitch Rate: 0.5 (M cells / ml / deg P)



NOTES:

Water:

5 Gallons in Boil Kettle (50% Primo/Distilled)

7.5 qts strike water @ 160 (50% Primo/Distilled)

7.5 qts sparge water @ 170 (50% Primo/Distilled)

Top up to 8.5 gallons with 50/50 water mix.

 

[giraffe]

6 lbs of dme should give you around 1.042 on its own, and then theirs honey. So either, you extracted nothing from your grains (very unlikely, unless you have an exceptionally busted thermometer) Or you didnt actually add 6lbs of dme, or you took you hydrometer reading in hot wort.

Adding the honey at 160, is a sanitation risk, but wouldnt mess up the gravity. Dissolved sugars are dissolved sugars. And Im sure you would notice a blob of honey at the bottom of the pot if it didnt dissolve.

 

[MrEggSandwich]

Yup. Trying to figure out how I went from 8.5 gallons at 1.044 to 3 gallons of 1.042.

 

[giraffe]

Does your hydrometer read plain water correctly? Are you sure you did the readings at around 70F? If you did them at 120F it would be way off. First thing to rule out is a bad measurement.

 

[MrEggSandwich]

Does your hydrometer read plain water correctly? Are you sure you did the readings at around 70F? If you did them at 120F it would be way off. First thing to rule out is a bad measurement.

Took all pre-boil readings with refractometer. Post- boil, I measured sample via refractometer & hydrometer. Both read low 1.040s.

I topped up an absurd amount (2.5 gallons), but that 3 gallons should have had a ton of sugars in it. So, post top-up (5.5 gallons), reading was 1.042.

 

[ong]

I'm guessing your top-off water wasn't completely mixed with the wort when you sampled it. The only other explanation might be that you left a big lump of fermentables in your kettle with the trub, but that seems unlikely.


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[duboman]

I'm guessing your top-off water wasn't completely mixed with the wort when you sampled it. The only other explanation might be that you left a big lump of fermentables in your kettle with the trub, but that seems unlikely.


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My thought as well, very poor mix of top off and wort, either that or the grains weren't crushed, they were crushed weren't they

 

[MrEggSandwich]

Grains were crushed! And I got a sweet wort out of the mash, no doubt.

I aerated the wort with drill attachment, then sampled. Should have been mixed just fine.

 

[boydster]

It often stays stratified a bit still. It's impossible to have a lower gravity post-boil than you started with unless you add more water to the boil than you are boiling off (not what happened, based on what you wrote), and you boiled off a lot from what I can tell. The only reasonable answer is that the top-up water you added post-boil didn't mix well.

Re: adding honey at 160, I see no problem with that. 160 temps will pasteurize the honey very quickly.

 

[BGBC]

NOTES:

Water:
5 Gallons in Boil Kettle (50% Primo/Distilled)
7.5 qts strike water @ 160 (50% Primo/Distilled)
7.5 qts sparge water @ 170 (50% Primo/Distilled)
Top up to 8.5 gallons with 50/50 water mix.

Your preboil SG was low for your anticipated OG, so it's possible you had some efficiency issues in your mash. If your OG after topping up from 3 to 5.5 gal (post-boil) was 1.042, that means the OG of your initial 3 gallons was 1.077, if my math is correct.

You say you had a lot of boil overs. How much do you think you could have lost to boil over? That's the only way I can imagine you would have gone from 8.5 gallons to 3 gallons.

Only other silly question...are you sure you topped up to 8.5 gal after the sparge? That would have meant adding 4.5 gal or so of extra water pre-boil.

 

[MrEggSandwich]

It often stays stratified a bit still. It's impossible to have a lower gravity post-boil than you started with unless you add more water to the boil than you are boiling off (not what happened, based on what you wrote), and you boiled off a lot from what I can tell. The only reasonable answer is that the top-up water you added post-boil didn't mix well.

Re: adding honey at 160, I see no problem with that. 160 temps will pasteurize the honey very quickly.

RE: Honey- That's what I figured, I had the honey in warm water, so it runny. And should have disolved.

 

[MrEggSandwich]

Your preboil SG was low for your anticipated OG, so it's possible you had some efficiency issues in your mash. If your OG after topping up from 3 to 5.5 gal (post-boil) was 1.042, that means the OG of your initial 3 gallons was 1.077, if my math is correct.

You say you had a lot of boil overs. How much do you think you could have lost to boil over? That's the only way I can imagine you would have gone from 8.5 gallons to 3 gallons.

Only other silly question...are you sure you topped up to 8.5 gal after the sparge? That would have meant adding 4.5 gal or so of extra water pre-boil.

Re: Boil overs- Tough to say, mostly foam. I don't think I could have lost 2 gallons, could I?

 

[Ravenshead]

BGBC is on to a problem. You need to figure out how you went from 8.5 gallons to 3. Unless you boiled for 2.5+ hours I don't understand how that could happen without some really serious boil overs.

That said, even if you did boil that long your sugars should still be in the wort so your gravity wouldn't be that far off unless you lost a lot to boil over. I'm guessing you have some measurement issues. Tell us specifically how you measured your volumes and gravities along the way.

 

[beernbourbon]

Re: Boil overs- Tough to say, mostly foam. I don't think I could have lost 2 gallons, could I?

I'm confused..... you are curious about losing 2 gallons, but the math is you really lost 5.5 gallons...... I've had a couple serious boil overs (unattended dumbassery) and left the valve open on the BK when sparging (yet more unattended dumbassery) and in total (yeah same brew.... ) only lost about a gallon, maybe less. Methinks checking your notes would be in order? Or, just chalk it up to WTF? and let it go and drink it when done. Will be beer.

 

[madscientist451]

I'm thinking the problem was in your mash. What was the mash temp after the strike water was added? How long did you stir it? Did you come back and take temp readings and stir the mash? What was the gravity of the first runnings and then the final runnings of the sparge?
Did you batch sparge? Did you stir it? Why only a 45 minute mash?
Don't know if these were the problems, but it could be.

 

[kh54s10]

I think it is a combination of things. How on earth could you go from 8.5 gallons to 3 even if you did have a boil over.

Crush? Were the grains crushed?

Top up water, stratified. Thus a bad reading?

There is so much wrong here (misreadings?) that it is either you have the right results but don't know it, or you might never be able to figure out what happened.

 

[MrEggSandwich]

Thanks for the replies...I'm just gonna chalk it up to a WTF moment. Maybe the boil overs were much worst than I thought...Will check the keggle for leaks.

All I know it: I threw in the 2L starter, and it took off like a rocket ship......had to add a blow off...So, there's a good amount of sugar in there.

 

[beernbourbon]

Hmmmm...... I know you said you checked them but dang, if there's that much sugars in there, maybe the refractometer and/or the hydrometer aren't giving you the correct numbers?


Sent from my BrewPhone using Home Brew, cuz I really didn't want to fire up the computer to post this.