What Should I Shoot for In Primary

[BrewVol]

I'm pretty new to, from what I can tell, is the absolute best hobby ever. I've done a few batches, and have yet to get a full five gallons after bottling. The last brew I got about 4.5. This is function of not only boil off, but not wanting to rack up the trub.

I brewed up this weekend, and used the BrewPal app on my iPhone to get my calculations down. That app, by the way, is amazing. It told me to sparge nearly a gallon more than I would have, left to my own devices (total mashing amount 7.7 gallons, 3.7 mash and 4 sparge). When I racked to the primary after cool down, I noticed I had right around 5.5 gallons in the bucket. This seems great, as I think all finally hit my 5 gallon mark, after fermentation. My only worry is watered down beer. I'd prefer 4 gallons of legit stuff, to 5 gallons of swill, obviously. I know this all depends on what Kind of beer I'm brewing, and that I should stop worrying. But I blame the hobby for my new found OCD.

It was Yooper's Rogue DGA clone recipe.

Put my mind at ease fellow beerpersons.

 

[slowbie]

Did you get the correct gravity of wort in the fermenter? If your OG is what you were shooting for the beer won't be watered down. If it's too low then you would need to calculate your efficiency and adjust the calculations that BrewPal is doing accordingly to get the proper amount of grain.

 

[BrewVol]

Did you get the correct gravity of wort in the fermenter? If your OG is what you were shooting for the beer won't be watered down. If it's too low then you would need to calculate your efficiency and adjust the calculations that BrewPal is doing accordingly to get the proper amount of grain.

OG was supposed to be 1.058, it came in at 1.056.

 

[slowbie]

OG was supposed to be 1.058, it came in at 1.056.

Sounds like you'll come out with great beer.

 

[brewmonk]

try a sip, and next time add an extra pound or two of grain if you want, hey it's YOUR beer.

sounds like you hit the numbers, though.

 

[Yooper]

My recipes are always for 5 gallons in the fermenter, so you may end up with less beer. I know that some people scale up their recipes, so they end up with 5.5 gallons in the fermenter and 5 finished gallons. Either works, but if you're wanting more beer in the end, you'll need to increase the ingredients slightly and scale up the recipe for whatever batch size you want to do.

 

[BrewVol]

My recipes are always for 5 gallons in the fermenter, so you may end up with less beer. I know that some people scale up their recipes, so they end up with 5.5 gallons in the fermenter and 5 finished gallons. Either works, but if you're wanting more beer in the end, you'll need to increase the ingredients slightly and scale up the recipe for whatever batch size you want to do.

Actually, I increased the grain from your recipe just slightly, to account for this. I just didn't want to ruin beer to just make more of it.

 

[Yooper]

Actually, I increased the grain from your recipe just slightly, to account for this. I just didn't want to ruin beer to just make more of it.

It's hard to ruin beer, trust me! I've done everything from dropping a screwdriver into a batch to forgetting to put water in the airlock. A few pounds of grain won't ruin the beer!

That recipe is almost impossible to screw up, but what I would do is scale up all the grains to keep the % the same. Now, it's not important at all when talking about .25 of a gallon, but if you want to scale up to 5.5 gallons, or 5.75 gallons, it's easy to just increase all of the grains keeping the % the same of each. (It's especially easy with software- my crutch to avoid math!)

 

[BrewVol]

I like doing the clones, especially now at my beginning stages. It gives me an immediate scale to compare how well my brews are coming out. Not that i expect them to taste identical, but I know when I'm getting close, or if i've totally missed the mark.

Also, to have 5 gallons of RDGA (sort of) for 25 bucks, as opposed to 11.99 a sixer at EarthFare seems way too economical not to brew it.