Why I am losing so much water in boil?

[Soulshine2]

Turn down your gas when you get a boil. I've cranked mine way down to a "simmer" with no effects. Now I'm pissed I've been wasting gas all these years. I also have a lot more room to drain by bag into the kettle because of less water needed.

This is my "argument" . I don't understand why the boil needs to be violent. If a goal temperature is met ( in this case 212*F) why does it need to pop and spit out of the pot to be effective. I can see and understand a specific minimum time of said boil to hot break .

If you guys think this is a long thread going in argument circles ,you should visit a motorcycle forum and bring up the subject of synthetic vs conventional oil... go ahead, I'll wait.

 

[balrog]

hop isomerization starts at ~170° and is better at 212° so keep it boiling. But I've seen nothing scientific about bubbles covering 25% surface vs 100% surface. I just keep it moving. I want to see movement, rolling, to keep the hop debris moving rather than languishing on the surface. You might get more Maillard reactions with higher heat input (stronger boil) and you'll get more charring of the wort with higher heat input especially if you have thinner pot bottom. But I just keep it moving.

 

[SanPancho]

Who would know a simple question would produce such a complex conversation, lol. Thats the interesting thing I am discovering about this hobby. Sometimes it seems and is so simple, but there are so many layers and complexities to explore if you desire.

hang around here long enough and this discussion will seem positively friendly and civil. its way too easy to over analyze every little thing about brewing, because it touches on so many different concepts: physics, gas laws, microbiology, in- and organic chemistry, statistics, and a bunch of other stuff.

at the end of the day, the best thing you can do is do the reading, learn the basic/underlying concepts, and decide which methods you are going to adopt: all grain, BIAB, herms, LoDo, hot boil, low boil, fast chill, no chill, high pH + high boil for dark beers, low pH + low boil for light beers, etc. etc.

at some point you'll have to compromise, time/effort/money means you cant always do every technique you'd like to perform. so establish a game plan, get your self a system or routine and make a bunch of beer. then drink it. if you're happy with it, great. you're done. if you're unhappy, or if you wanna tweak it a bit then make your changes to process one at a time.

 

[mabrungard]

I thought you wanted a rolling boil to keep the beer from scorching on the bottom of the kettle, and to promote the mixing of the hop pellets throughout the wort, rather than letting them settle to the bottom (where the scorching is taking place).

I start the boil with 7 gallons, and by the time it's boiled, cooled, screened, and in the fermenter, I have ~5.6 gallons remaining. Am I a victim of excessive boiling?

With a light simmer, the wort is moving and circulating within the kettle. The point is that you don't need a volcanic boil to avoid the problems you mention above.

In my opinion, you are likely losing more evaporation than you need to. If you are wanting about 5.5 gal at the end of the boil, you could start with about 6 gal and control the boil intensity and exchange with the open atmosphere to get that loss down to around 10%.