1st AG Brew: 25th August 2008

dr_bob · Post by **dr_bob** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 5:24 pm

queenaudio wrote:Don't worry about the gravity during a boil, your hydrometer is calibrated somewhere around 22C and at higher temperatures, you need to adjust the reading upwards. e.g 1.044 @ 60C is 1.059 at 20C. There is a formula on here somewhere that will do this for you, or you could get beersmith to do the hardwork for you. Either way, I can guarantee your gravity will be much higher at yeast pitching temperature

G.

Ah, righto! So much to learn, such a tiny brain to hold it all in!

Thanks guys. Did you all worry this much on your first brewdays?

Post by **Jim** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 5:24 pm

dr_bob wrote:
fraserjaxx wrote:Have a beer and reflect on things while your wort is boiling Bob.Like QA has said it would take a mighty FU to ruin things and it looks like you are on the home straight now fella.When this brew is done you will know your kit and be more comfortable next time.Welcome to the darkside !!
Aye, I'm sinking a beer now. I still think this batch is gonna be shot though - the hydrometer reading is now 1000, after half an hour of the boil. Oh well, you live and learn!

Run a small sample off and cool it to 20C, then take a gravity reading. Taking a reading while it's on the boil is meaningless.

pantsmachine · Post by **pantsmachine** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 5:24 pm

If you think you have 7 gallons of wort in there you are in for a long boil to reduce to 5 gallon! You could go down to the supermarket and buy a kilo or 2 of brown sugar and whack it into the boil or it could be that your hydrometers knackered. Don't give up and get it done, it'll taste great in a few weeks! Edit sorry did not realise hydro taken at boil temp. As said by Jim, draw a sample run it under the cold tap to cool and take reading again. Also could do a seperate sample of cold water add sugar shake and take sample to make sure hydrometers working ok.

Grahame · Post by **Grahame** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 5:28 pm

dr_bob wrote:
queenaudio wrote:Don't worry about the gravity during a boil, your hydrometer is calibrated somewhere around 22C and at higher temperatures, you need to adjust the reading upwards. e.g 1.044 @ 60C is 1.059 at 20C. There is a formula on here somewhere that will do this for you, or you could get beersmith to do the hardwork for you. Either way, I can guarantee your gravity will be much higher at yeast pitching temperature

G.
Ah, righto! So much to learn, such a tiny brain to hold it all in!

Thanks guys. Did you all worry this much on your first brewdays?

I had a good two or three brown trousers moments during my first AG, its all part of the fun

G.

dr_bob · Post by **dr_bob** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 5:54 pm

Ok, so, do I:

a) Continue as normal, and add my east kent hops at 6pm, do the last 15 minutes of boil and begin the cooling, or;

b) Boil for longer in the hopes of reducing the volume down from around 7G to 5G? (I measured out the original 5 gallons of water into the boiler at the beginning, and drew a line on the outside of the boiler so I'd not have to measure it out next time) - currently, the boil is about 2 inches above that line....

Grahame · Post by **Grahame** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 5:56 pm

I would collect a sample, run it under the cold tap until its room temp, and check the gravity. If it is anything over 1.040 I would just stop, cool and collect 23L and bin the rest, or put into another FV if you have one.

G.

dr_bob · Post by **dr_bob** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 6:42 pm

I decided to press on with the original plan, and added the hops and finished the boil. At the time - 75 mins into the boil, I didn't have the time to pour some off, cool and take a 20c reading, so I'm just going with the plan for the time being and am chalking things up to experience.

However, I've faced another impasse - the Hop and Grape immersion chiller - even with 7 gallons in the boiler, the chiller barely touches the water when hooked onto the side of the barrel, and suspending it in the middle of the boiler runs the risk of the water connections working loose right in the middle of the wort...

dr_bob · Post by **dr_bob** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 7:51 pm

Well, I'm gonna have to leave this to cool naturally. :/

Stupid me. Oh well.

What a disaster! At least I've learnt a lot, and hopefully next time will be much more straightforward.

Thanks for your help, guys.

Dennis King · Post by **Dennis King** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 7:59 pm

Good emergancy cooler, put the hot wort into the fv and place in a bath of cold water. Change the water a few times.

prolix · Post by **prolix** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:10 pm

dr_bob sounds like a great brew day plenty of things to worry about, you wait 'till it goes well then you'll really worry

Grahame · Post by **Grahame** » Tue Aug 26, 2008 3:05 pm

dr_bob, any update on this? What was your SG at pitching temp? Any activity in the fermenter yet?

G.

dr_bob · Post by **dr_bob** » Tue Aug 26, 2008 3:45 pm

queenaudio wrote:dr_bob, any update on this? What was your SG at pitching temp? Any activity in the fermenter yet?
G.

Ended up leaving it to cool overnight.

I dropped the wort into the FV this morning and pitched the yeast, but I strongly suspect this'll be going down the drain. I'll check on it when I get home from work tonight - if there's signs of life, I'll leave it, if not, well...

The SG at 20c was a lowly 1032 - quite some way off the 1054 the recipe shoots for. You never know - it might pass as Shandy

Grahame · Post by **Grahame** » Tue Aug 26, 2008 4:20 pm

I would give batch sparging a go next time, using the calculator here:
http://jimsbeerkit.co.uk/batch_calculator.html

You wont overshoot the required amount then. For starters I would put:
15% for loss to boil
3L for loss to trub
Measure your dead space in the tun by adding about 5L of water, opening the tap and letting it drain until it stops coming out of the tap, and pouring the remaining water at the bottom of the tun into a measuring jug and add that to the calculator (mine is 1.2L for example)
Use a ratio of 2.5L/Kg

I use that calculator every time and it is spot on.

G.

PS a 1.032 brew isnt too bad, it will still hit around the 3% mark, and best thing is, it will be ready to drink after only 2 weeks in the keg

Barley Water · Post by **Barley Water** » Tue Aug 26, 2008 4:29 pm

Well Dr., I feel your pain as your experience mirrored my first all grain attempt. I remember trying to make an IPA and ended up with a very hoppy bitter. Don't worry, it only gets better from here.

If you are willing to throw a little money in the interest of avoiding this problem in the future, here is what I do and it works out very well. First, purchase a refractometer (maybe $80 US). I like these because they are easy to use, you don't need to mess with temperature correction and you don't pull a big sample, just a couple of drops. Once you collect the required volume at the end of sparging, take a reading. Do the boil for the usual lenght of time (in my case 90 minutes, I do it for all my beers) and take another reading (this one will be your O.G.). You now know the relationship between your initial reading and final gravity due to evaporation and other process losses for say a 90 minute boil. Armed with this knowledge, you should now know at the start of the boil if you are going to hit your gravity or not and you can adjust accordingly before adding any hops. Better living through technology I always say.

youreds91 · Post by **youreds91** » Tue Aug 26, 2008 5:26 pm

Grahame wrote:I would give batch sparging a go next time, using the calculator here:
http://jimsbeerkit.co.uk/batch_calculator.html

I did the batch spage & it worked a treat. Like all techniques on here it took me a while to get my head round it but I got there in the end.
Look out for my next brewday thread this weekend.

CD

Jim's Beer Kit

Practical Homebrewing

HomeBrew Forum

Sponsored by BREW-SCHOOL

1st AG Brew: 25th August 2008