Want to step up to extract

[daveyk]

been brewing kits for a couple years and want to step up to try some small trials of extract. (I've done this once before which ended in up in 40 bottles of brew heading down the drain). I was going to pick a couple of Graham Wheelers recipes and scale down to say 10 litres.

So here is my plan.... chose a recipe, scale down ingredients to 10l.
Boil in a jam pan on the hob BUT the capacity of this is only 6-7 litres. will this be ok if I then dilute the resulting wort in the FV or do need to tweak hops for utilisation or any thing else?
Grains and hops I will put in a bag, the fish out.
Cool wort with a soon to be built cooler, ferment as normal.....

Any advice?

[danbrew]

A higher OG in the boil will reduce the efficiency of extraction of the bittering component of the hops. It depends which recipe your going for I would say. If your going for a 'bitter' bitter then it'll come out a bit milder. A really high EBU stout and (IMHO) you probably wont notice the difference.

Your knocking about a third off the boil volume so on a fag packet calculation you might want to increase the 90 minute addition by about a quarter. Hope that helps.

Downloading beer engine might help you calculate it for yourself. Alternatively don't worry about it.

[daveyk]

Thanks Beerkiss.... I'm kind of thinking not to worry about it..... been doing that for far too long, hence no plunge yet.

BUT... is there any mileage in holding back some of the DME for the boil.... hopefully to counteract the efficiency loss in the bittering from the hops?

Will this work?

Obviously I'm planning on getting a proper boiler when I then start doing full 5 Gallon brew lengths.

[danbrew]

Good idea. Just make the main boil up in the same proportions as the main recipe then add the rest of the DME after you have switched the heat off. Not sure it's critical to boil the dried stuff. If your using liquid malt extract just do a second boil with it one it's own.

I was also going to suggest hop tea but you'll need something software based to help you with the calculations to get the desired EBU.

EDIT - don't know of that makes sense but yes your on the right lines.

[daveyk]

Thanks for the confidence boost BK.
I think it makes sense.... it certainly makes sense enough to head off to the LHBS for some supplies tomorrow. I'll keep you posted as towards progress.

[monkeyboy]

as somebody who just went from kits to extract, i can tell you that my first extract brew has been extremely rewarding. it's been in a barrel for about a week now, is nearly clear and tastes fantastic. i used beer engine to work out a recipe, loosely based on tim taylor's landlord. not everything went to plan, but the end result is worth it. if it was me, i'd leave the boil length alone, and just add a few more hops to counterbalance the utilisation. none of this is a very exact science in my opinion, and unless you're using exactly the same yeast, it won't taste exactly the same anyway.