Ok....so I cocked up

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dan2702

dan2702

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well what was meant to be a simple brewday turned into a stressful one at that .
Not having my friends hotplate and SS kettle meant having to use a 10ltr hob cooking pot and my cooker hob. Simple, it won’t matter I said. Firstly, the BIAB recipe I had decided on was a winter ale, 6.8% ABV with OG of 1068.
I calculated the ingredients and off we went. Waiting a good 45mins to get the mash temp right. I checked every 10 mins as the temp was decreasing rapidly so I found myself stuck by the hob turning it on and off. The pot was bigger then the ring so when taking measurements I got different readings in different areas. I mashed for 10 mins longer to extract as much as I could. At the end I used 1ltr of the wort to sparge over the bag. I took a reading at this time and I got 1030.
Moving onto the boil it took 50 mins to get it to a rolling boil and then I added my hops as planned and anything else I decided. I also added in 250gm of dark Belgian candied sugar, why? Who knows by this time I was stressed and not myself and wanted the og higher so guessed this might help. End of boil, transferred to carboy, had about 7 litres so a full carboy and a part one. I forgot to take another OG Reading. So have no idea what it is at. This morning however it is fermenting well, started after about 4hrs and has kept going. Am using Safale US-04 for the first time. I will take an OG Reading from the part filled FV when it finishes fermenting, but I hope it will be higher then 1030, but can I guess or work our the rough ABV knowing I forgot to take it at the end of the boil????
I learnt a lot about preparation and equipment.
And know ever said all brew days were easy. Lol
Any guidance greatly appreciated
 
I think you are going to be somewhat under your target gravity but still have a respectable beer; though it will be thinner in body than you planned for because of the Candi Sugar. I reckon the OG would have been around 1.050. Your problem was your mash & lauter efficiencies. For a 1.068 OG you should have had a pre-boil gravity around 1.049. Big beers need an efficient mash and very thorough sparge to get those sugars out.
 
dan2702 said:
well what was meant to be a simple brewday turned into a stressful one at that .
Not having my friends hotplate and SS kettle meant having to use a 10ltr hob cooking pot and my cooker hob. Simple, it won’t matter I said. Firstly, the BIAB recipe I had decided on was a winter ale, 6.8% ABV with OG of 1068.
I calculated the ingredients and off we went. Waiting a good 45mins to get the mash temp right. I checked every 10 mins as the temp was decreasing rapidly so I found myself stuck by the hob turning it on and off. The pot was bigger then the ring so when taking measurements I got different readings in different areas. I mashed for 10 mins longer to extract as much as I could. At the end I used 1ltr of the wort to sparge over the bag. I took a reading at this time and I got 1030.
Moving onto the boil it took 50 mins to get it to a rolling boil and then I added my hops as planned and anything else I decided. I also added in 250gm of dark Belgian candied sugar, why? Who knows by this time I was stressed and not myself and wanted the og higher so guessed this might help. End of boil, transferred to carboy, had about 7 litres so a full carboy and a part one. I forgot to take another OG Reading. So have no idea what it is at. This morning however it is fermenting well, started after about 4hrs and has kept going. Am using Safale US-04 for the first time. I will take an OG Reading from the part filled FV when it finishes fermenting, but I hope it will be higher then 1030, but can I guess or work our the rough ABV knowing I forgot to take it at the end of the boil????
I learnt a lot about preparation and equipment.
And know ever said all brew days were easy. Lol
Any guidance greatly appreciated
Click to expand...
Did you correct for temperature of the wort when you read it? or cool it?
if not a 65c wort at .030 corrected is about .046 which assuming 10ltr boiled down to 7 gives a new og of 1.066, which is pretty close. however adding that sugar will give about 11 points, so 1.077.
 
Sorry to hear about your woes mate. I'm new to this so frankly I know chuff all about brewing, but I know a think or two about thermodynamics.....

Out of interest, what kind of hob is it, gas, electric etc? Water needs a lot of heat adding to heat it, and a lot of heat removing to cool it. I had some doubts my gas hob could boil 14L water but in the end it got there and was fine.

My technique is to boil or heat as required water in the electric kettle 2L at a time and use my thermometer if I don't want boiling water. Or you can mix boiling and cool water in the appropriate proportions.

This worked fine to get my mash and sparge water to to 65 or 80degC as required. In addition I mashed and sparged in my brew kettle which I can than fit in the oven at the corresponding temperature.
 
Thanks for all the comments. After the boil I just cooked as quickly as possible to 22c,
Then pitched half a packet of US-04 into the carboy and put the airlock on. Santising everything that was likely to come into contact with the beer. It’s still bubbling away in the carboy in the living room...
 
When you took the pre-boil gravity sample that came out at 1.030 was that at mash temperature or did you cool the sample. As @divrack says, if you measured the gravity when It was warm the actual gravity will have been substantial higher. You can get hydrometer correction calculators online, or cool your sample to 20°c which is what most hydrometers are calibrated for.

If you do think that your gravity sample was correct I would check that you stirred the mash really well when you added the grain. In a small pot with a large grain bill it's very easy to get dough balls and if the water can't get to the grain it isn't going to convert the starches to sugar. A large whisk is useful to make sure everything is well stirred.
 
Thanks for the reply. The measurement was taking whilst the mash was still warm, in fact it was taken just after I removed the Brewbag so was still around 65c. I will take another OG Reading from the fermenter once it’s finished doing its thing, still chugging away after 2 full days.
So fingers crossed
 
dan2702 said:
Thanks for the reply. The measurement was taking whilst the mash was still warm, in fact it was taken just after I removed the Brewbag so was still around 65c. I will take another OG Reading from the fermenter once it’s finished doing its thing, still chugging away after 2 full days.
So fingers crossed
Click to expand...
1.030 at 65c should be 1.049 at 20c when adjusted for the higher temperature. With sugar added it will then be higher. The reading at the end will give you FG
 
dan2702 said:
Thanks for the reply. The measurement was taking whilst the mash was still warm, in fact it was taken just after I removed the Brewbag so was still around 65c. I will take another OG Reading from the fermenter once it’s finished doing its thing, still chugging away after 2 full days.
So fingers crossed
Click to expand...
You can't take an og anymore that so has sailed.
As I said it looks like your og was about right, but then you aread sugar which will have taken it up by 11 points.
The sugar won't affect the fg much as it's so fermentable. Your beer will likely be about 1.5 percent abv stronger than you expected
 

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