I don't know about most brewers, but one thing I seem to miss on occasions is the correct mash and sparge water volumes. I know what they should be, but due to a lack of attention and the fact that few measuring jugs are accurate, I tend to overshoot.
This weekend I was aiming for a final volume of 21 litres at 1.069. I actually expected the gravity to be higher as I had a few grain bags that had a little more than the required weight, so rather than save small amounts I chucked it all in.
I tend to shift water from the HLC to the mash tun using a jug. I always vow I'll buy a child's abacus and screw it to the brew stand so I can keep a tally of the number of jugs gone in. On Saturday I was doing the typical "is this 7 or 8?" and figured I'd best assume the lower number. I was thinking about monkeys, so it's easy to get distracted...
The end result was 32 litres at 1.050. Okay, it's not what I was aiming for, but I'm not too disheartened.
I'm trying to come up with a better way of checking water volumes, and as a metric thinker I'm guessing the best way is to weight the water from the HLC, unless anyone has a better plan (that doesn't involve calibrated flow meters)!
This weekend I was aiming for a final volume of 21 litres at 1.069. I actually expected the gravity to be higher as I had a few grain bags that had a little more than the required weight, so rather than save small amounts I chucked it all in.
I tend to shift water from the HLC to the mash tun using a jug. I always vow I'll buy a child's abacus and screw it to the brew stand so I can keep a tally of the number of jugs gone in. On Saturday I was doing the typical "is this 7 or 8?" and figured I'd best assume the lower number. I was thinking about monkeys, so it's easy to get distracted...
The end result was 32 litres at 1.050. Okay, it's not what I was aiming for, but I'm not too disheartened.
I'm trying to come up with a better way of checking water volumes, and as a metric thinker I'm guessing the best way is to weight the water from the HLC, unless anyone has a better plan (that doesn't involve calibrated flow meters)!