Help

Brewing today. Preboil volume high by .5 gallons and preboil sg low by 5 points.

Any thoughts on how long i should increase my boil?

Toss in some DME!

Thats an option. How much to bump 5

Just boil until you get to your desired volume or gravity…then add your bittering hops.

Assuming 40 gravity points per pound per gallon, .125 pounds per gallon.

~ 8 or 9 oz of DME.  DME has about 45 gravity points/lb/gallon, so 45 points diluted to 5 gallons gives you ~ 9 points for a 5 gallon batch. You need 5 points , so you need right around 1/2 lb of DME.

Thx

As long as it takes.  I simply measure the gravity about 20 min. before what I think will be the end of boil and judge by that.

+1

As you get more and more batches under your belt, you’ll get a good feel for what to expect from your equipment and environment. Lots of variables at play with boil-off.

I use 1 gallon/hour as a general ROT, but a refractometer and experience are the best good bets here.

Didnt have any dme. I ended up doing exactly that. I added 10 mins on the front of the boil prior to my hop schedule. I then checked gravities with my refractometer throughout the boil. 2 questions that came up. Does the gravity change after cooling? Does the volume?

With the added ten minutes I came within 1 point of my desired OG.  Another question, if you add time on the back end doesnt that screw up the hoping on he beer?

All of this came up on this brew cause I just complicated things with a sight glass; trying to pin down volumes, boil off ect…on my equipment.

It really depends on how long you need to add to the boil.  10 minutes won’t make a huge difference.  You just need to add you aroma hops a little later.  If you way over shoot volume, it is better to increase the boil on the front end.

Paul

cooling will change the volume by around 4% (from boiling to ~68)

There will be continued evaporation so that will change the gravity.

I have also noticed that I need to stir the cooled wort to get an accurate chilled wort gravity reading - maybe some stratification occurs or evaporation plays into it, but my readings can vary a couple points if I don’t stir the pot.  Could also be operator error  :o