diluting batches

[tcc]

Sorry if this has been covered already...

I am thinking of brewing a 24L batch of strong (say 1.060) wort and diluting it down to 40L.

Reasons for doing this are my system can't produce more than 24L of wort so I find myself brewing stronger beers as it is a better (or more efficient?) use of my time and money. I figure though if I can scale up my volumes using this technique I can convince myself to get into more sessionable beers...

Does anyone do this? Is there something obvious I am missing or will it be as easy as I think?

Thinking of doing a mild this way and then a low alc saison...

 

[Proffs]

Mate, I was wondering the same thing. I'm about to attempt to clone a holgate IPA on Saturday in a 19L pot. Download brewmate. It's got the calculators you need. http://www.brewmate.net/

 

[stakka82]

I do this sometimes, use boiling water to dilute in cubes. Keep in mind ibu will also be diluted in the same ratio as sg.

 

[Midnight Brew]

BS2 dilution tool calculates 24L of 1.060 wort diluted with 16L = 40L at 1.036 a good level for lower alcohol beers. Other options could be using some malt extract to gain some more gravity points. Or could bite the bullet and make a bigger system to brew larger batches.

 

[verysupple]

Due to the limitations of my system (brew in the kitchen) I always do concentrated brews and dilute them in the FV. I haven't come across any problems in terms of taste/quality. If anything it's been beneficial - if I miss my target gravity it doesn't matter because Isimply adjust my dilution to hit it. As I'm never too far off my target gravity the small difference in final volume (post dilution) doesn't change my target IBUs enough to notice (note that as they are planned as concentrated brews the IBUs are designed to get diluted too).

 

[beerdrinkingbob]

go for it as others say, i would back off the dilution to 1.046 though, nothing wrong with a keg almost full or a couple less bottles for full strength beers.

 

[mash head]

I would try to keep the gravity up around 1040-50 range unless you like light-mid beers.

 

[tcc]

cool guys thanks for the advice

will let you know how it turns out

 

[of mice and gods]

If you're worried about diluting down the IBU's or general hoppiness and haven't taken it into account, wouldn't it be feasible to boil the top up water as a weak wort with some extra hops at this stage, let it cool over night and use the extra malt to naturally carb the keg?

 

[tcc]

here is what im planning on doing;

pre boil and store 16L of water in an empty cube

make up 24L of 1.060 wort with maybe 50 IBUs (calculated with beersmith) and chill

whack it all into 2 fermenters (water and wort) - maybe using 2 different yeasts (nice chance to do a side by side)

so far the only problem I can see is im going to be using more hops - the high grav wort wont extract the IBUs as well

 

[tcc]

well I did this yesterday, now have two fermenters each with 20L of ESB wort, one 1.040 the other (somehow) 1.038....WY1469 and WY1318

problems:

- efficiency (didn't quite accommodate for how much it drops off doing high SG)
- boiling (hard to boil vigorously with this much high gravity wort - have now modded my crown urn so hopefully will get past this)

I got around the efficiency drop off by adding more jaggery, although this just slowed the boil even more...

Looking forward to doing a side by side

 

[pedleyr]

I have a similar issue.

I have been getting shit efficiency of around 60%, doing BIAB. At this stage I wasn't worried about fixing that, more focussed on getting my other processes down, especially while I only brew small (11 litre) batches. I'd just adjust recipes to accommodate.

Yesterday I did a brew, and for the first time in my AG career I indulged in a few brews while I did so.

Without thinking I decided to sparge in a spare bucket. I also was HEAPS more enthusiastic squeezing the bag than I've ever been. Being half pissed no doubt helped me be less worried about the hot grain and wort.

Anyway long story short, target OG of 1.039, ended up with 1.060.

I no chill, and for this brew I deliberately didn't adjust my hopping schedule for no chill so I could have a comparison of the effects of thst: 4g centennial @55m, 4g centennial @35m, 5g cascade @ 20m, 5g cascade @ 5m. Shooting for IBU in the low 20s before no chill adjustments. I will end up with a bit more than this I think.

Whilst I'm happy that I seem to have fixed the efficiency issue (which wasn't really an issue and I've read enough to know that if I asked for tips on that I'd have been told to do almost exactly what I did), I want to dilute it because if I don't it's just going to be over the top for my tastes. But if I dilute it down to 1.039 I'll be adding about 6 litres, which will make the hops pretty hard to detect.

The other option is to dilute it down to 1.049 or so as a half way house, which I may do. Given the extra IBUs from no chill that should still leave me with decent bitterness.

My question though is can I use something similar to the argon method to bitter my top up water to mitigate the effect on IBU? I'd like to end up with something sessionable like the planned brew, if possible.

 

[tcc]

I guess if you are happy with your OG:IBU ratio already, then diluting shouldn't be a problem as it wont change it. Otherwise, it gets tricky...I'm not familiar with the argon method

 

[toncils]

Am I right to understand that adding water after fermenting makes it taste like watered down beer? Adding water before is better?

 

[tcc]

dont think ive ever heard of someone adding water after

if you add water before, you reduce the gravity thus making it easier work for the yeast I imagine

 

[pedleyr]

I guess if you are happy with your OG:IBU ratio already, then diluting shouldn't be a problem as it wont change it. Otherwise, it gets tricky...I'm not familiar with the argon method


The thing is, I'm not happy with the ratio. The hops should be higher as a percentage of the gravity (if you want to put it that way). And I also just realised that I neglected the fact that the higher gravity means that the hop utilisation will be less.

What I'm thinking of doing is a lower gravity higher bitterness batch and blending them. Or just pitching yeast and dealing with a beer that's not exactly what I was after.

 

[MaltyHops]

Am I right to understand that adding water after fermenting makes it taste like watered down beer? Adding water before is better?

As tcc said, adding water before will make it easier on the yeast but with a well made, well balanced beer, you have the right amount of water in it to create a balance between the bitterness level, the sweetness levels and mouthfeel from unfermentable sugars, the flavour. If you simply add water, that will affect all those things depending on how much water you're diluting with and will have much the same effect whether you add before or after fermentation.

But if you add water after, you can try adding different amounts of water and see whether it's better, acceptable or not. Could try pouring 100mL of the fermented beer in a glass then add 20mL of water to it and see whether it's noticeable enough and whether you like the results enough to dilute it by an extra 20% of water, and maybe try other percentages of water to add.

 

[tcc]

The thing is, I'm not happy with the ratio. The hops should be higher as a percentage of the gravity (if you want to put it that way). And I also just realised that I neglected the fact that the higher gravity means that the hop utilisation will be less.

What I'm thinking of doing is a lower gravity higher bitterness batch and blending them. Or just pitching yeast and dealing with a beer that's not exactly what I was after.

have you considered using isohop? personally ive never used it but might be worth looking into perhaps adding some when you bulk prime?

 

[pedleyr]

Hadn't considered isohop, could be a good opportunity to test it out actually!

 

[Yob]

get the Co2 extract if you can..