Help! My Porter Has Low Og And I Don't Know Why?

[zarniwoop]

Hi All,

Just finished making my 3rd brew, a porter based roughly on Palmer's Palm O Porter. Ingredients as follows:

Black Rock Unhopped Light LME 1.5Kg

Black Rock Unhopped Amber LME 1.5Kg

Dark Dry DME 0.5Kg

Roasted Barely steeped 0.125Kg

Chinook 11.8% - 60min 20g

Fuggles 5% - 40min 22g

Fuggles 5% - 20min 17g


Plugged it into the kit extract designer spreadsheet and I should have an OG of 1.057 but I just took a measurement and it's 1.044. (20L volume of wort for fermenting)

Process as follows:

Steeped barely in 2L at 63C, added to pot, rinsed in 2L of 70C added to pot, topped up pot to 11L, brought to boil added 500g of DME and 750g of LME to make 1.040, boiled for 1 hour with hop additions, added remaining LME 5 minutes from end to sanitize. Cooled to 40C added to 1C water in fermentor to make total volume up to 20L, took OG fluid to read once the bubbles in tube had settled then added yeast.

I'm sure I'm missing something here but I don't know what? any ideas much appreciated!


Cheers

Zarniwoop

 

[zarniwoop]

OK scratch the above, I just placed my new hydrometer in tap water and it reads 0.94 which means my OG is actually 0.06 higher than I measured so closer to 1.050 which puts it in the porter range, still a bit out from the calcs though.

 

[mwd]

Also don't forget hydrometers are usually calibrated to 20C so if you measured the wort while hot you do not get a true reading

 

[zarniwoop]

Measured at 18C so this shouldn't be a major issue. Thanks anyway

 

[Diggs]

Made my first heavy beer today and only realized whilst doing my og that hydrometer only goes to 1040!

Anything I can do apart from get a better one?

 

[kelbygreen]

zarniwoop, Maybe you didnt extract any sugars out of the grain, although it wouldnt contribute much as its so small. Maybe the brew was not mixed properly, The amounts of the extracts where out or to much water added.


Diggs, Get a better hydrometer forget about OG use the spreadsheet to guess what it was (it used to be very close when I used it) and just go off your FG. Your better to pitch yeast and not know your OG then to wait and risk infection. Get a better hydrometer or refractometer (best thing in the world, spent prob $100 on hydrometers over the years so they pay for them selfs fast)

 

[Diggs]

Cheers kelby, I'm only really concerned with % content so I don't risk anyone getting behind the wheel drunk.

Apart from knowing that does it assist with any other aspects?

 

[kelbygreen]

yes the hydrometer is the only way to tell if the brew is finished. You will have a expected gravity but its not always this is can be lower or higher. I check my gravity after 10 days then again in 3 days if its the same bottle or keg if different check again in 3 more days if its the same then bottle or keg and repeat. But its good practice to leave the beer a while after its finished.

Refractometers are good. You only need 3 drops so use minimal beer, As you are using so small of a amount it takes bugger all to cool down to ambient temps. Down side is that alcohol affects the reading so you need to use a calculator (for eg. beer I have ATM started at 1055, Now its down to 1031 according to the refractometer, Put this into the calculator and it tells me the gravity is infact 1014) so you need the calculator to work out fermenting wort.

 

[Diggs]

Haha! I must have sampled too many tonight. That's exactly what I have been doing. Using gladwrap and testing for 3 days straight of same gravity. I guess the noob might be showing a little