AG and lowering Gravity??

[mickeyt69]

Hi

Probably a simple question but i have recently done my first allgrain brew and it came out at around 1048 how would i lower the gravity for a weaker brew as to sparge more would lead to me dropping too below 1010 and possibly extracting tannins and lead to a bad brew. Is it just a matter of adding more water to the boil? Any help advice apreciated thanks in advance

Mick

 

[jamesb]

Use less grain!

Let's say for arguments sake your grain bill was

4.5kg Pale Malt
0.5 kg Crystal

and that gave you a gravity of 1050. To reduce that to 1042 you would

4.5 + 0.5 = 100% of your grain bill.

100 / 50 * 42 = 0.84

4.5kg * 0.84 = 3.78 kg of Pale
0.5 * 0.84 = 0.42 kg of Crystal

Alternatively, some of the software tools can do it for you.

Or you could just add water.

Don't forget to account for your hop bitterness.

 

[mickeyt69]

Thanks for the reply i was under the impression that a smaller grain bill would just give me a shorter brewlength as i would finnish sparging quicker anyway what ama i thinking about lowering the alcohol for :rofl: :drink:

 

[craigite]

One of my favourite brews is about 3%. I have a lower grain bill, 3.06kg, and I aim for a low efficiency of about 70%, by not sparging more than 11 litres. I have enough water treated and heated for sparging to give me the 12 litters or so to put into the boiler to fill it to the 30 litre mark. After the boil I end up with about 23 litres.