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Braggot gravity calculations


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#1 Fatman

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Posted 25 August 2011 - 11:26 AM

I'm gonna amp up the honey in the Liquid Stupid recipe and turn it into a Braggot. I'm guessing I'll use somewhere around 10 lbs. of honey, which should be about a gallon. When I'm calculating my target O.G., do I assume the honey will completely dissolve into the wort, or do I figure on a extra gallon of volume in the calculation?

#2 MtnBrewer

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Posted 25 August 2011 - 11:52 AM

I'm gonna amp up the honey in the Liquid Stupid recipe and turn it into a Braggot. I'm guessing I'll use somewhere around 10 lbs. of honey, which should be about a gallon. When I'm calculating my target O.G., do I assume the honey will completely dissolve into the wort, or do I figure on a extra gallon of volume in the calculation?

I wouldn't calculate OG at all. I'd decide what I want the OG to be and then add honey until I get to that point. To answer your question, the honey will add nearly a gallon to your volume. Look in the FAQ section and there's a handy spreadsheet that will help.

#3 Fatman

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Posted 05 October 2011 - 04:01 PM

I wouldn't calculate OG at all. I'd decide what I want the OG to be and then add honey until I get to that point. To answer your question, the honey will add nearly a gallon to your volume. Look in the FAQ section and there's a handy spreadsheet that will help.

I pitched the beer wort on an ale yeast cake and added 3lbs of honey a day for 4 days starting on day 3 of fermentation. There was something on the BN somewhere about making beer yeast eat the maltose before it gets the honey. Doing that prevented me from controlling the OG with the honey. I had 4 gal of 1.080 wort, and 1 gal (12 lbs) of honey at about 1.320 (right?) so my OG would be (1.080 * 4 + 1.320) / 5 = 1.128?I just took an FG - 1.002! So the ABV is about 16.5%?? Probably not to be drank anytime soon, then.

#4 EWW

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Posted 05 October 2011 - 06:22 PM

Your honey addition alone would contribute 1.084 to a 5 gallon finished batch. Starting OG for the whole beer would be around 1.164 (if there isn't a layer of unfermented honey at the bottom). 1.164 to 1.002 would give you around 22% abv. Beer yeasts shouldn't go that high. My bet is the honey wasn't mixed enough and it'll be sitting at the bottom of the fermenter...hard to guess what you have.

#5 Fatman

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Posted 06 October 2011 - 05:10 AM

Your honey addition alone would contribute 1.084 to a 5 gallon finished batch. Starting OG for the whole beer would be around 1.164 (if there isn't a layer of unfermented honey at the bottom). 1.164 to 1.002 would give you around 22% abv. Beer yeasts shouldn't go that high. My bet is the honey wasn't mixed enough and it'll be sitting at the bottom of the fermenter...hard to guess what you have.

I think the 1.164 number assumes that the honey adds no additional volume to 5 gal of 1.080 wort and dissolves perfectly. I had 4 gal of 1.080 and am figuring that the honey doesn't dissolve at all to give me 5 gal. How much does the honey dissolve? By looking at the carboy, I would guess not much, but I don't really know. The yeast cake was a big serving of Cal ale (WLP001) a couple generations in, fermented at about 72 ambient. It started chewing on the 1.080 an hour or two after pitching, and I think adding the honey later, in steps would give me a real good chance to get a big number with this big, mature, warm pitch, even with a beer yeast. However, I think a stirring may be in order, though I don't want to introduce a bunch of oxygen at this point. How sensitive are braggots to O2?

#6 EWW

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Posted 06 October 2011 - 05:27 AM

The honey does add volume. If you have 4 gallons of liquid and add 1 gallon of liquid honey you're going to end up with 5 gallons total.Cali has an alcohol tollerance around 12% IIRC. Gradual feeding could up this some, but I doubt you'd get into the 20+% range.Try swirling the carboy and take a reading. If the honey is sitting on the bottom the sg will raise some. Don't overdo the stirring the introduction of O2 at this stage is an issue.Don't know what else to tell you at this point...maybe someone else will chime in

#7 MtnBrewer

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Posted 06 October 2011 - 09:58 AM

I pitched the beer wort on an ale yeast cake and added 3lbs of honey a day for 4 days starting on day 3 of fermentation. There was something on the BN somewhere about making beer yeast eat the maltose before it gets the honey. Doing that prevented me from controlling the OG with the honey.

Actually, no. You can still figure out what the effective OG was via the spreadsheet. The only difference is that you added the honey gradually. The same amount of honey went in as if you had added it all at once so the spreadsheet calculations should still work.


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