Final volume into fermenter always off

[ancientbrewer]

I use beersmith3 mobile now. My volumes are always short (stronger beer is fine by me!)

But I would like to be consistent especially for brewing a successful beer over and over. I think my problem is my equipment set up.

I try to brew 5 gallon batches using a 5 gallon round cooler, fitted with a stainless steel bazooka screen. I pretty much manage to get all available wort out of the mash tun.

For the boil I use two 5 gallon aluminum pots with fitting lids. At mash out I put the lids on and allow wort to cool by itself. Hop pellets go directly into the wort.

My primary fermenter is a 7 gallon bucket with lid and airlock. Into fermenter I do not filter the beer.

Secondary fermenter is 6 gallon bucket with spigot.

Looking for help setting up equipment profile.

Thx

 

[Big Monk]

I use beersmith3 mobile now. My volumes are always short (stronger beer is fine by me!)

But I would like to be consistent especially for brewing a successful beer over and over. I think my problem is my equipment set up.

I try to brew 5 gallon batches using a 5 gallon round cooler, fitted with a stainless steel bazooka screen. I pretty much manage to get all available wort out of the mash tun.

For the boil I use two 5 gallon aluminum pots with fitting lids. At mash out I put the lids on and allow wort to cool by itself. Hop pellets go directly into the wort.

My primary fermenter is a 7 gallon bucket with lid and airlock. Into fermenter I do not filter the beer.

Secondary fermenter is 6 gallon bucket with spigot.

Looking for help setting up equipment profile.

Thx

Trying going from end to beginning, i.e. determine what volume you need in the fermenter and add all your measured losses stage by stage to back track to strike volume.

This is the way I track in my excel sheets:

Post-boil Volume = Fermenter Volume + Kettle losses + Kettle Deadspace

Pre-Boil Volume = Post-Boil Volume + Boil-off

Strike Volume = (Pre-boil Volume + Absorption + MLT Deadspace) - Sparge Volume

Then enter all these values in your equipment profile.

 

[day_trippr]

Hitting predicted volumes in BS requires solid equipment and mash profiles . It needs to account for all losses from strike to fermentor otherwise you're just going to get frustrated.

So have you started one yet? BS comes with a number of canned profiles that the user can copy then customize. In your case given the two five gallon pots with a 5 gallon cooler I think I'd start with the "All Grain - Standard 5 Gal/19l Batch - Cooler" profile then adjust the post-mash items to cover the two pots. Ie the Boil Off, Loss to Trub and Chiller, etc, needs to cover the total losses at each phase.

You'll need to calculate your actual mash and boil and transfer losses - you can't just pull those numbers out of a canned profile and expect repeatable results, especially when using twin kettles. So keep accurate notes over each of the next brew days and keep tweaking your profiles...

Cheers!

 

[ancientbrewer]

Rpi Scotty and day trippr. T

Thx for quick response. I think I will need to measure but will start by doubling my boil off rate. It all points to the two pots. I think that will get me there.

Thx again guys!!!