Splitting 5gal batches in half

[Romex2121]

Would someone PLZ explain how to take a 5 gal recipie and make it a 2.5 gal recipie that would have the same ABV , IBU , etc etc ?
Im finding 5 gal is to much at one time for me especially when its not good ..
Ive been reading on how to do this but theres so many different opinions im going crazy and its getting very frustrating....
Is it as simple as splitting the grains , hops water volumes and such right down the middle and this will get me the same beer as if i had started with 5 gallons just smaller ??
Ive tryed playing with the calculators that are supposed to figure this kinda stuff out but not having much luck .......

 

[Dgallo]

Just like baking a half batch of your favorite cookies or brownies. You can simply use a proportion and scale the recipe down to 1/2 the amounts of all the grains and ibus.

 

[jveruin]

I think the answer is “mostly yes”, you can split everything and it will be pretty close.

If you are brewing all grain, you may have to adjust a few things after learning about your system. An example... If I do a half batch, my grain bed will be much more shallow. It’s possible that my efficiency will rise and OG might be slightly higher than expected.

If one wants to really get detailed, there may be more scientific differences, but the resulting beer may not really taste that different.

I wouldn’t sweat over the advice. Try it and see what you think.

 

[Tobor_8thMan]

Believe most brewing software can scale a recipe any way desired.

 

[kevin58]

If you get in the habit of figuring your recipe ingredients in percentages in addition to weight you can easily scale any recipe to any size. Simply cutting your weights in half will not result in what you are aiming for but halving the percentages will.

 

[day_trippr]

Ummm...

 

[Dgallo]

If you get in the habit of figuring your recipe ingredients in percentages in addition to weight you can easily scale any recipe to any size. Simply cutting your weights in half will not result in what you are aiming for but halving the percentages will.

Halving the percentages would make the numbers add up. He wants to take a 5gallon batch and make it a 2.5 gallon batch. Here a simple example 10lb of 2row is 80% of a 5 gallon batch. Now he only wants his beer to be 2.5 gallons so he is cutting his total volume in half. By cutting the 2row in half and only using 5lb this time would be the correct thing to because with the halved volume and halved amount of 2row the 5lb of 2row would be 80% of this grain bill

Your theory would be taking the 80% 2row and halving the percent would drop it to 40% would bring it to 5 lbs in a 5 gallon batch or 2.5 lbs in a 2.5 gallon batch which the numbers don’t jive

 

[kevin58]

Halving the percentages would make the numbers add up. He wants to take a 5gallon batch and make it a 2.5 gallon batch. Here a simple example 10lb of 2row is 80% of a 5 gallon batch. Now he only wants his beer to be 2.5 gallons so he is cutting his total volume in half. By cutting the 2row in half and only using 5lb this time would be the correct thing to because with the halved volume and halved amount of 2row the 5lb of 2row would be 80% of this grain bill

Your theory would be taking the 80% 2row and halving the percent would drop it to 40% would bring it to 5 lbs in a 5 gallon batch or 2.5 lbs in a 2.5 gallon batch which the numbers don’t jive

My bad. I didn't mean to half the percentage. You reduce the weights but keep the percentages from the original.

 

[Romex2121]

Thanks for the help ,, I think i found out why Brewers Friend wasn't working for me ,,, I didnt sighn up for the free trial ,,, once i did alot more options opened up and i was able to take a posted recipe (Biermunchers Centennial Blonde) and play with it to get a feel of how the program works , i was able to scale from 5 gal. to 2.5 gal. ( or more ) And also adjust ABV and IBU of selected recipie .
I will be buying the year long membership i also like how you can select buy and all the ingredients are right there ready to go..
Ill need to play around with it a little more to get my set up dialed in but this is going to be a BIG help and relive a lot of frustration from trying to scale recipies that work better for my needs ......