Rather low OG

bobbylonghare · Aug 26, 2014

Hi, last night I brewed my first batch of beer after a hiatus a several years. Thought a nice ESB would be a good way back, use DME, some chocolate and crystal grains for color, no fuss. For a 5 gallon batch I used 2 pounds Munton DME amber and 3 pounds Briess Light dry boiled for 60 minutes. My did the house smell good! The OG I measured was only about 1024 at 65F, I was expecting about 1040.
Though maybe my hydrometer was broken but it measured just about 1000 in tap water.
Any thoughts on the apparently low OG?

Thanks
Bobby

Hogarthe · Aug 26, 2014

did you do a smaller boil and add top off water when done? if so you might not have gotten it mixed very well, so most of the heavy wort was at the bottom when you sampled.

bobbylonghare · Aug 26, 2014

Yes, did a 3 gallon boil and added 2 gallons.
Poor mix, that is possible. I strained the boil into the primary, dumped in the cool water I had then had to add a little more from the tap to bring it up to 5gal. Took the OG reading from the top of the liquid. That would probably have been mostly the added tap water. An old memory is stirring that I've made this error before! Need to make a BIG note to self.
I probably didn't do a good job mixing in the yeast either. Hopefully the slogging the fermenter got as I moved it to the basement will take care of that.

Thanks Hogarthe
Now what will be my next batch?

Bobby

Ozarks Mountain Brewery · Aug 26, 2014

I know its not always possible but its best to do a full boil with all the water, you will most always get the correct og, also go through the quick water calculator and don't add any more than it says, boiling not only sterilizes the wort but bonds the sugar to the water, not boiling away the extra water can lead to light and thin tasting beer

and not being mixed up well enough can get an off reading, your probably fine though