Mayday, mayday, OG of 1.020, how can this be?

Yeah definitely get in the habit of always taking the following measurements if you want to lock your system in which allows for proper recipe formulation:

total #'s of grain

strike water volume
preboil volume
(the difference between those two should equal your grain absorpotion loss when taking your total pounds of grain into account)

preboil gravity
(helps you calculate your mash extraction efficiency when taking your grain bill size and preboil volume into account)

post boil volume
(the difference between it and the preboil volume helps you calculate your boil rate when taking your boil length into account)

post boil gravity
(usually dependent on your preboil gravity and boil off rate)

volume into the fermenter
(difference between your post boil volume and this is your combined "cooling loss", "kettle hop absorption loss" and "transfer loss", which helps you calculate your brewhouse efficiency)

 

I disagree that it biab sucks. I have been limited to 1-2.5 gallon batched for the last year and biab has been my savoir. It's only a couple bucks to make up the loss in efficiency when it's such a small batch. Although this statement is neither here nor there for the OP.

 

The Northern Brewer BIAB kits are meant for three gallon batches.

 

BAM! Here's the answer

 

Fair enough. Was hopping this solved your problem because 1020 seems insanely low I wouldn't even know what the cause was. How many BIAB batches have you done so far? I'm sorry if you've already answered this...

 

The way I look at it is as follows:

If the mash extraction was correct, then...

1. A higher boil off rate would have yielded a higher OG than expected.
2. Topping that post boil volume off with water to reach the originally intended post boil volume should have resulted in the correct OG.

Since he got a lower OG than expected (with the right post boil volume), the issue clearly can't be due to boil off rate and is probably due to a poor mash extraction. Poor mash extraction is usually due to a poor crush (especially when brewing BIAB).

Plus, as somebody else previously mentioned, BIAB typically gets lower mash extraction efficiency (usually 10% lower) than other forms of all grain brewing to begin with. So if the recipe kit wasn't formulated for BIAB, it probably didn't have enough grain in it to hit the target OG via BIAB.

Starting down 10% on grain and getting very poor mash extraction efficiency (due to a poor crush or NO CRUSH as may be the case here) could result in an 1.020 OG.

 

Low ambient pressure will decrease the boiling point, high ambient will raise it.
At 10,000 ft. Water boils at 193.2 F - Leadville CO.
At -1300 ft. It will boil at about 214 F. - Dead Sea.
Then there is what you get in a pressure cooker, about 230F when I saw a cereal mash done in one.

Agree on that addition of dissolved solids.

 

Makes sense. But I have much faith in Northern Brewer and don't think they would set up a kit that would be so easy to mess up. I would think with above that it is maybe possible the grain wasn't crushed at all.

OP- Maybe send an email to NB with this issue and see what they have to say about it.

 

The only thing I'm thinking though is if the grain wasn't crushed at all, would it even be possible to hit a 1.020 OG? Can a small amount of sugar be extracted from the grain despite it not being milled at all? I doubt it.

With all that being said, I think this situation is due to:

1. Kit not being formulated for the 10% lower mash extraction BIAB typically gets
2. Poor crush (I doubt the grain was unmilled) yielding in poor mash extraction*

* ph (and possibly water mineral content) could play a small role in lowering the mash extraction too, but I doubt they could solely account for the 1.020 OG in this case.

 

Somebody FUed...uncrushed grain has to be the problem...with minimum wage unsupervised workers being the root cause : )

 

Northern Brewer does sell the kits as all-grain UNcrushed if you order it that way...pardon my indictment of Northern Brewer junior personnel...boil up some extract (your call on how much, but I'd guess 2/3 of the amount for their all extract kit), cool it and add it to your fermentor. Any part of homebrewing can be the weak link...including the ordering process.

 

You can try making a mead by adding a mass amount of honey in your fermenter.
A combination of maple syrup, table sugar/brown sugar can also help.
Bear in mind, it will probably not taste like beer if you go this route...
http://www.beer-wine.com/learning/how-adjust-specific-gravity
You can also try blending your 1.020 brew with a high gravity 1.075+ beer...
Just remember, any options you do, the beer beer will not taste like it originally was intended.

 

Hoppy mead, hmm interesting idea.

OP like others pointed out your grain was not crushed. You can pick up a corona mill for 15-20$ and make a mash tun while you are at it. Then start buying ingredients in bulk. You will be able to brew at will. You will feel all powerful and awesome and for good reason.

One more thing you can do with this batch is to just treat it like a giant starter and harvest the yeast for future batches.

 

There are places below sea level in this world.