DME conversion

[gnemesis]

Most recipes call for LME - how do I determine how much DME to use instead?

[Beer Martin]

Most recipes call for LME - how do I determine how much DME to use instead?

The 20-20-20 rule of thumb says that you would use 20 % less DME than LME.

It figures there's 20% more malt sugars in DME in place of water over the LME.

The other 20 is converting LME and mashed grain. I think it's use 20 % less LME than base grain to convert all grain to extract recipes.

Grab one of the brew softwares and you can get a good idea on gravities from ingredients. They are promash (http://www.promash.com/) and beersmith (http://www.beersmith.com/). Both are great programs and they are fairly cheap. Grab the free trials from their sites and see which one you like better. Apart from personal preference theres really not a lot of difference in terms of which is better.
________
MEDICAL MARIJUANA PATIENT (http://mmjp.org)

[beerking]

Don't know where you get 20%, Beermartin, but LME is 10% heavier than DME for the same amount of sugar. That is why LME comes in 3.3# cans, but you use 3# of DME to replace. LME is 10% water.
The example Palmer gives on page 35 of his 3rd edition backs this up: "5 lbs of DME having 40 pts/lb/gal, or 5.5 lbs of LME having 36 pts/lb/gal."
(I cannot find this sidebar online.)

[Beer Martin]

Don't know where you get 20%, Beermartin, but LME is 10% heavier than DME for the same amount of sugar. That is why LME comes in 3.3# cans, but you use 3# of DME to replace. LME is 10% water.
The example Palmer gives on page 35 of his 3rd edition backs this up: "5 lbs of DME having 40 pts/lb/gal, or 5.5 lbs of LME having 36 pts/lb/gal."
(I cannot find this sidebar online.)

I dont know where I heard it, but use 20% less DME than LME, and 20% less LME than grain

I only use DME to make up for mash efficiency on big beers, but I thought I'd share something I've heard before.

I'd certainly recomend using the brew software over a rule of thumb.
________
Pontiac Assembly (http://www.chevy-wiki.com/wiki/Pontiac_Assembly)

[beerking]

I dont know where I heard it, but use 20% less DME than LME, and 20% less LME than grain

I only use DME to make up for mash efficiency on big beers, but I thought I'd share something I've heard before.

I'd certainly recomend using the brew software over a rule of thumb.

Well, the correct figure is 10%, not 20% (although I have never done the calculations (or seen them) for LME to grain).

+1 on the software recommendation.

[Beer Martin]

Well, the correct figure is 10%, not 20% (although I have never done the calculations (or seen them) for LME to grain).

+1 on the software recommendation.

Yeah, that makes more sense. I'll just revise what I heard to the 10-10-10 rule of thumb. I'm not really sure why there is a third number...

I should drink less and sleep more.
________
VOLCANO VAPORIZER (http://www.vaporshop.com/volcano-vaporizer.html)

[BrewDog]

I've always used 36 pppg for LME and 44 pppg for DME as basic round estimates. This will vary a couple points up or down by brand, but those numbers usually result in a pretty accurate estimation.

For base grain, I use 35 pppg * my system's extraction efficiency to get the correct value. Again, the actual value will depend on the actual grains used, but that's a decent starting point.

At 70% efficiency, 10 lbs of 35pppg in 5 gallons gives you a 1.050 wort.
It scales up and down nicely - 15 lbs gives a 1.075, 8 lbs gives 1.040.
These are nice round numbers to remember if you ever need to calculate these values in your head and/or by hand (ie, on a BJCP exam).

36/44 = 0.81818181818 => use 82% of the weight when going from LME to DME
44/36 = 1.22222222222 => use 122% of the weight when going from DME to LME