Doh!

[asciibaron]

long story short - i have 4 gallons instead of 5 in my fermentor that has been fermenting since friday the 4th. what should i do?

[YamahaXS]

nothing!

you will have a strong beer. probably a bit sweeter/maltier than you would other wise. but it should be enjoyable.

oh, don't bottle until your FG readings have leveled out. Allow extra time for the secondary ferment.

[paul84043]

That ought to be very interesting...let us know how it comes out.

I was reading a kit for barleywine on (I think) Northernbrewer.com, they recommended cutting the recipe back to 4 gallons to acheive a O.G. of 1.100!!!!
That baby would knock you on your butt!!!

[asciibaron]

i have recieve much input on this matter and finally decided to add about a gallon of water to the fermentor.

i first boiled a gallon for 15 minutes to make damn sure it was free of crap. next, i cooled the water to 70F. i then gently added the water to the fermentor to minimize any aeration.

my first thoughts were to just leave it, but i really want to know how the beer is supposed to taste. if the 4 gallon batch is stronger, i would not be able to gauge the beer.

i'll check the fementor tonight for signs that it is still fermenting. sunday i'll take a gravity reading and go from there.

[paul84043]

It should be fine as far as sanitation goes, the only drawbacks that I could see would be adding a bunch of oxygen with the water after the formation of alchol has begun, this will oxidize existing alcohol and could potentially lower your overall content or possibly dull the flavor a bit, it all depends on how long it's been going and how much oxygen was removed from the water while boiling. Have you taken a gravity reading to try to figure out how much fermentation had occurred yet?

Ultimately I think I would have left it alone, but I would wager that your beer is still going to turn out great.

[asciibaron]

i was very tempted to not mess with it, but...

the heavy fermentation has finished and it is entering into the conditioning phase now - adding cooled boiled water should not harm the yeast. i added the water very slowly by tilting the fermentor and pouring the water down the side. i could see bubbles, but i'm thinking that was CO2.

no matter what happens it will turn out better than 85% of the commerical beers. :D

[Tweek]

this also depends on how you lost the water. If you lost it in a boil over or spillage, then adding water is only going to, for lack of a better word, water it down.

If it was just never there to begin with adding water should be fine. It is a bit strange to do it after ferment has started but should work.

[BucksBrew]

My first batch came out at 4.5 gallons. I did what you did, only I added it I think prior to pitching yeast.

The first time I measured everyting perfectly! haha Now I round up by the quart!

You have evaporation, plus fluid in the trub you don't want to siphon out in primary AND secondary fermentors.

My concern was I read that you don't want to much priming sugar and not having at least 5 gallons of beer to bottle. (over carbonation issues)

I'm the proud owner of 3 batches so far!

[paul84043]

I usually boil 4 gallons of water when I start a batch, with 4 gallons pre boiled and cool.
By the time I'm finished cooking, it's typically down to at least 2.5 gallons. Sometimes less.
I strain it into the fermentor, top up with brewing water to about 5.25 gallons to allow for all the solids that are in the beer, and losses during transfer if you're transferring.

Typically I will end up with just shy of 5 gallons if I'm careful.