20% alcohol beer

whitecastle2779

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hope you're doing will,

is it possible to have 20% alcohol beer!!!.

I just batched my first homemade beer. I used a 7Ib barely syrup with 1Ib malt barley in 20L wort and final volume was 17L.

by using a refractometer, the reading was 14 brix. After a 5 days using safale us-05 , the bubbles in the airlock slow down so I took another readying which was 8 brix according to calculations I should have a 5% alcholo beer however I used another refractometer for measuring alcohol V/V and the readying was 20% alcohol, is this possible or I have done something wrong .is it still good to consume it?.
 
Refractometer doesn't work for attenuated beer. You have to use a hydrometer. I'm sure there are some ways to figure it out, but it's easier to just use a hydrometer for attenuation. There's no way it's 20% alcohol.
I use refractometer just for mashing so I can keep up with conversion during the process. Then I get a hydrometer reading before the boil to check against my refractometer readings and also to confirm gravity for hop additions during the boil.
For Original Gravity (post boil) and FG after fermentation, I rely only on the hydrometer.
 
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Alternately, you can use the refractometer and the correction calculator on this site. All you need is the beer's OG and the refractometer reading.
 
The reason that the refractometer doesn't work when alcohol is present is that the light is refracted differently. I also use a refractometer on brew day, and a hydrometer post fermentation.
 
Refractometer doesn't work for attenuated beer. You have to use a hydrometer. I'm sure there are some ways to figure it out, but it's easier to just use a hydrometer for attenuation. There's no way it's 20% alcohol.
I use refractometer just for mashing so I can keep up with conversion during the process. Then I get a hydrometer reading before the boil to check against my refractometer readings and also to confirm gravity for hop additions during the boil.
For Original Gravity (post boil) and FG after fermentation, I rely only on the hydrometer.


Thanks J A
I will use hydrometer for the next batch.
 
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The reason that the refractometer doesn't work when alcohol is present is that the light is refracted differently. I also use a refractometer on brew day, and a hydrometer post fermentation.

thanks Craigerrr for sharing.
 

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