Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilling

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Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilling

Postby Bundaboy » Thu Sep 15, 2016 7:11 pm

Well, there has been a thread or 2 on hydrometers but none answered the specific question: Is there a hydrometer available scaled specifically for washes intended to be distilled?

I have 2 hydrometers, one intended for beer, and one wine and beer.

Both do the job (just) but both have compressed scales in the area of interest - the final SG.

I recently had what must have been a stalled ferment (my first) but I didn't fully comprehend this until after I had hit the "close enough" button.

Basically it comes down to this, all my other ferments came down to below 1.00 - by how much? buggered if I know because, well, compressed scales and 62 year old eyes, but I have been getting close to the theoretical output for the amount of sugar used.

This "stalled" ferment came down to one paltry graduation above 1.00 - thinking that was close enough (or at least not worth the effort of trying to restart it) I threw it, along with the other 2 ferments, into the boiler.

While it was coming up to temp I decided to calculate the ABV% expecting it to be down 1 or 2% from the theoretical only to find it was not even than 60% of the theoretical!

Darn it I think that would have been worth trying to correct.

Of course in future I will be well aware of this gotcha but it would help if there was a version of the hydrometer that had an expanded scale in the area of interest - I doubt the physics of a hydrometer would allow the linearity of the scale to be different to what it is, so I expect the only solution is an elongated scale with a heavier "ballast" or something.

Does anyone know of such a thing?
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Bundaboy » Thu Sep 15, 2016 7:48 pm

Yah! seniors moment - I meant barely 80%,
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby bluc » Thu Sep 15, 2016 8:01 pm

Good question i dont know why they compress the fg area the way they do. I generally dont use a hydromter, i use the suck it and see aproach :whistle: if it aint bubbling or sticky when allowed to dry on a finger i run it and hope for the best. Generally this method works but I havd had a few failures..
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby rumdidlydum » Thu Sep 15, 2016 8:24 pm

Not sure about that.
But to make your life easier can you mark where your standard fg is, then at a quick glance you can tell if its above or below the norm :think:
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Thu Sep 15, 2016 9:09 pm

Surely, if there is doubt, one could measure/weigh a clear sample of the wash, cook it at a temp below 90C (or whatever is a suitable temp) and when the vapor stops, weigh or measure whats left to determine the ABV?
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby wynnum1 » Fri Sep 16, 2016 5:37 am

You can buy HYDROMETER - FINAL GRAVITY but may be expensive and probably break just as easily .
Precisely read your finishing gravities in beer with this narrow-range, highly accurate hydrometer. The scale range is only .990-1.020, but the individual gradients are extra large allowing for an easy read.
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Fri Sep 16, 2016 7:14 pm

wynnum1 wrote:You can buy HYDROMETER - FINAL GRAVITY


Any specific link/s where to get one, or is it a readily available thing?
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby bluc » Fri Sep 16, 2016 7:17 pm

Check out online brewing shops seems they are common 5sec search revealed 2 aus shops
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Fri Sep 16, 2016 10:16 pm

I agree, HB shops should have what's needed if that range mentioned above is correct, but I have a question about what the wash is consisting of - is there different with start and finish values depending on what the wash is made of?
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby bluc » Fri Sep 16, 2016 10:48 pm

Nope just that on standard hydrometer the the area of the fg is squished up hard to get an exact mesurment of fg. But og is easy, so apparently there is an fg hydrometer were the fg end is stretched out for more accurate reading...
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Sat Sep 17, 2016 3:34 am

Is lightening (less weight) and elongating a hydrometer the answer?
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby warramungas » Sat Sep 17, 2016 6:13 am

Carbonator wrote:Is lightening (less weight) and elongating a hydrometer the answer?

I wouldn't mess with one. Some washes will have a higher final gravity due to the amount of unfermentables in it. Take a mollases wash for a perfect example. Or a heavy Belgian tripel beer wash. Never ferment to 1 or less.
Can still use the hydrometer though. When it doesn't go down over a few consecutive days its as finished as its gunna be.
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Bundaboy » Sun Sep 18, 2016 3:20 pm

wynnum1 wrote:You can buy HYDROMETER - FINAL GRAVITY but may be expensive and probably break just as easily .
Precisely read your finishing gravities in beer with this narrow-range, highly accurate hydrometer. The scale range is only .990-1.020, but the individual gradients are extra large allowing for an easy read.


That looks to be just the shot, thanks.

I don't normally care about the starting sg as I do mostly sugar washes and they seem very consistent compared to theory. The only vagary of a sugar based wash appears to be "has it finished?" and "if not why not?"

I actually don't normally care about final sg either as if it ferments to dry that's close enough, but this time the ferment was obviously not behaving itself and I wanted to know if it had stalled - it had but I should have done the calculations rather than thinking it was "good enough" - I think an expanded scale would have been more likely to give me cause to think (and that's always a good thing ;-)).

Thanks everyone.
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Kenster » Sun Sep 18, 2016 9:21 pm

as has been implied... you can buy them but they are 70 or 80 bucks...from the USA... ebay have them..search Final Gravity Hydrometer...they have heaps.
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Dig Brinker » Mon Sep 19, 2016 12:52 am

Or just take a pic on your phone & expand the photo... works for anything I can't see :handgestures-thumbupleft:
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Mon Sep 19, 2016 8:06 am

warramungas wrote:
Carbonator wrote:Is lightening (less weight) and elongating a hydrometer the answer?

I wouldn't mess with one. Some washes will have a higher final gravity due to the amount of unfermentables in it.


Good point, but it's friggen hard to know when two standard and different shop bought Hydrometers return different results. I'm getting 1000 and 995.
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Sam. » Mon Sep 19, 2016 8:28 am

What do they read in water at 20c? Should be 1.000
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Mon Sep 19, 2016 9:06 am

Sam. wrote:What do they read in water at 20c? Should be 1.000


Yep, it is so obvious, but I didn't think of that - I'll check them now. :oops:
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Sam. » Mon Sep 19, 2016 9:43 am

As long as you know how far out it is it won't matter too much, for your ABV calc you only need the difference between SG and FG.

But yeah would definitely be handy to know for certain when it's 990 :handgestures-thumbupleft:
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Re: Hydrometer specifically for a wash intended for distilli

Postby Carbonator » Mon Sep 19, 2016 4:12 pm

Sadly, I didn't think of measuring SG (OG?), but at the moment, I have steady bubbling and wash (All DEX) is still sweet, but has that ethanol tang to it when I had a taste and spit test.

Just did the controlled test with water at 20C;
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A wee bit of difference, but not as much as when in a wash. The variation is the physical size and weight between the two. The bigger and heavier one seems to be more accurate!
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