In the market for a refractometer. I’ve seen them range in price from $20 to $60. Is there a big difference in accuracy with the cheap ones?
Any recommendations?
I do not own one but in my limited research (as I am in the market for one as well) typically the cheaper ones only read in brix so you have to do the conversions yourself as opposed to the more expensive ones that have brix & SG.
I have really only looked at my LHBS and one or two places online but that does seem to be the theme I have seen.
I just bought this one for $32:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AOCKWMU/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
It reads in both gravity and brix. I’ve only used it once but it’s square with my hydrometer.
I just bought one a few months ago. I only handled one once prior to buying one. I have crappy eyes, and the one I played with the first time was scaled 0-35 Brix I could not see the scale too good. I tried to focus the eye piece, but I still could not read it accurately. I bought a Vee Gee with the scale 0-20 Brix, I can see that scale a lot better. Most beers I brew will not have that high of a SG. When I make a beer that has real high SG, I can still use the hydrometer to get a SG, then use the refractometer for the FG. MHO, the Vee Gee is a solid piece of equipment. You can tell when you handle it. I will not say it is any better than others only because I haven’t had any experience using refractometers, but I am we’ll satisfied with the one I bought. Mine was $90.00. Did I wast my money? I don’t think so. But you have to stay with in your budget when buying equipment. What I really like about using a refractometer is the fact it only takes a few drops of wort to get a reading and you can use it easily during the brewing process. There are conversion tables you can use to convert Brix numbers with alcohol present in your beer to final gravity.
Unrelated question…
So I’m new to using refractometers, but I understand that you cannot reliably use one once fermentation has started. And that the presence of alcohol skews the readings.
Do you guys just switch to a hydrometer once fermentation has started? Or do you use some sort of refractometer correction calculation?
[quote=“Chris-P”]Unrelated question…
So I’m new to using refractometers, but I understand that you cannot reliably use one once fermentation has started. And that the presence of alcohol skews the readings.
Do you guys just switch to a hydrometer once fermentation has started? Or do you use some sort of refractometer correction calculation?[/quote]
There are calculators out there that will work if you keep track of all your gravities. I normally switch over to my hydrometer once it has fermented though. Mainly because I like to taste what’s going on at the end of fermentation 
As for refractometers… I picked one up off ebay (0-32 brix ATC) for under $30 and it’s been great for years. It does only measure in brix but that’s not really a probablem if that’s all you’ve ever had :lol:
This:
http://seanterrill.com/2012/01/06/refra ... alculator/Sean worked very hard on making it accurate. IIRC, it loses accuracy at the far ends (very light gravities and very large gravities), but very accurate for the bulk of homebrews.
New refractometer user here… Dead Ringer clone is in secondary; when I racked from primary after 9 days, I took refractometer readings below:
OG: 1.057
Racking Gravity: 1.027
Using the web calculators listed I got these corrected gravities:
1.011
1.008
http://onebeer.net/refractometer.shtml
Having sprinkled the packet of Safale US-05 directly into primary and fermenting at 60-62*F, I am wondering whether the beer has really progressed that far already, or if I am missing something about using the calculators to correct my readings. Your help would be most welcome! 
[quote=“tallcoldone”] I am wondering whether the beer has really progressed that far already, or if I am missing something about using the calculators to correct my readings.[/quote]Totally reasonable for US-05.
