FWH

Beersmith enables me to permanently or otherwise make allowance for first wort hopping in recipes. Well sort of!-see below. I have it permanently set for all defaults.

The recipe I have calls for the mash hopping of Chinook, but I would prefer to go the way of FWH.  How should that Chinook be treated for an alternative FWH addition, given its alpha is 3-4%, suggesting it's a 20 min or less flavour/aroma hop addition?

My interest, per se, is not a change from a 60 min regular boil to a 60 min FWH but for late intentioned FWH additions. The effect there seem to be problematical because apparently BS requires a FWH to always be set for the full boil time, so I'm not sure how it sees a late hop addition. That concerns me!

So, for an intentional 15min, 10 min, 5 min FWH done at lautering, how does BS make the adjustment for those times?

From my understanding, FWH can only be done for the entire boil seeing as how they are added during the lautering process. Brad covers the topic in this article... http://beersmith.com/blog/2008/03/17/the-first-wort-hop-beer-brewing-techniques/ hope this helps some.

I for one have never understood the story about using FWH as the flavoring addition.  The FWH are in there for 90 to 120 minutes and get boiled the full 60 to 90 minutes, so full bittering is extracted from whatever you put in as FWH. 

I do think the 'character' of the bittering is different as many have commented on, but I always do the bittering addition as FWH and do flavor and aroma drops as well.

On blatantly hoppy styles, I add mash hops, and sometimes do FWH and a 60-minute drop just to get the different 'characters' from the various timings and exposures.