Help choose a crush

I'm a recent owner of a Monster Mills MM-2, and I'm trying to figure out the crush setting.

In this picture I've crushed 4 handfuls of grain at 4 different settings. Starting at the bottom and moving counter-clockwise, the gap was as wide as I could get it, then somewhere in between twice, then as small as it can be adjusted. I don't have a set of feelers, so I was just sort of eyeballing this.



The bottom one is definitely too coarse, hardly anything cracked. The smallest gap setting is mostly flour, and most of the husks seem shredded pretty well too, which I gather could lead to a stuck sparge. Not only that, but I haven't motorized this yet, and the smallest setting is pretty hard to crank by hand.

Of the two in-between settings, I brewed this weekend on a crush that was sort of in between the two, and my efficiency was pretty low. I didn't take enough measurements to know for sure where it came from, so until next weekend I'm stuck speculating on possible reasons, and I'm guessing since I just got the mill that the crush could be partly to blame.

I'm thinking somewhere maybe between the two finest crushes in that picture would be a little better, but I'm still pretty new to this, so I thought I'd look for some advice.

I can probably get some closer up pictures if that would help, I didn't realize that uploading here would resize the image so small.

Thanks in advance!

I'd use the one in the round partition, but I'm no expert.

Can I get a close up of the one on the left? It looks nice and fine but I can't tell how intact the husks are... I'd try it anyway. What kind of mash tun do you use?

I like the looks of the round portion as well.

Sorry for the large image sizes, I'm having some amount of trouble getting the on site image hosting to work now, so I had to put them up on photobucket.

Here's the coarsest crush.


Second coarsest.


Second finest.


Finest crush.


This is my mash tun. Simple copper manifold in a 48qt picnic cooler.

I like the finest crush. I've never had any tannins or off flavors from a finer crush, so I wouldnt worry if some of the husks are not intact.

I second the finest crush...a syphon sparge quite interesting...oh and most go slits down on the manifold fwiw.

I would go with the finest crush also. It doesnt like THAT shredded and I've also never experienced tannins or off flavors.

I've never had a stuck sparge happen before, so I guess it couldn't hurt to try the finest setting. I also lauter pretty slowly most of the time. Basically start the siphon and then set the stopcock so barely a trickle is flowing. It usually takes about a half hour or so to get 7 gallons-ish out of there, so that should help. I'm still trying to get the whole process figured out, but I bet I could get away with a bit of powder.


And RE: my mash tun:

The manifold isn't soldered together on the ends, so turning the slits down wouldn't be an issue, save for the tube with the output on it, which could only be turned halfway.

And I built the it with a siphon based on what How to Brew suggested. Is there a better way to do that? I thought about going out the drain spout on the end of the cooler, but it was a bit more work, and my plumbing know-how is pretty limited. Plus doing it this way lets me use the cooler for legitimate cooling purposes if for some reason I should happen to need to do that.

I got my first stuck sparge last week with a fine crush like the one you have pitctured. Not to scare you off from it, I was trying to get it as fine as possible, and I think I found the boundry. Next time I will back the crush setting it off slightly and all should be good. Good luck.

I still like the second finest crush. Just my $.02

I like the round portion, but you said you ground twice? I think if you adjusted somewhere between that crush and your finest you'd be golden.

Search the forum for malt conditioning and use your finest setting. You will be amazed at how much different your crush will be.

I would use the finest setting you have shown there. With a manifold of that size you should be fine with single batches and double batches will just be slow. Your efficiency will improve if you go with the finer crush, and I haven't seen any tannin flavors in my brews with a crush near to that.

Also as mentioned before, once you get everything soldered, make sure to put the slits down, your efficiency will improve. It was pretty drastic for me after I flipped mine over.

I have a manifold similar in size to yours and I brewed a double porter a few weeks ago with 21# of grain in a cooler similar to that, and the sparge was slow, but nothing stuck.

samc said:

Search the forum for malt conditioning and use your finest setting. You will be amazed at how much different your crush will be.

Click to expand...

Seconded. Fine crush with malt conditioning works really well.

Well, last time I brewed I used a crush somewhere in the middle of the middle two shown here, so I'll try a finer crush next time. Malt conditioning looks like it should be pretty doable as well, I may have to try that at some point too.

IXVolt said:

Also as mentioned before, once you get everything soldered, make sure to put the slits down, your efficiency will improve. It was pretty drastic for me after I flipped mine over.

Click to expand...

How drastic are we talking here? A couple percent of efficiency, or like 10%? I wouldn't have thought that just flipping the tubes over would have made much of a difference at all, but I'll give it a shot.


Thanks for all the advice so far!

When you flip them over it reduces dead space in the MLT... so you leave less wort behind in the mash tun. Fill it up with water that let it empty and see how much liquid if left in the MLT; then flip the manifold and try again, there should be a lot less liquid left behind.

Have you tried wet milling the grain set at .030? I have my barley crusher setup like this with excellent results.

Go to the auto parts store and buy a set of feeler gauges. You want to make sure your gas is even side to side as well. I like the finest setting you have shown, and would also suggest trying the malt conditioning. It does make a huge difference if you have the time.
BTW I found it's easier to wet the grain if I do it in a bucket, and tilt the bucket on a 45 and spray while rotating the bucket. The grain mixes itself while I spray, much less workout for my arms and hands.

Learn how to condition the malt before crushing it.

I use a 7 gallon bucket and spray 10ml warm water/pound of grain.

It is a process that can take up to an hour to get it just right. But, try to work in the mist slowly where the husk absorbs the spray where the insides stay all crispy-crispy.


Other than that.... I like the crush on the middle circle thing.

StAnthonyB said:

I use a 7 gallon bucket and spray 10ml warm water/pound of grain.

It is a process that can take up to an hour to get it just right. But, try to work in the mist slowly where the husk absorbs the spray where the insides stay all crispy-crispy.

Click to expand...

Yikes. It only takes me about 10 minutes. I have a spray bottle with oz markings. I start with it filled up to 10 oz and add however much I need to condition the malt (3-4 oz for 2% of the grain bill by weight).

I place the measured grain in one Homer bucket and scoop the grain into an empty bucket. With each scoop, I mist the grains I just scooped in with 3-4 squirts from the spray bottle.

I just scoop and spray until I'm back down to 10 oz in my spray bottle. It usually takes 2-3 transfers bucket to bucket but by the time I'm done it's well mixed and I let it sit for at least 20 minutes before I crush.

Conditioning and crushing is all done by the time my strike water is heated up.

spinning a bucket of grain at a ~45˚ angle (sit it on angle in another bucket or pot) I can spray the grain down in about 5 minutes, I wait 20-30 minutes and then grind away. The grain will feel leathery and there will be very little dust.

Put a batch of grain through this last night. I tried to get it to look like the smallest sample from above there, but the rollers are nearly touching at that setting and it became damn near impossible to crank. To put a handful through is no problem. Putting 12ish lbs through it turns out to be a different story all together. So, I backed it off just a little bit, think I still ended up with a pretty good crush, definitely finer than the first time I used the mill.

Funny thing is, last time, at the end of the sparge, there was a thin layer of goo over the top of the grainbed, which I figured was flour that had settled out on top there. This time I definitely crushed finer, but that thin layer of goo didn't happen.

Anyway, here's what the crush looked like, not a great picture, I know, but it's all I really have. Does that look fine enough? If it isn't, I'm going to have to invest in a motor, because I just don't have the torque to put a big grain bill through at the finest possible settings.

You will want a motor unless you have popeye arms, or want them. I use a heavy duty geared drill. That looks fine enough to me. Since you spent the dough on a quality mill, you really should get a feeler gauge set at the auto parts store. They aren't that expensive, and you want to know the gap for repeatability (it will change over time) and to keep the rollers aligned so that the mill will last a long time.
That Goo on the surface is protein, totally normal.

EvilGnome6 said:

Yikes. It only takes me about 10 minutes. I have a spray bottle with oz markings. I start with it filled up to 10 oz and add however much I need to condition the malt (3-4 oz for 2% of the grain bill by weight).

I place the measured grain in one Homer bucket and scoop the grain into an empty bucket. With each scoop, I mist the grains I just scooped in with 3-4 squirts from the spray bottle.

I just scoop and spray until I'm back down to 10 oz in my spray bottle. It usually takes 2-3 transfers bucket to bucket but by the time I'm done it's well mixed and I let it sit for at least 20 minutes before I crush.

Conditioning and crushing is all done by the time my strike water is heated up.

Click to expand...

+1 on the conditioning

I do it with even less attention. I have my grain in white 5 gal pail and lightly sprinkle h2o directly on with a salad sprayer. I then vigorously turn it over by hand to evenly distribute the moisture. I repeat this a few times and then let is sit for 15 min.

I'm amazed as to how fine I can set my mill and still keep the hulls intact.