Mash tun too small

Hi All,

My mash tun is a 48qt cooler which has worked extremely well for me to date..
The problem I have is I pretty much maxed out the TUN at 27Lbs of grain @ 1.25/qts H20/Lb.

I am planning on brewing a bigger beer with 33+ LBS of grain, so my question is will I lose efficiency if I thin out the ratio of water to (1-1)? I can always use more sparge water to get the 13 gallons I'm looking for.

I have had some great luck with efficiency and really don't want to compromise, I would rather build a bigger Tun if need be.

Cheers,
Frank

Ya know... I was actually wanting to brew bigger beers myself. While at a beer tasting tonight, a fellow homebrew mentioned something that may work. He suggested using another clean spare cooler. Mashing half of the grains in each cooler. He then said you would drain the first cooler, dump the second coolers contents into the first cooler....drain again, and sparge. I haven't thought about it much since I've had a few drinks, but it just may work.

Interesting idea and I may think about doing that...

I'm still curious if the 1/1 ratio would be less efficient or no change

Thanks,
Frank

I believe there should be no difference in efficiency for using 1/1... your mash will just be thicker raising your chance at a stuck sparge. Some rice hulls thrown into the mash would help against that though.

Generally, a thinner mash will produce higher efficiency. It's a matter of the enzymes being able to get at the starches. Longer mash times will help to compensate for the thicker mash.

Thankis, Thinner mash it is then with a longer mash time...

Longer mash time also means more homebrew to drink .. I like the trade off.

Cheers,
Frank

Homebrewcrazy said:

Thankis, Thinner mash it is then with a longer mash time...

Longer mash time also means more homebrew to drink .. I like the trade off.

Cheers,
Frank

Click to expand...

I like the way you think

I also run into that problem....I mash in a 5 gallon cooler and I find myself always having to double sparge and keep my grain bill under 14lbs