Questions after second all grain batch

FuriousE said:

Hey all,

Just finished my second all grain batch. Its the Petite Saison D'ete from Norther Brewer. Recipe is as follows:

4.5 lbs Belgian Pilsner
2.75 lbs German Vienna
.75 lbs Torrefied Wheat
1 oz UK Kent Goldings (60 min)
.25 oz Styrian Goldings (Celia) (10 min)
.25 oz Saaz (10 min)
.75 oz Styrian Goldings (Celia) 2 min
.75 oz Saaz (2 min)

I did close to this recipe - very nice!
I think everything went well. I collected 6.75 gallons at 1.036 pre boil. I have a couple of questions:

1) I mashed 11 Quarts at 165 degrees. My target mash temperature was 150. I measured it at 147. Is this a big deal? How can I adjust Beersmith to take into account what actually happened?

You need to adjust your water temperature to get the mash temperature you need. Also put some 140 - 180 degree water in the tun to pre-heat it. You can also add some really hot water or ice cold water to adjust your temperature. The less the better. Due to the lower temperature you will get a slightly drier beer than intended. Not a really big deal.

2) I was expecting .5 gallons boil off per hour (according to Beersmith). I actually experienced about 2 gallons per hour. I have a shorter, wider kettle vs a higher, narrower kettle. I assume this is why? Does 2 gallons per hour seem like a lot? I measured after cooling...

I get about 2 gallons boil off in an hour. I collect a little over 7 gallons for a little over 5 going into the fermenter.

3) Assuming I keep boiling off at 2 gallons per hour, would you recommend sparging more and boiling the full volume to get to my target at the end, or topping up at the end of the boil (which is what I did this time).

I would only top up after checking your OG. If it is high = top up. If it is not I would leave it alone. Best would be to work on your boil off rate and you should not have to top up.

4) When transferring from my boil kettle to my fermenter, should I be looking to leave all the hops behind? I used pellet hops. Should I put them in a bag to make this easier? Or should I just transfer them to my fermenter and not worry about it (which is what I did).

I bag my hops in a 5 gallon paint strainer bag, clipped to the rim, so that I don't get too much into the fermenter. You can let them settle while cooling, whirlpool or just not worry about them. They will settle in the fermenter, but you will lose some volume.

After my boil, I had 4.75 gallons, so I added another .75 gallons to get to 5.5 and measured an OG of 1.042, for a measured efficiency of 79.8%. I think this will turn out really well, and I am very excited to drink it!

I don't recall the recipe's OG, but I think with the low mash temperature you will get a slightly drier beer. It should be very good.

Thanks in advance for any help.

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RM-MN said:

I think that if you are boiling off 2 gallons in an hour you are probably boiling too vigorously. Turn the heat down until you have a slow rolling boil and see what you get. With my turkey fryer pot (tall and narrow) I can limit the boil off to about half a gallon.

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Paradingbull said:

You are fine. Shorter wider pots tend have more boil off volume, so you can learn and adjust for future batches. If you are batch sparging I highly recommend looking up the Denny Conn method. It takes so much stress out of the all grain brewing process.

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RM-MN said:

I think that if you are boiling off 2 gallons in an hour you are probably boiling too vigorously. Turn the heat down until you have a slow rolling boil and see what you get. With my turkey fryer pot (tall and narrow) I can limit the boil off to about half a gallon.

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FuriousE said:

Thanks for the replies so far, all! In terms of the boil off volume, now that I know what it is, I can adjust for it up front by adding more water.

In terms of hitting the mash temperature - Beersmith tole me to add 11 quarts of water at 165 degrees. Since I did this but missed my target by 3 degrees, is it as simple as adding water at 168?

What if I was adding more grain? Would I need to increase the temperature more than 3 degrees?

Is there a way to tell Beersmith my actual results so it can correct for my equipment in the future?

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LandoLincoln said:

Yes, it's as simple as adding water at 168. You have to tailor it to your system. My rig loses ~17° from HLT after transferring to the MLT and stirring thoroughly, so I just add 17° to my target mash temp.

No, typically you do not have to add more heat when you add more grains, since you're adding more water which adds more thermal mass.

I suppose there is a way to tell Beersmith to adjust accordingly, but I just always know to add 17° to my target mash temp, so I don't really depend on Beersmith for that anymore.

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Paradingbull said:

You are fine. Shorter wider pots tend have more boil off volume, so you can learn and adjust for future batches. If you are batch sparging I highly recommend looking up the Denny Conn method. It takes so much stress out of the all grain brewing process.

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1) I mashed 11 Quarts at 165 degrees. My target mash temperature was 150. I measured it at 147. Is this a big deal? How can I adjust Beersmith to take into account what actually happened?

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mgortel said:

First off make sure in your recipe you had the check box on the mash page to "Adjust Temp for Equip".


Now if you had that clicked.....go to your recipe you used in Beersmith and change the mash target temp to 147 F...which is what you actually measured. Now you need to go into your Equipment Profile that you used for the recipe and adjust the mash tun weight until the strike water temperature matches what you actually used......you will have to go back and forth a few times probably by trial and error. Once you do this......your equipment in Beersmith will now be calibrated to your actual equipment.

Also remember that you will need to enter the correct grain temperature and mash tun temperature on the Mash page the day of the brew session. I stick my thermometer into my grain bag and read a temp after it settles. For my mash tun I like to fill it with water and let it set for 15 minutes or so....take the temp of the water...and that is the temp of the mash tun to enter....dump out the water just before you are ready to do your mash so that the cooler is at the temperature your calcs are based on when you dump in your strike water and grains.

Now just for fun you can go back into recipe and change your target mash temp to 150F,......and you will see what your strike water temp should have been....not to mention you will be very close now in future...I am usually right on

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muels said:

Beer smith will also tell you how much boiling water (or cold water) to add if you miss your target temp. There are some nice calculators in there.

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FuriousE said:

Roger that. I'll be brewing this upcoming Friday. I'm doing a Russian Imperial Stout.

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