Beersmith strike water temp.

How accurate is beersmith2 at calculating strike water temp? I have seen some OLD articles stating it underestimated the temp. I have my recipe set to adjust the temp based on the temp of the grains and my mash tun.

Beersmith calculated 10.68 qts strike water at 177F. 10 gal mash tun and 8.4lbs of grains, both at 63F. I'm shooting for a mash temp of 157-158F

Does it sound pretty reasonable?

It's been pretty accurate for me. I do BIAB and my brew kettle is my mash tun, so I uncheck "adjust temp for equipment" since the mash tun is heated with the mash water. I also make sure to put in a pretty accurate guess for the grains (I don't measure, but I usually have a good idea what the temp of the part of my basement I store them is).

I usually do try to shoot for 1-2 degrees higher because it's easier for me to drop the temp quickly with a couple ice cubes than to increase the temp. But it's never off more than a couple degrees.

How warm are your grains? Do you pre-heat the mash tun?

My last brew my grains were set at 72 because I forgot to change the temp to 68. My mash tun temp was set to 72 and I don't change it because it is difficult for me to tell. I do throw a gallon of water at 150F in there while my strike water is heating. For medium body, it says 160.7F. I happen to know that it is off for me so I heated the strike water to 170F and once it was all mixed, I was still a little off at 150F. I threw in boiling water until I came to temp. I keep that on hand for these instances.

Even if I change the mash tun temp to 70F and the grain temp to 60F, the strike water is supposed to be 162F. Again, whatever I am doing, I know I need it hotter. In the summer this all changes. I use a single chugger pump to pump my water into my MLT. I keep the pump inside overnight when I know I'm about to brew, however, I realized the other day that I should bring my hoses inside from the garage as well because this may drastically change things.

There are so many factors, but if you start realizing your temps are too high or low, start adjusting your grain and mash tun temp to get to the number you know it should be and continue that process going forward. With seasons, these variables may change as I know they do for me. My garage is warmer in the summer, hot actually, and my ground water comes out at about 170F so heating the mash tun up with that means it is hotter.

Next time you mash in, make sure the grain temp and tun (i'm assuming it's a cooler setup) temp are accurate and use the exact temp water they tell you to. You will of course have to adjust so have some boiling water ready. After mashing in take the temp. Now you know how many degrees it is off from estimated. Say it said to use 165* strike water to get a 150* mash. You followed this and the mash only got up to 145* so you really needed 170* strike. Go into the profile for the mash tun and adjust the specific heat of the tun until the recommended strike temp is 170*. This may not be the best or most accurate way to correct for the temp discrepancy but it will work fine and is easier than having to remember to have your water however many degrees higher than what it says.

Early on I thought the strike water temp calculated in the timer part of a recipe in the mobile version was off as well. I missed my mash temp low the first few times I used it. I started using the tool from the tools menu and saw it gave different results, requiring a higher temp which allowed me to hit the target. My initial thought was to adjust the specific heat. That is when I realized "Adjust Temp for Equipment" was not checked in the default mash profiles I was using. I was using a cooler MLT and it was at room temp. When I made this change the temp was more realistic. There still may be some minor inaccuracies that I need to adjust the specific heat for my setup, but it is much close. This may not be your problems, but from the threads I have seen, I suspect some of the posters may have the same issue I did.

I did check off "adjust for grain and equipment temp"

Its always been fairly accurate for me.