What's the most effective thing for shortening a brew day?

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jevers

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I just got done with another 6+ hour brew day, and I'm wondering what i need to buy or build next in order to cut down on the time spent. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy brewing and it's delicious results, but there comes a point when you have to make things more efficient.

I'm currently doing all grain, batch sparging, chilling with an immersion chiller, and gravity draining from the keggle into the fermenter. It seems like a lot of the time is eaten up lautering, chilling, and draining the keggle.

So what was your best upgrade at this point?

P.S., this time is in addition to me grinding all my grain and collecting all my water the night before.
 
I can't imagine it taking very long to chill or to drain the keggle. To speed chilling, make sure you move/stir the wort around the chiller and make sure the water for chilling is as cold as possible. Keep a good flow of water into the chiller, for faster chilling.

Lautering for batch sparging takes less than 10 minutes, so I can't imagine that being slow, either.

Can you type out a rough timeline, so we can see what's going on?

Like this:

Bring water to strike temp- 20 minutes
mash- 60 minutes
etc.
 
Collecting water from night before would lengthen my brewday. I collect hot water from hot water heater the day of. Shorten's my time to get to strike temp.
 
Grains, hops, water ready the night before. When I stared using a counter flow chiller that knocked off a solid 15 minutes as well.
 
How long does it take to get a boil going?
The size of the burner you use could be an issue.
Once my mash is set, I might weigh out my additions for my boil, then have a beer.
I start this sparge water when the mash is getting close to done so that its done in time, but I don't have to run the burner to hold the temperature for a long time.
I'm not sure where you can save a lot of time after that. The mash needs as much time as it needs, your boil is for a pre determined amount of time.
 
Newmanwell said:
Grains, hops, water ready the night before.
Click to expand...

This is a big one. Other little things like washing equipment during mash or in between hop additions helps. I scoop spent grain from the mash tun right next to the kettle so I can watch for boil overs and be ready for 60 min addition as soon as I see the boil. I also start heating my sparge water as soon as I mash in.
 
Yooper said:
I can't imagine it taking very long to chill or to drain the keggle. To speed chilling, make sure you move/stir the wort around the chiller and make sure the water for chilling is as cold as possible. Keep a good flow of water into the chiller, for faster chilling.

Lautering for batch sparging takes less than 10 minutes, so I can't imagine that being slow, either.

Can you type out a rough timeline, so we can see what's going on?

Like this:

Bring water to strike temp- 20 minutes
mash- 60 minutes
etc.
Click to expand...

This was all for a ten gallon batch

Bring water to strike temp- 30-40 minutes on stove inside (saving some propane...)

Mash-60 minutes

Lautering-this seems pretty slow, I would guess on my time here to be approximately 30-45 minutes, it was draining really slowly. Maybe add some rice hulls to make it drain faster? Beersmith did say that I got 80% efficiency, so my crush may be too fine.

Bring to boil-probably 20-30 minutes. The banjo burner really gets after it.

Boil-60 minutes

Chilling-40-45 minutes or so. I haven't measured the temp of my incoming water, but it's probably fairly warm (maybe a prechiller?). I am constantly moving the chiller around and stirring the wort. I use a 50' "ribcage" chiller.

Draining into fermenter- 35-45 minutes. I used whole hops today and used a SS scrubber on my pickup tube to filter them out. It was draining pretty slowly.

Moving fermenters, pitching, cleanup-60 minutes

Probably doesn't add up, but I started at 8 AM and finished around 3 PM. I also didn't time heating up my sparge water correctly, so that added about 15 minutes.
 
Newmanwell said:
Grains, hops, water ready the night before. When I stared using a counter flow chiller that knocked off a solid 15 minutes as well.
Click to expand...

Water ready the night before?
I use hot tap water to start. It saves little time getting the water temperature.
I do make sure the grain is up to room temperature by setting it out the night before. When I get my mill and start milling at home I'm a pre weigh them so that brew day goes faster.
 
Make sure you are prepping for the next step whenever there is a period where you are waiting.

When waiting for strike water to heat, get everything ready for the mash.
When mashing, get everything ready for the boil.
When boiling clean up and get ready for transfer to the fermenter.

That is about the best that can be done without spending tons on special equipment.

I'm waiting for the BIAB responses!
 
jevers said:
This was all for a ten gallon batch

Bring water to strike temp- 30-40 minutes on stove inside (saving some propane...)

Mash-60 minutes

Lautering-this seems pretty slow, I would guess on my time here to be approximately 30-45 minutes, it was draining really slowly. Maybe add some rice hulls to make it drain faster? Beersmith did say that I got 80% efficiency, so my crush may be too fine.

Bring to boil-probably 20-30 minutes. The banjo burner really gets after it.

Boil-60 minutes

Chilling-40-45 minutes or so. I haven't measured the temp of my incoming water, but it's probably fairly warm (maybe a prechiller?). I am constantly moving the chiller around and stirring the wort. I use a 50' "ribcage" chiller.

Draining into fermenter- 35-45 minutes. I used whole hops today and used a SS scrubber on my pickup tube to filter them out. It was draining pretty slowly.

Moving fermenters, pitching, cleanup-60 minutes

Probably doesn't add up, but I started at 8 AM and finished around 3 PM. I also didn't time heating up my sparge water correctly, so that added about 15 minutes.
Click to expand...

Ok, a couple questions, then! One is, you said you're batch sparging. If you're batch sparging, you add the sparge water and stir like you mean it, then vorlauf and drain. If it's "draining slow" and you have the valve wide open, then that is a big issue. It should totally drain in less than 5-7 minutes.

The incoming water for the chiller is a big factor- if your water is warm, it just won't chill effectively. You could definitely consider a pre-chiller if the water temperature isn't cold enough. In the summer, my water temperature is in the 60s and it takes longer for me to chill than in the winter when my tap water is in the 40s!
 
A pre-chiller will probably cut about 30 minutes off of your cooling time. It makes a big difference when you have warm tap/ground water.
 
Yooper said:
Ok, a couple questions, then! One is, you said you're batch sparging. If you're batch sparging, you add the sparge water and stir like you mean it, then vorlauf and drain. If it's "draining slow" and you have the valve wide open, then that is a big issue. It should totally drain in less than 5-7 minutes.

The incoming water for the chiller is a big factor- if your water is warm, it just won't chill effectively. You could definitely consider a pre-chiller if the water temperature isn't cold enough. In the summer, my water temperature is in the 60s and it takes longer for me to chill than in the winter when my tap water is in the 40s!
Click to expand...

Ok, what do you recommend for speeding up the lautering? Rice hulls, coarser crush? The prechiller might be a good investment. I was considering making a counter flow chiller from my current IC, so that may be pretty easy to do.

I'm not sure that the tap water here ever gets really cold.
 
BIAB can save you a few minutes but even better (although it technically doesn't save any time) is don't do everything in 1 six hour time block. I get everything set up friday night. at 8am saturday I fill the kettle and bring to strike temp, mash in and then let it sit all morning while I do other things. At noon, I'll pull the bag and boil the wort, when its done I'll just throw the lid on and leave it sit the whole afternoon while I do something else (sometimes I'll put in an icebath, other times put the chiller in and just leave it on the burner hot) In the evening, I'll hook up the chiller and cool to pitch temp, rack to a fermenter and fill everything with PBW to soak over night. Sunday morning its just a quick spray off and everything is done. The only session that takes more than an hour is the boil but I can usually lauter and 90minute boil within 2hrs. In terms of ideal process, a 4 hour mash isn't ideal (the FG is always lower than expected) and not chilling immediately could lead to dms issues depending on the recipe. But it allows me to brew AG batches on weekends that I would never have time to dedicate a 6 hour time block to.
 
I've done a lot of management of staff and processes, and it's held true for all the years I've done it that usually the best way to cut down on task time is to be highly organized.

After only two brew days so far, I can tell you it works the same way with the brewing. Brew 2 went much faster than brew 1.
 
jevers said:
Ok, what do you recommend for speeding up the lautering? Rice hulls, coarser crush? The prechiller might be a good investment. I was considering making a counter flow chiller from my current IC, so that may be pretty easy to do.

I'm not sure that the tap water here ever gets really cold.
Click to expand...

I see that you're in GA- you're right, the tap water probably never gets very cold! I'm not sure what other brewers do in the south, but even if you got a CFC or a plate chiller, your tap water probably needs a prechiller or you could try recirculating ice water instead of water from the tap.

A courser crush isn't probably the issue, but I'm not sure what is. Do you open the ball valve wide open, and the wort trickles out? Do you have a piece of tubing on the "out" of the ball valve? It's important to use tubing, as it will help siphon the wort out of the mashtun.

Another thing that is helpful is to put your runnings on the boil right out of the MLT. That means it comes up to a boil much faster, and by the time you're done sparging you'd be at a boil.
 
Getting my blichmann top tier shaved hours off. No more complicated dangerous stacking set ups, better burners boil and heat sparge water faster. All and all just keeps things more organized. Im self employed so time is at a premium, shaving hours off more than paid for the top tier.
 
gbx said:
BIAB can save you a few minutes but even better (although it technically doesn't save any time) is don't do everything in 1 six hour time block. I get everything set up friday night. at 8am saturday I fill the kettle and bring to strike temp, mash in and then let it sit all morning while I do other things. At noon, I'll pull the bag and boil the wort, when its done I'll just throw the lid on and leave it sit the whole afternoon while I do something else (sometimes I'll put in an icebath, other times put the chiller in and just leave it on the burner hot) In the evening, I'll hook up the chiller and cool to pitch temp, rack to a fermenter and fill everything with PBW to soak over night. Sunday morning its just a quick spray off and everything is done. The only session that takes more than an hour is the boil but I can usually lauter and 90minute boil within 2hrs. In terms of ideal process, a 4 hour mash isn't ideal (the FG is always lower than expected) and not chilling immediately could lead to dms issues depending on the recipe. But it allows me to brew AG batches on weekends that I would never have time to dedicate a 6 hour time block to.
Click to expand...

I like the idea of BIAB but I'm not sure I'd go for it as I already have all the equipment for a standard setup, and I'm not really a fan of spreading everything out over three days.
 
Yooper said:
I see that you're in GA- you're right, the tap water probably never gets very cold! I'm not sure what other brewers do in the south, but even if you got a CFC or a plate chiller, your tap water probably needs a prechiller or you could try recirculating ice water instead of water from the tap.

A courser crush isn't probably the issue, but I'm not sure what is. Do you open the ball valve wide open, and the wort trickles out? Do you have a piece of tubing on the "out" of the ball valve? It's important to use tubing, as it will help siphon the wort out of the mashtun.

Another thing that is helpful is to put your runnings on the boil right out of the MLT. That means it comes up to a boil much faster, and by the time you're done sparging you'd be at a boil.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the ball valve is wide open and I do have about 16" of tubing on the outlet to create a siphon. I was draining into the BK with the burner on but had to cut the flame back because it was already about to boil before the sparge was half done. Probably cut it back too much though.

My MLT is a 10 gallon cooler with a SS braid. I know that a lot of other people use this, so I doubt the equipment is an issue.
 
Yooper said:
I see that you're in GA- you're right, the tap water probably never gets very cold! I'm not sure what other brewers do in the south, but even if you got a CFC or a plate chiller, your tap water probably needs a prechiller or you could try recirculating ice water instead of water from the tap.
Click to expand...

I'm on the AR/LA line. It took me ~20 minutes to chill my 5 gallon batch two weeks ago with a 3/8" 25' immersion chiller. That's with me constantly "stirring" with the chiller and prechiller to make sure I get the best heat transfer possible. Haha it's kinda exhausting. I plan to build a CFC soon so at least I can switch arms when one gets tired. Another idea my buddy and I have been kicking around is to pack a bottling bucket full of ice and then run tap water into the airlock hole and out the spigot. That way we can get much closer to 32 F water going into the chiller.
 
How much of a height difference is there between your MLT and what your draining it into? Do you open the top while draining?
 
coolharry said:
How much of a height difference is there between your MLT and what your draining it into? Do you open the top while draining?
Click to expand...

Bottom of MLT is about 3 ft off the ground, with a piece of 16" tubing hanging down off the spigot. Yeah the top is open so it's not trying to pull a vacuum or anything.
 
I live farther south. A pre-chiller is a huge time saver. My tap water is 80* in the summer and I run 50 feet of garden hose across my yard in the hot sun to my chiller. I use a 25' 3/8" pre chiller in a cooler full of ice and an a 50' 3/8" wort chiller. I cool 5 gallons to 65* in 12 minutes. You have to make sure that you keep both chillers moving for good heat exchange.
 
It seems like you have a lot of time spent getting the wort from the mash tun to the BK, and a lot of time getting it from the BK to the fermenter. Are you doing a double batch sparge? Also are you trying to keep all the hops from the fermenter? I use a cooler mash tun with a bazooka screen and it usually only takes a quart or two of wort for it to clear and set the grain bed. It runs to the BK at full speed till it drains with no problems. I usually open the ball valve only 1/2 way while I vourlauf then open it to full. Max time 10 minutes to drain to BK on first half. Maybe 15 minutes on second runnings. I Have my diptube on my BK angled to the sidewall of the keggle so I can create a whirlpool with my mash paddle while I drain to fermenter. It is no more than 10 minutes to fill Fermenter. I think cooling is definately a time issue for you as well. I have the luxury of barely above freezing groundwater which will take me from boil to 80 in about 15 minutes using a 50 ft 1/2 inch IC. A prechiller may be the way you have to go in GA, but the time from tun to BK and from BK to fermenter are way too long.
 
45_70sharps said:
Water ready the night before?
I use hot tap water to start. It saves little time getting the water temperature.
I do make sure the grain is up to room temperature by setting it out the night before. When I get my mill and start milling at home I'm a pre weigh them so that brew day goes faster.
Click to expand...

Yea... I turn the burner on my mash water as soon as I wake up. I kinda don't count mash water heating in my brew time cause I am busy eating breakfast, coffee, head...
 
I always make sure everything is clean and where it needs to be. I HATE cleaning during the brewing process or wasting time looking for something.
 
Why are you heating up your strike water inside to save on propane? If you need 4-6 gallons I can't imagine a normal kitchen stove being able to heat that in a reasonable amount of time.
 
I'm surprised people are using hot water from the hot water heater. I won't even make spaghetti noodles from hot water heater water.

My brew days consistently take 5-6 hours. There might be room to tighten that up, but I just relax or do something else during the dead time if I'm all prepped for the next step.
 
Switch to extract brewing

Use hot water from the house tap

If you have an icemaker in your fridge, use the entire box of ice as your cooling agent on the wort. You can cool 5 gallons to 100 degrees in about 60 seconds.

I make a 5 gallon batch of heavy ale in about 2.5 hours start to finish.
 
I average around a 6 hour brew day in my apartment.

I multitask while mashing .. do the dishes, keg or bottle, and I always end up changing around my hop additions.

Also, I started using an XL grain bag in my mash tun to minimize cleanup. Works great!
 
Brew with extract...just kidding. Brewing is fun and enjoyable for me so I don't worry about the time. Other then staging everything the night before and having a efficient chiller your all grain brew day is going to take more then 4hrs no matter what. Oh we'll just gives me more time to drink homebrew.
 
Brew day for me is around 5hrs +/-. Using water from hot water tank might not be a great idea as might give off off flavours depending on how old your tank is. It pretty much takes as long as it takes, besides, I'm doing something I enjoy.
 
Gixxer said:
Yea... I turn the burner on my mash water as soon as I wake up. I kinda don't count mash water heating in my brew time cause I am busy eating breakfast, coffee, head...
Click to expand...

This.

My stove doesn't have a problem getting my strike water to temp in the time it takes for me to do my normal morning routine.

I guess I just need to figure out why it takes me so long to drain the MLT and the BK. Also I'm pretty sure that a pre-chiller build is in my immediate future.
 
I live in Tucson, so my tap water in the summer is 90 degrees.

The bottom of my kegerator is the freezer. I freeze 80 lbs of ice in there. During the boil all of that goes into a tub full of water, so that the water is about 40 degrees. Then I use a pump to circulate that through my 50' 1/2" copper rib cage immersion chiller, then out to a tree. I do not re-circulate/re-use the water.

This chills my 10 gallons in 30 minutes.
 
I am in the process of completely redoing my setup.

I am taking a systems approach to everything.
  1. Water taps for filtered water and for RO will be directly over the kettles.
  2. Prechiller/tub will be directly next to boil kettle.
  3. Drains will be under each kettle.
  4. Huge tub for cleaning everything, with spray hose already attached.
  5. In most cases I will use copper pipe instead of silicone tubing, matched to exact size, easier to clean, easier to store.
  6. I am trying to get every system to support the next system in system efficiency.
  7. ect...

I am hoping to start the build on this beginning next year.
 
jevers said:
Ok, what do you recommend for speeding up the lautering? Rice hulls, coarser crush? The prechiller might be a good investment. I was considering making a counter flow chiller from my current IC, so that may be pretty easy to do.

I'm not sure that the tap water here ever gets really cold.
Click to expand...

What kind of manifold system are you using? I had slow lauters when using a SS braid, but it flows out freely with my newer copper manifold.
 
I do no sparge biab 1.25 gallon batches, brew day is around 3 hours. inclu clean up. I can brew two different recipies at once leaving me at 2.5 gallons per 3 hours per week. I also pay a dallor extra for the HBS to seperate out my grain bills for me and grind em. so its heat strike water dump and steep for 60 mins [bout 90 mins total], 60 min boil, and cool, for about 30 mins {one in each side of the sink with ice water.] pitch and lid, then clean the pots and bags. MY brew days are a breeze and my beer and pretty dang good. If I buy grains in bulk I weigh and grind while im reading hbt at night, that way I can just dump. Should be even easier and shorter once I build my mini MLT.
Write down your processes and time them, See whats taking up the bulk of your time [I bet it chilling after the boil]. Learn how to stage your equipment and ingredients. Treat it like a mini assembly line, it's easy when you have production experence.

Brewing should be about a simple effecient process, to make a great product. RDWHAHB
 
jevers said:
Yeah, the ball valve is wide open and I do have about 16" of tubing on the outlet to create a siphon. I was draining into the BK with the burner on but had to cut the flame back because it was already about to boil before the sparge was half done. Probably cut it back too much though.

My MLT is a 10 gallon cooler with a SS braid. I know that a lot of other people use this, so I doubt the equipment is an issue.
Click to expand...

OK, this helps. Your SS tubing is getting crushed by the grain weight. I had this same problem. You need a manifold system to fix it.

Braids work well for 5 gallons batch sparges, but the grain weight for an average 10 gallon batch is too high to maintain proper wort flow.

I dealt with this exact issue and it sounds like our processes are the same.
 

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