Brewing a Rye IPA, Mash water question

SO i'm brewing Northern Brewer's Denny's Wry Smile Rye IPA.

I have a 10 gallon round cooler system i'm using (fly sparging)

I'm using beersmith and the directions included, and the total grain bill is 16 lbs. Well, i used 8 gallons of water which comes out to about 2 gallons/lb. I preheated my mash tun, and my grain temps were at 77 when i added to the mash tun. I heated my mash water to 165 and added to my grains to try to get to the 153 recommended mash heat. Well, apparently i overshot, my temps were at 160. So i added 1/2 gallon of cold water to get it down to 153/154. It's mashing at the moment.

My questions are
1) Will too much mash water ruin my efficiency?
2) My 10 gallon cooler is pretty full with the 16 lbs of grains and the 8 gallons of water. When i start sparging, it doesn't seem like much will happen, because my tun is so full right now. Any help or easing of my tension would be appreciated.

This is my 2nd all-grain batch ever, so i'm still not 100% comfortable.

1. not likely
2. batch sparge (the way the recipe was designed! )

Well, i fly sparged the only other time i've done all-grain. As it sits right now, my 10 gallon water cooler has maybe 1 to 1.5 gallons of open space until it overflows. As i understand it batch sparging, is just adding a bulk amount of water at a time. Therfore, i have fears of it overflowing.

Also, recipe calls out for mashout @ 170 for 10 minutes. As i understand it, mashout is a sort of rest at 170. If i do the mashout, do i even need to sparge? Or is the mashout acting as a sparge?

No, the mashout is not acting like a sparge. I almost never do a mashout any longer, especially with higher mash ratios like you used. But that's batch sparging, not fly sparging. If you don't sparge, your efficiency may be low and your OG low also. Out of curiosity, how did you decide on 8 gal. of mash water?

2 quarts/lb. of grain

BugAC said:

2 quarts/lb. of grain

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Yeah, I realize that. I'm wondering why you didn't adjust it down a bit to compensate for the size of your cooler. Maybe that's just something I do. I use between 1.6 (most often) and 2 qt./lb. but I decide based on what the total mash volume will end up being.

Well, like i said, it's my second all-grain batch ever. So i didn't know that i could do that without having adverse consequences. I'll know better for next time.

You might want to at least look into batch sparging. I've used it to brew that recipe dozens of times and other recipes hundreds of times.

www.dennybrew.com

will look into it for my next batch. Thanks!

With fly sparging you would be removing water at the same rate you are adding it so I don't see the problem with overflow as long as you keep an eye on it. You could even draw wort out before you start the sparge flow to give you a little more space if you really are worried about overflow.

If you were batch sparging you'd totally drain the tub before anymore water was added. So your one gallons of remaining space isn't a problem either. I think you have confused batch with no sparge type.

brewchez said:

With fly sparging you would be removing water at the same rate you are adding it so I don't see the problem with overflow as long as you keep an eye on it. You could even draw wort out before you start the sparge flow to give you a little more space if you really are worried about overflow.

If you were batch sparging you'd totally drain the tub before anymore water was added. So your one gallons of remaining space isn't a problem either. I think you have confused batch with no sparge type.

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Yes, but with fly sparging, you do normally mash out to get the grainbed up to 168.

If I'm "close" with my grainbill and water, I always batch sparge.

I almost always mash at 1.25-1.5 quarts of water per pound of grain. As a new brewer, I almost always used 1.25 quarts of water per pound of grain. There were a couple of reasons- one, in case I missed my mash temp I could easily still add boiling water or cold water to hit it (this is pretty important- if you mash in with 2 quarts/pound are at the mashtun limit, you're pretty limited); and two, because the experts said so!

Now, with my current system I mash with 1.5 quarts/pound. I have a HERMS set up with pumps and I need a thinner mash for it to work. I've never gone to 2 quarts/pound though. That's pretty thin and doesn't give much allowance for missing the temperatures.

Yooper said:

Yes, but with fly sparging, you do normally mash out to get the grainbed up to 168.

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I don't know too many fly brewers around me that mashout necessarily. They sparge with 170F water, and after they collect ~2gallons of wort they fire the kettle to slowly get the boil started. Seems to "lock-in" their mash profile pretty well. In fact I have a couple friends that manage to time it just right that they wort is boiling just as they shut down the run-off and they are ready for the first hop addition.

But to each their own. Its all brewing. Just for the OP with only 2 batches in, a mash out is the least of his concern in this case. He's just trying to find a way to deal with the small remaining volume in his tun.