FlyGuy
Well-Known Member
A recent and excellent thread by RichBrewer (https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=30466) got me re-thinking batch sparging for high gravity beers.
In his list of advice, Rich suggests that at least 3 quarts of brew water per pound of grain is required to optimize efficiency (i.e., 1 to 1.25 qt/lb for mash and an additional 2 qt/lb for sparging). Obviously, for a high gravity brew, the large amount of grain necessitates a considerable amount of water, perhaps even more than can be accommodated in one's kettle.
I have basically followed this formula for some of my lower gravity beers with great success. But my last brew was fairly high gravity (1.0787) and I definitely had lower efficiency (dropped about 10%) which I thought was a temperature problem, but now I am thinking it was because I had too little sparge water (now I really wish I had taken the gravity of my second runnings! – oh well, I bought a refractometer so no excuse now). Anyway, I have the capacity to boil a large volume (up to 15 gal), but I don't really want to be boiling for 2-3 hours.
So, my question is whether anyone knows of a method to estimate the loss in efficiency that one can expect if you want to brew a high gravity beer but use less water than Rich suggests above. I expect that the loss in efficiency will be related to the gravity of the beer since I want to keep my boil time (and hence, the volume of runnings) fixed, and the higher the gravity and the more grains that are used, the greater the shortcoming of water and lesser the efficiency. I pursued batch sparging because it seemed quick and easy, and I wasn't afraid to add a little extra grain to my mash to compensate for any loss in efficiency. I would like to follow the same principle here, if possible, when mashing large amounts of grain yet keep my boil volume consistent. All that's needed is a method to calculate the additional grains to compensate. Any ideas? Thanks.
Oh, I should also mention that I have fiddled with Beersmith and Promash -- if they perform these calculations, I wasn't able to figure out how to do it. I am guessing that they weren't designed to do this.
In his list of advice, Rich suggests that at least 3 quarts of brew water per pound of grain is required to optimize efficiency (i.e., 1 to 1.25 qt/lb for mash and an additional 2 qt/lb for sparging). Obviously, for a high gravity brew, the large amount of grain necessitates a considerable amount of water, perhaps even more than can be accommodated in one's kettle.
I have basically followed this formula for some of my lower gravity beers with great success. But my last brew was fairly high gravity (1.0787) and I definitely had lower efficiency (dropped about 10%) which I thought was a temperature problem, but now I am thinking it was because I had too little sparge water (now I really wish I had taken the gravity of my second runnings! – oh well, I bought a refractometer so no excuse now). Anyway, I have the capacity to boil a large volume (up to 15 gal), but I don't really want to be boiling for 2-3 hours.
So, my question is whether anyone knows of a method to estimate the loss in efficiency that one can expect if you want to brew a high gravity beer but use less water than Rich suggests above. I expect that the loss in efficiency will be related to the gravity of the beer since I want to keep my boil time (and hence, the volume of runnings) fixed, and the higher the gravity and the more grains that are used, the greater the shortcoming of water and lesser the efficiency. I pursued batch sparging because it seemed quick and easy, and I wasn't afraid to add a little extra grain to my mash to compensate for any loss in efficiency. I would like to follow the same principle here, if possible, when mashing large amounts of grain yet keep my boil volume consistent. All that's needed is a method to calculate the additional grains to compensate. Any ideas? Thanks.
Oh, I should also mention that I have fiddled with Beersmith and Promash -- if they perform these calculations, I wasn't able to figure out how to do it. I am guessing that they weren't designed to do this.