Wables
Well-Known Member
For my last 2 10 gallon brews, I tightened up the spacing on my barley crusher by about 1/8th of a turn. I am mashing in a coleman X-treme 70 quart cooler with a PVC manifold with hack saw slots every 1/4". Since I tightened my crush, I have gone from 75%ish to 85%+ efficiency, but my batch sparges have gotten really slow. Two brews ago, I added 2# of corn that I had laying around and I wanted to get rid of it. I chalked up the slow sparge to the corn. My last brew I had a mix mash of grain that was getting old and wanted to get rid of. About half was year old 2 row, and the rest was 6 row and older caramel. This was very slow sparging as well. Basically, my initial runnoff took 20 minutes, and my batch sparge took 30 minutes after a 10 minute stir and rest. Total sparge time was an hour for both batches. The left over grains were very solidly packed, kind of like tile grout with barley hulls.
My question is, are my slow sparges a result of my finer crush? I really like the efficiency that I am getting, but if my sparges are this slow, I will start fly sparging.
My question is, are my slow sparges a result of my finer crush? I really like the efficiency that I am getting, but if my sparges are this slow, I will start fly sparging.