Multi-Sparge Questions

Hi All!

So I want to try a technique I've read a little bit about, but info seems to be scarce and I am hoping that others may have tried it or know more about it.

I'm getting an all grain Imperial stout together and I will do that as a standard brew, I then want to sparge the same grains again to make a brown ale and then a third time (hopefully) to make a mild ale.

My two questions are:

1. Is this possible/likely to work? Why or why not?
2. How would you setup something like this in BeerSmith2?

Thanks a Lot!

Tipsy~!

What you're talking about is a partigyle (or partygyle, or party gyle, I've seen several spellings, but that can help with searching for more info). I'm currently planning a similar experiment this weekend (RIS/oatmeal stout), and found braukaiser's partygyle simulator very handy. There's no reason why your plan won't work, but the simulator can help you to figure out whether or not you'll be able to get enough extracted out of your grains for the batch size you're looking for. I'm looking at a smaller first batch (3gal) and a 5 gal second batch consisting of 2 sparges, so mine is a little easier. The only thing I can see you getting stuck on is being able to get enough extracted for that third mild batch (even assuming a low OG ~1.03) without having to sparge with a lot of water and boil it down pretty far. If it looks like that might be the case, you can always add a little more grain to the mash and let that go for another hour, or you can just add some extract if you want to make sure you hit a certain OG.

One thing that I haven't been able to figure out, but shouldn't be a problem for you, is how much color carry over from dark grains occurs between the first and second batches (and third in your case). I'm planning on holding back a little of my dark malts to toss in before running the second batch out, and depending on how dark you want your second and third batches to be, you might consider something similar.

As far as setting it up in Beersmith, I haven't figured out a foolproof route yet. Right now I've got three separate recipes, one with the entire grain bill for mashing purposes, then one for each recipe where I've basically just added enough grain to keep the expected color and gravity consistent so I can track fermentation and gravities on each batch. Not a perfect system, but hopefully it will work for my purposes!

erikpete18

Thanks for the great info! Having the right term will help a lot i'm sure. Are you looking at a big beer small beer? I think a lot of old Belgian breweries did that. What type of beer are you going to be?

Ya i'm planning on starting with a beer that has an og of 1.117 and and an srm of 40.7. I'm basically maxing out the imperial style. I think that should bring me to a mid point for brown ale and perhaps the bottom end of mild ales.

Let me know how your experiment goes!

That's actually pretty close to where I am. I'm shooting for a first batch of about 1.10 and 45SRM (3 gal), then a second batch of 1.049 (5 gal). My first batch is essentially going to be my first runnings, 16lb of grain and 24qt of strike water, hopefully getting out about 4 gal pre-boil where I can boil it down to about 3 gal. I've only got one BK, so the second batch I'm mashing an additional pound of oatmeal, pound of base grains, and a few handfuls of my dark grains for an hour while I boil the first batch, then sparging to get up to about 6.5 gal preboil for round 2.

You're definitely starting high enough you might be able to squeeze a pretty decent third beer out of it. If nothing else, mild is a great choice if you wind up on the lower end, as it should still be damn tasty!

I'm hoping to get 3 full 5 gal batches out of it. It may be a pipe dream but the calculator you linked seems to think it might all work out!

Also, i'd forgotten to throw some oatmeal in there. thanks for the reminder.