Who's this vorlauf guy?

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gkeusch

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What a great site! I put up a post last week and got a generous and helpful response!

So now it's time to advertise even more of my ignorance. I though I had read a lot about AG brewing (Charlie P., Dave Miller) and have tried it several times but I never heard of the term "vorlauf" until I started reading some of the postings here. Obviously it has to do with the laughtering process, but what is it exactly?

FYI - I use a picnic cooler with slotted drain pipes in the bottom as a MLT and have a "sprinkler" system rigged over it for sparging.

Thank you in advance for educating me some more. I'm getting to be an old dog, but when it comes to home brewing I'm willing to learn some new tricks!
 
Vorlaufing is recycling the sparge back through the grain bed, hopefully until it comes out clean.
I have 2 AG under my belt and I am 99% certain of this answer, but someone else will chime in here directly. Cheers!
 
I have never read Papazian's book, but I know it is in Miller's, you could probably look it up in the index.

I dont know the history of it or anything, but what it is is the act of collecting your first runnings and adding them back to the grain bed. By doing this, you are removing the grain husks and creating a filter out of your grain bed.
 
Yup. Just catch the first couple of quarts or so and pour it gently back into the tun. It's to keep bits of grain and such out of your boil kettle.
 
I also vorlauf my first sparge as well. Not necessary, but pouring sparge water in tends to shake things up pretty good.
 
Yeah, I just pour it back in no problem. Your sprinkler sounds cool, but it may be just one more thing to clean. Then again it may get more sugars from all of the grain if it spreads the vorlauf more evenly.
 
"Vorlauf" means "forerun" or the first running of the sparge liquid. As others have covered, it is to recycle sparge run off until it is free of grain particles. A common practice in commerical brewing.

Dr Malt:mug:
 
someone correct me if I am wrong...but it sounds like he is fly sparging, not batch sparging, which means he should only vorlauf one time.

after that you can't vorlauf because you're continuously fly sparging for 30-45 minutes until you've collected your boil volume.

When batch sparging, you'll vorlauf at least twice...once before collecting first runnings, and again for the second runnings. if you had a small MLT and a big grain bill that needed a double sparge, that'd be 3 vorlauf's.

Right? (keep in mind, I only batch sparge)
 
Yup. I vorlauf 3 times because I take runnings after the mash and then after each of two batch sparge infusions/stirrings. You basically vorlauf after anytime you disturb the grainbed.
 
Heinric Vorlauf was an Austrian that later moved to Germany, near Stuttgart. He was known for having a well respected moderate sized brewery during the mid to late 1800's and many other brewers took to trying to copy his many unique brewing practices, as his methods were efficient and streamlined the process in general.

His description of extracting the wort from the brew kettle and leaving the unwanted by-products behind in a simple but elegant trick eventually stuck and became a universal method that still bears his name today.
 
I stoped doing it all together. I just put a very fine strainer bag on the end of my runoff hose and let her rip. It catches all that crap and I don't have to spend the extra time vorlaufing.
 
[SIZE=-1]I believe Vorlauf is an old, old wooden ship that was used during the Civil War era.....or is that Diversity?
[/SIZE]
 
Thank you! It's neat to know where the term comes from, not just what it means. Turns out I was doing it, I just didn't know what I was doing.

Hmm - that didn't come out right . . .
 
FSR402 said:
I stoped doing it all together. I just put a very fine strainer bag on the end of my runoff hose and let her rip. It catches all that crap and I don't have to spend the extra time vorlaufing.
Based on my recent experience with an astringent stout I will not be skipping this step at any point in the future. The most common suggestion as the reason for the astringency was my accidental skipping of the vorlauf step. I can't say for sure it was the reason but it appears to be a strong possibility.
Craig
 
malkore said:
someone correct me if I am wrong...but it sounds like he is fly sparging, not batch sparging, which means he should only vorlauf one time.

after that you can't vorlauf because you're continuously fly sparging for 30-45 minutes until you've collected your boil volume.

When batch sparging, you'll vorlauf at least twice...once before collecting first runnings, and again for the second runnings. if you had a small MLT and a big grain bill that needed a double sparge, that'd be 3 vorlauf's.

Right? (keep in mind, I only batch sparge)

OK, I'm now a bit confused (not particularly unusual). I am not sure what batch sparging is exactly as compared to what I do. All the stuff I read described the laughtering process as a continuous flow through the grain bed once the process was begun. Maybe you could enlighten me about how batch sparging works.

Here is what I do (not saying it's right, it's just what I do :)). At mash-out time I have about 5 gallons of hot water at 170 degrees ready in a tank which I connect with platic hose to the inlet of my sprinkler do-hickey (flow is by gravity - when I am ready I can open the valve at the tank, letting the heated sparge water flowthrough the sprinkler onto the grain bed).

When I start the run-off from the MLT I catch the first runnings and pour it back into the cooler as gently as I can - It does not go through the sprinkler and yes, it stirs things up a bit, so I feel like I'm taking two steps forward, one back each time I do it! I recycle about the first half gallon or so, then let 'er go into the boiler and turn on the flow of my sparge water at a rate that will maintain an inch or so of water above the grain bed. All in all it seems to work OK.

One thing that concerns me is Dave Miller's concern as stated in his book that the temperature of the mash needs to be raised to 168 degrees at the end of the mash to stop enzymatic activity in its tracks. There is no way I can raise the temperature of the goods in my MLT to that by adding a quantity of boiling water. It would take too much.

Maybe your batch process addresses that too?

Thanks much for your response.

Greg
 
How clear is the Vorlauf actually supposed to be? Seems like there is always "dust" for lack of a better term that never really goes away.
I batch sparge with a SS washer hose

gkeusch, Take a look at Denny's page http://hbd.org/cascade/dennybrew/
it pretty well explains batch sparging. I cant really get it up and past 168 with a gallon of boiling h2o either, but it hasnt harmed my beers. Or at least I dont think it has.

BTW Batch sparging is a real time saver
 
I recirculate the first several quarts of runnings from my tun, as it seems there is always some degree of junk that sneaks under the false bottom. Once the runoff is pretty clear, I just stop collecting the runnings and let them drain to the kettle. This seems to do a pretty good job of setting up the filter bed, and my runoff is generally clear enough that I can see through the hose.

I fly sparge, but the recirculated runnings do not go through the sprinkler setup - they just get poured fairly gently into the liquor above the grainbed. Once I start the runoff to the kettle, I turn on the pump which supplies hot water to the sprinkler from the hot liquor tank.
 
gkeusch,

in a nutshell, batch sparging means you add roughly half your water volume, and let it rest 60 minutes. then you drain it...bone dry.
then you add the rest of your water, vourlaf, and then drain those runnings til they're all gone. you're draining a few quarts a minute, so it only takes like 5 minutes on each sparge to drain the MLT.

fly sparging means you only maintain a few inches of water over the grainbed, again letting it rest 60 minutes, then you start draining, and at the same time, trickle more water in at the same rate you're draining. it takes 30-45 minutes to complete the fly sparge.

those are very simplistic instructions, but highlight the main differences. with fly sparging you don't vorlauf several times or you end up with grainy wort.

typically fly sparging has a better efficiency if done right, but you have to watch your pH and gravity closer to avoid tannin extraction, and its way easier for a fly sparge to get stuck, or tunnel thru the grain bed and give crappy efficiency.

batch sparging, IMO, is easier. pH isn't as much of an issue, and because you vorlauf several times, its very hard to get a stuck sparge. usually the efficiency isn't quite as good as fly, but I know there are several guys on the board pushing high 80's efficiency through excellent batch sparging techniques.
 
Ender said:
How clear is the Vorlauf actually supposed to be? Seems like there is always "dust" for lack of a better term that never really goes away.
I batch sparge with a SS washer hose

gkeusch, Take a look at Denny's page http://hbd.org/cascade/dennybrew/
it pretty well explains batch sparging. I cant really get it up and past 168 with a gallon of boiling h2o either, but it hasnt harmed my beers. Or at least I dont think it has.

BTW Batch sparging is a real time saver

Thank you, thank you for the web link. That is exactly what I needed! Sounds to me like I'll be changing my process next time!
 
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