Batch Sparging: what's your setup like?

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TheWulf

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I am looking forward to my first AG brew next week and had a question about batch sparging.

My setup is basically a 9gal brew kettle and a cooler mash tun. My question is: what is your hardware and process for batch sparging?

My initial thoughts was that I would be fine with a single kettle and MLT, but it seems I will need an extra vessel for either boiling water OR collecting the wort between batches.

I was thinking of using a plastic pail to collect the wort, but I would be worried about aerating the wort when putting it back in the BK. Now I am thinking of just getting another large kettle for boiling water, I was just hoping to avoid that expense.

Thoughts? What do you do?
 
Would like to hear more responses on this. My setup is identical. I've done two batches with my cooler mash tun. My kettle does not have a spigot, so I've struggled with moving hot liquor to the mash tun as well as moving preheated sparge water. What I've been doing is using a bottling bucket, hose, and aerator nozzle to manually sparge, and then collecting the wort in my kettle. Pouring the hot water into both the cooler and bucket sucks.
 

Thank you! Here's a pic of all the equipment I use....

equip1.jpg
 
I am apartment AG brewing on an electric stove. Here's my process.

1. Heat strike water in 10 gal BK
2. Start mash in Igloo MLT and start heating mash out water in BK
3. Simultaneously start heating sparge water in a cheap lobster pot
4. Add mash out water and collect first runnings in BK
5. Start boiling first running in BK
6. Add sparge water from lobster pot, collect second runnings, and dump into BK on the stove.

EDIT: Although my BK does have a ball valve, I only use it for transferring the wort to the fermenter. I just dump the water into the MLT.
 
I use a 48qt. Rubbermaid marine cooler, with stainless braid. I have an aluminum 7gal. turkey fryer pot that I use to heat my water up with, and then my 10 gallon brew pot. I've been lucky with my set up so far. Using my kitchen stove, it takes just under 45 minutes to heat my sparge water to 170. So, by the time I mash in and get the amount of sparge water I need, I throw it on and it's ready just about the time I need it to sparge. My stove is only about 20 feet away from where I'm brewing in the garage, so it's not a big deal to me to be moving it around. I used to work for a water company, so lugging 5 gallons here and there is old hat to me.

Anyways, I'd love to get a brew rig together, but I just don't have the space. I just posted in another thread about how I'm storing different parts al over the place.
 
If you collect wort in a bucket, use a bottling bucket. This way you can slap some tubing on the spigot and gravity drain the wort into your kettle to avoid excessive aeration.
 
If you collect wort in a bucket, use a bottling bucket. This way you can slap some tubing on the spigot and gravity drain the wort into your kettle to avoid excessive aeration.

I've been experimenting with pouring from a collection bucket into the kettle on the last 6 batches. No problems noted.
 
I am looking forward to my first AG brew next week and had a question about batch sparging.

My setup is basically a 9gal brew kettle and a cooler mash tun. My question is: what is your hardware and process for batch sparging?

My initial thoughts was that I would be fine with a single kettle and MLT, but it seems I will need an extra vessel for either boiling water OR collecting the wort between batches.

I was thinking of using a plastic pail to collect the wort, but I would be worried about aerating the wort when putting it back in the BK. Now I am thinking of just getting another large kettle for boiling water, I was just hoping to avoid that expense.

Thoughts? What do you do?

Am I the only one who doesn't worry about aeration at this point? I mean after my mash and sparge are done I put my wort into my boiling kettle and it rolls around for 60+ minutes. Am I wrong in thinking that boiling forces most of the oxygen out of my wort anyway? Then, when the boil is done and I have chilled the wort and pitched the yeast I try my best to get as much aeration as possible to give the yeast a nice environment to do their thing. Am I completely off base here???
 
Am I the only one who doesn't worry about aeration at this point? I mean after my mash and sparge are done I put my wort into my boiling kettle and it rolls around for 60+ minutes. Am I wrong in thinking that boiling forces most of the oxygen out of my wort anyway? Then, when the boil is done and I have chilled the wort and pitched the yeast I try my best to get as much aeration as possible to give the yeast a nice environment to do their thing. Am I completely off base here???

I have never worried about it. My fermenter takes my first runnings, sparge runnings go into BK, then fermenter runnings go in to BK and boil away.

Never had any issues. I dont splash the **** out of it, but i just pour it in.
 
I've been experimenting with pouring from a collection bucket into the kettle on the last 6 batches. No problems noted.

I know where you're coming from. HSA is really not that big of a worry. My wort gets exposed to plenty of oxygen pre-boil when I brew larger batches and I've never had a problem. Just answering the OP's question. That's how I do it for 5 gallon batches since it's not that much more trouble to drain thorugh a spigot for peace of mind.
 
I have two buckets with volume markers on the side to collect the wort while the sparge water is heating in the brew kettle. After I get my first runoff, I set the mash tun back on the floor, dump in the sparge water, and put my first runoff into the brew kettle. Never needed an extra pot. Plus the buckets help me gauge if Im hitting my volumes by seeing how many gal I collect.
 
+1 for the bottling bucket for transfer and temp storage. It also has pre-marked gallon measurements for double checking sparge volumes. Hot side aeration may be overstated, but I'm not a fan of pouring gallons of hot, sticky wort.
 
I have 1 boil kettle and two 10 gal round coolers. I heat the strike water and dump it into the mash tun. Then heat more water and dump it into the 2nd cooler for my sparge water. By the time the 1st cooler can be drained into the boil kettle, the second cooler will stay hot enough to batch sparge, just dump it in and mix.
 
I also use my bottling bucket. Comes in handy with measurements and saves me from buying more equipment.
 
this is my setup (of course barrel and boxes are not there when in use), it is very convenient to use, add water to the top keg (through hose with carbon filter), heat water, drain into the mash tun, drain mash tun into bottom keg, repeat whole process for sparging

DSC_0277.jpg
 
Am I the only one who doesn't worry about aeration at this point? I mean after my mash and sparge are done I put my wort into my boiling kettle and it rolls around for 60+ minutes. Am I wrong in thinking that boiling forces most of the oxygen out of my wort anyway? Then, when the boil is done and I have chilled the wort and pitched the yeast I try my best to get as much aeration as possible to give the yeast a nice environment to do their thing. Am I completely off base here???

This is exactly what I am trying to figure out. If it's a non-issue, then great, so it shall be. But I defer to the AG experts on this, as I am not one.
 
I use 1 pot and 1 ale Pail to do my 5gallon batches.
Heat water to strike temp.
Dough in grains
Mash for an hour
Drain into ale pail
Add sparge water.
Stir vigorously and let settle 10min.
Drain into ale pail also
Clean spent grains from pot
Dump ale pail into pot
Boil
Chill
Back into rinsed and sanitized ale pail
Pitch
Done
 
I use a 44 qrt boil kettle, a 50 qrt igloo marine cooler with a cpvc manifold for my MLT, and a 20 qrt kettle for my sparge water. This set up has worked great so far and I've gotten very good efficiency with batch sparging.

2013-01-01_12-15-23_931_zpsbbc2a8f5.jpg
 
It seems we all do the same thing. I have a 7 gallon brew pot. Heat my strike in the pot and mash in a 10gal Home Depot Rubbermade. Drain into my ale pale. Heat the sparge in my brew pot, Sparge and drain in the same pail. Poor back into my brew pot for boil. I do have a brand new 15 gallon brew kettle but have not used it yet.
 
Would like to hear more responses on this. My setup is identical. I've done two batches with my cooler mash tun. My kettle does not have a spigot, so I've struggled with moving hot liquor to the mash tun as well as moving preheated sparge water. What I've been doing is using a bottling bucket, hose, and aerator nozzle to manually sparge, and then collecting the wort in my kettle. Pouring the hot water into both the cooler and bucket sucks.

For now, I am in the same boat. I use a pitcher to move most of the water, then when it gets low I just pick the pot up and dump the rest.

Using the pitcher probably costs me a few degrees with the strike and mash out water, but I just overshoot and correct downward with stirring and/or cold water.

Im about to build a new set up, but its hard to spend the 1000 bucks I'm planning on considering I can make great beer, its just not sexy and more importantly I want to minimize my lifting on brewday.
 
I just lift and pour. It's not safe but the darn spigots for the kettles cost ~30$ if I remember right. I also use free pots that aren't exactly pretty or perfect.

I'd like to add a ball valve one of these days when I can justify spending more on brewing equipment....
 
If you collect wort in a bucket, use a bottling bucket. This way you can slap some tubing on the spigot and gravity drain the wort into your kettle to avoid excessive aeration.

Aeration doesn't matter, HSA is a myth. You're about to boil it all and drive out the air.

My setup is an 8gal pot on the stovetop, it has a thermometer and a ball valve. I drain that into a 10gal round cooler with a hose braid, then when I sparge it's right into the 10gal brew kettle. I used to use hoses for all these steps but now just let the liquids free fall into the mash tun/kettle.

One trick I learned is to put a smaller collection container under your mash tun spigot and leave it running for a good 20-30min. You'll often wind up with an extra half gallon of wort. You might have to tip it a bit but it can make a difference in your efficiency.

Before I got ball valves on my kettles I did the pouring method, but it kinda scared me a bit. I made it a priority to get a pot with a ball valve to use for heating water/boiling, and then later on wound up putting a weldless valve on another pot to simplify things a bit. It made me feel a lot safer... though it took me a while to make the investments, it's not exactly cheap.
 
1) 70 qt. Coleman extreme cooler with SS tube screen (bazooka tube), SS bulkhead and ball valve.

2) Blichmann floor burner

3) 10 gallon SS polaware boil kettle

4) DIY wort chiller with 50ft of copper tubing.

5) Thermapen thermometer.

6) Monster Mill MM2 2.0

a lot of this stuff was upgrades over birthday and X-mas this year. I started out with not much more than a 10gal gatorade cooler and cheap Ol' turkey burner. Happen to find the boil kettle barely used on Craigslist for $40.
 
40qt Al boil kettle with a ball valve.
5 gallon cheap-seats SS pot for heating mash and sparge volumes, no valve
40 qt (I think) rectangular cooler mash tun with a ball valve.
Ideally I would boil/ heat everything on a Bayou Classic Sportsman's Choice burner, but lately it's been too cold and it wouldn't be able to boil rubbing alcohol. I've been using the stove lately, but just bought a BG14.

When I strike or sparge I just siphon from the 5 gallon into the mash tun until there's only a couple inches left in the pot- then I pour. I employ my truck's tailgate and stairs to our house (only 3 high) to drain wort into the boil kettle. It's a pain but I haven't built a proper tun stand yet. Kyle
 
Yep. Like this...
.
spargeaddition2.jpg

Yep exactly, I built a three tier stand for batch sparging, after a couple of batches I got impatient waiting for the HLT to drain into the MT so I grabbed a 1 gallon pitcher to speed things up. Within a few batches I realized that gravity draining was slow and not as quick and easy as the simple pitcher. I then cut the stand down to two levels...HLT to MT gets bailed w/ the pitcher, then gravity to the kettle. It kills me when I see a five gallon system for batch sparging with a pump for sparge water...you really need a pump for 2-3 gallons, c'mon really?

The $2 manual pump...20-30gpm hi temp food grade


Rubbermaid-3063-1-Gallon-White-Covered-Pitcher.jpg
 
I use 1 pot and 1 ale Pail to do my 5gallon batches.
Heat water to strike temp.
Dough in grains
Mash for an hour
Drain into ale pail
Add sparge water.
Stir vigorously and let settle 10min.
Drain into ale pail also
Clean spent grains from pot
Dump ale pail into pot
Boil
Chill
Back into rinsed and sanitized ale pail
Pitch
Done

My mash tun is also my BK, so my method is the same as above. Last brew was the first time to use this setup (new Blichmann for a wedding present! SWMBO loved that...), and I didn't think to use a bottling bucket, so I wound up draining into two different stock pots and recombining in the BK after cleaning out the grains and pulling the false bottom. Seemed to work, but I'm switching to a bucket. Thanks for the tip!
 
Food-grade plastic bucket is fine for collecting runoff. Don't worry about aeration.

This.

Am I the only one who doesn't worry about aeration at this point? I mean after my mash and sparge are done I put my wort into my boiling kettle and it rolls around for 60+ minutes. Am I wrong in thinking that boiling forces most of the oxygen out of my wort anyway? Then, when the boil is done and I have chilled the wort and pitched the yeast I try my best to get as much aeration as possible to give the yeast a nice environment to do their thing. Am I completely off base here???

Nope, you're not off base at all.

Here's my setup:

img_2042-47340.jpg


The cooler usually sits on the sawhorses, but this pic was taken after I had cleaned it out and the boil had commenced.
 
I'm sure my setup is pretty similar to everyone else. I put my 10 gallon mash tun on top of a table, then vorlauf and drain first runnings directly into my boil kettle. After adding sparge water, I let it sit for ten minutes or so, vorlauf again, then drain into the boil kettle.
 
I use my 5g BK as a MLT. 6 lbs of grain is the most I can do with my 5g BK. I have (3) 8 qt stock pots that are heating to 170 while my first run lauter is at mash temp. I collect the wort into my bottling bucket. Clean BK, dump in wort. It works. Having another 8g BK would be nice.
 
I believe simple is better and to simplify things I bought a cheap stock pot from walmart. I think it is about 4 or 5 gallons. Since most all of my grain bills are right around 9 pounds I took a hammer and dented a spot that if I fill to the dent I have plenty of sparge and strike water.

I heat the strike water up and then start the mash. While mashing I am heating the sparge water. I dump the first runnings into my big boil pot and set it on the burner heating up to boiling while I sparge the rest of the wort into the cheap stock pot. When I am done sparging I dump the wort into the now almost boiling wort on the propane.

I am not a speed fiend but by the time I am done sparging I am getting drunk enough to forget important things like hops and such so getting it to a boil fast saves time and helps me stay kind of sober. That and I do not brew until after 10 at night so if I want a decent nights sleep faster is better.
 
My AG system:

I use an 8 gallon kettle with 1/2 inch ball valve, and false bottom as my direct fire mash tun and BK.
I use a cheap 5 gallon aluminum pot to heat up the sparge water.
A march pump for recirculation.
I use a 5 gallon bucket to collect runnings.
I also mash with a big mesh bag, like what they use in BIAB, to make removal of grains easy and quick.


Heat the strike water.
dough in.
adjust pH.
turn burner on and recirculate if temp drops.
heat the sparge water.
Lauter/drain into bucket.
pour sparge water in mash tun.
Lauter/drain 2nd runnings into bucket.
Remove bag with grains for ready use of the BK.
Pour wort from the bucket into BK for hop boil.

I've gotten 75-77% efficiency with this method.
 
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