First stuck sparge, and was it a doosie...

10 gallon batch of a guinness clone. Included 10% roasted barley (2lbs) and 25% (5lbs) of flaked barley.

This time my paint strainer over the manifold idea back fired. That nylon mesh turned into a solid wall. I'm convinced that it was the roasted barley and not so much the flaked barley.

I ended up finding every pot I own in the house and scooping out half the grains and manually straining them then setting aside the grains.

Then I removed the other half of the grains one sauce pot at a time into a fermenting bucket and set that hot, black, gooey, sticky, grainy stuff aside. This gave me the chance to clean out my mash tun and manifold and start over. By this time I had managed to get about 4 gallons of think wort...and only needed another 7 1/2 .

So I heated up 4 1/2 gallons of water to 180-190 degrees and poured it into the MT and replaced one of the halve of grains. This was a much thinner mash (duh) and after about 10-15 minutes, it drained nicely. I decided to repeat the process and add another 4 1/2 gallons of hot water and try an place the rest of the grains back in.

This worked okay too. Slower, but okay. By the time the grain bed had drained, there was a thick black goo all throughout the grains and I think that the fine crush of the roasted barley was the culprit.

I did end up with 11 1/2 gallons and a gravity of 1.047 compared to the 1.052 I was shooting for. Next time I think I'll use a grain bag for the roasted barley and throw in some rice hulls.

All in, my Friday night MASH ONLY session lasted nearly 5 hours. Saturdays boil went fine...

Except I had my first major boil over...:cross:

Any one else have problems with a 10% raosted barley recipe?

For my 10 gallon batch I use 14 pounds 2row, 4 pounds flaked, 2 pounds roast, .....No problems yet.

I've never done a 10G batch but I've used 15% roasted barley before with no trouble. I would think the flaked barley would be a bigger culprit, I haven't used it in ages but if I recall correctly I believe it behaves similar to flaked oats in that it gets very thick and gummy. I've had a few already so my memory may be wrong.

That sounds like a gnarly session, BierMuncher.

In answer to your question- I just did a stout today- slightly over 10% roasted barley, and yep, I had a boil-over. I think it was because i was careless, though. As soon as I turned the heat down, it subsided. The worst foaming I've ever had was with an oatmeal stout w/ about 5% rolled oats... that one damn near jumped out of the kettle.

BTW, what's your recipe for a Guinness clone? Thanks -p

I think the problem is the Paint Strainer that you used, it has a real fine screen...
I'v pained cars for 30 yrs and use them all the time. I tried them myself for straining the wort into the carboy on PM batches & they would plug up FAST!

That sucks man...what's the name on this one? Stuck stout?



Dan