Parti-Gyle advice

Ok when I am done next 4 beers I was thinking of doing a parti-gyle brew day. Don't know why but, it is causing anxiety for me. I have a 2 burner horizontal brew stand. I let my buddy have my other burner stand I had before I had stand built. Now I was just going to do something simple like an IIPA then maybe an amber ale. I was going to do this:

-Strike water so I have enough to get 7.5gal pre-boil.
-2nd strike water would be ready by time 1st running is boiling.
-Add 2nd strike to MT with maybe addition of 1lb of some Crystal.
-When 1st is done chilled and in fermenter I would then add 2nd runnings.

Now I know having 2 burners would make it so I can be boiling at same time but, since this is my first time I want to keep it simple. Plus it would only add another hour to my brew day and would have 2 batches. Now my question is for 2nd batch do you collect 1st runnings and thn sparge just like a regular batch?

Edit-I know there is another thread on Parti-gyle now but, didn't want to jump onto it with another question.

You can. It kind of depends on how strong you want the second batch to be, and how much boil volume you can manage. I'm not quite sure how to calculate what the gravity of each separate running will be; it depends on a lot of factors, such as mash temp, density, runoff method, grain bill, etc. Topping off with more malt adds another factor.

Unless you can find some good way to calculate all that, or use a recipe someone else has already tested, it would probably be best to just devise a recipe the best you can and run with it. Make the first-runnings beer, and in the meantime take a sample gravity of your second runnings to figure out what the OG of that beer would be when you get it to volume. If you want more sugar in it, I suppose you could do a sparge, but I doubt you'll get much more from it. At least, not if you recirculated the second runnings somewhat. Households used to make 'small beer' from third runnings, and it was weak enough that it could be drunk in place of water.

In essence it is like doing a 10gallon batch of beer. But, my normal 1st runnings would be my 1st beer. I think my first time I am just gonna semi-wing it and see what I get. I figure I will do calculations for 10gallons of say a 1.060 beer. I am guessing that will give me around a 1.090 1st batch and 1.045 2nd batch. But, will cap off 2nd with few pounds of Crystal and can add sugar or DME to 2nd if I want higher gravity but, doubt I will need to.

vanwolfhausen said:

Now my question is for 2nd batch do you collect 1st runnings and thn sparge just like a regular batch?

Click to expand...

You can do it any number of ways. You can use the 1st runnings for the 1st beer and the second runnings for the second beer. You can fly sparge and fill one pot then keep sparging to fill the second pot. Whatever logistically works for your system.

buried in this article has a few tables that might help.

http://www.brewingtechniques.com/library/backissues/issue2.2/mosher.html#3

note, his tables are calculate for total batch size of 15 gallons, so 5 gallons of strong beer, and 10 gallons of normal/small beer. i ran into trouble because i want 10 gal batch size, 5g strong, 5g small....

Kia's spreadsheet is helpful. Boil off is wrong to me though but that's the easy part.

http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Batch_Sparge_and_Party_Gyle_Simulator

that spreadsheet is strange for me.

ok, so i set it all up, 24.5 lb grain, 9.5gallon mash water, 75% conversion eff, 6.6gal of 1.061 out of the first mash.

so, 1st sparge, i add 2 gallons, get 2 gallons of 1.040 out. total of 8.6g of 1.066

then for kicks i changed the 1st sparge to 7 gallons total sparge water, which gives me 7 gallons of 1.022. but when i change the 2nd runoff to 2 gallons, suddenly my total batch goes from 8.6g of 1.066 to 8.6g of 1.071.

confused!

yeah this doesn't make sense.

6.6g of 1.061 + 2g of 1.040 = 8.6g of 1.056, not 1066

I am a spreadsheet moron. I can never get them to work. I always seem to make it work better with pencil and paper. If you normally have 75% efficiency is that what you use? I keep thinking lower since 1st runoff is such a big beer. But, guess it doesn't matter since your basically making a normal size 10gallons according to calculations.

I was just reading about parti-gyle brewing in 'Radical Brewing.' According to Randy Mosher, the crucial piece of information when parti-gyle brewing is that the first third of the wort contains half of the extract. So if you split the mashing into thirds, the first third would be twice as strong as the second two thirds, mixed. If you split it into halves, the difference will be greater still - about 2.2:1.
Starting with a recipe that, if brewed entire, would have a gravity of 1.060, that would give a first third of 1.090 and a second two-thirds of 1.045 - he suggests this would make a good barleywine and bitter, respectively. You would have twice as much of the second beer. If split into halves, this would give a first half of 1.083 and a second half of 1.037.

This seems simpler to me than using complicated tables and spreadsheets. But it is probably more a rule of thumb than an accurate calculation.

If you want to do a 50/50 split Partigyle take the decimal part of the strongest beer's OG and divide by 2. Then subtract that from the OG. Let's say you want the 1st beer's OG to be 1.088. The second beer's OG is 1.088-(.088/2)=1.044

To calculate the full 10 gallons OG add the two OG's & divide by 2. (1.088+1.044)/2 = 1.066. Use 1.066 for your target OG for a 10 gallon batch.

For the SRM you can use .4 as a multiplier and be real close. Say for your 1st beer you expect an SRM of 35. The second beer's SRM will be about 35*.4=14.

You can adjust OG's by blending the wort. If you want to leave the 1st beer as is but want a higher OG for the 2nd beer you can cap it with some grain when you sparge or add DME or LME. What ever turns you crank. Same for SRM. If you want a darker SRM for the second beer just cap it with some dark malt when you sparge.

Batch sparging works great for Partigyles because you have the 2nd runnings available shortly after the 1st runnings so you can blend & start boiling right away.

Here's Mosher's article that has links to the tables. http://brewingtechniques.com/library/backissues/issue2.2/mosher.html

Hope this helps... Cheers!!!

this is really helpful. i'm interested in trying this to and this chart makes planning much easier.

Conversion efficiency is not brew house efficiency. It should beover 90%.

http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Understanding_Efficiency

I am gonna do a DIPA and an amber as 2nd. I am gonna cap off with 2lbs 2row, 1lb C80L and 1lb of Caramunich II. I might throw in .5lb sugar to BK also. Should make for interesting day. I have some US-05 and Am Ale I slurry I have to use up.