Mash Lauter Tun

My tun is a converted cooler, and I'm reasonably happy with it. But I notice that the drain allows a little less than an inch of would be wort to lay in the bottom with the grains. Sparging three times with copious amounts of hot water seems to keep my efficiency on target, though.

But I wonder, how much better is the efficiency with a pot style mash lauter tun that has a false bottom?

There really is no good answer to this. What kind of efficiency are you getting now? What is your exact technique, how is your crush? What is your water profile / pH?

There is so much that goes into efficiency that it's really hard to answer this. Efficiency is impacted by many other things other than equipment or set-up. I've used different kinds of MLT but finally settled on a round cooler with SS braid, and I am consistently getting around 80% efficiency.

I'm using a round cooler also with the SS braid, in a circle.

Similar to this setup:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/cheap-easy-10-gallon-rubbermaid-mlt-conversion-23008/

BUT, I have a Brass "T" compression fitting connecting my SS Braid.

anyone else have experience with both types of MLTs?

kirscp said:

I'm using a round cooler also with the SS braid, in a circle.

Similar to this setup:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/cheap-easy-10-gallon-rubbermaid-mlt-conversion-23008/

BUT, I have a Brass "T" compression fitting connecting my SS Braid.

Click to expand...

Can you punch a few small holes in the tubing right at the point where the compression fitting connects to the bulkhead? If you are batch sparging with a braid, you don't need to worry about losing the siphon effect. Instead, the holes will allow a drainage point for you to tip the cooler to get the last bit of goodness out.

Everyone has different inputs/experience on this.
I started off with cooler/copper manifold. Worked good, still like it. Then went to s/s mash tun/kettle with s/s fb. Points went up a bunch for me and I've never had a stuck sparge with fb.

chemist308 said:

My tun is a converted cooler, and I'm reasonably happy with it. But I notice that the drain allows a little less than an inch of would be wort to lay in the bottom with the grains. Sparging three times with copious amounts of hot water seems to keep my efficiency on target, though.

But I wonder, how much better is the efficiency with a pot style mash lauter tun that has a false bottom?

Click to expand...

It is pretty easy to work out the efficiency loss due to the dead space in your current MLT.

efficiency_loss = (dead space volume)(last running gravity units)/(recipe gravity units)

For instance if I plug in the numbers from my last batch (45 mL, 1.012, and 404.75) I get:

efficiency loss = (0.012 gallons)(12 gu/gal)/(404.75 gu) = 0.035%

chemist308 said:

My tun is a converted cooler, and I'm reasonably happy with it. But I notice that the drain allows a little less than an inch of would be wort to lay in the bottom with the grains. Sparging three times with copious amounts of hot water seems to keep my efficiency on target, though.

But I wonder, how much better is the efficiency with a pot style mash lauter tun that has a false bottom?

Click to expand...

I am using the 10 gallon round rubbermaid cooler mash tun,with braid, when I first used it, it was leaving 1.75 quarts in the bottom, I then modified it using a short piece of copper tubing soldered to a 3/8" threaded open end plug and bent it into an elongated S, that way the tubing is sitting on the bottom of the tun, 0 wort left after draining, BobbyM showed me this, he might have a pic somewhere, like the others stated, there are a lot of things that affect effeciency, but at least you will get all the good stuff out of the tun, good luck.