BIAB Brewing (with pics)

I have brewed a couple things from clone brew book and followed the 90 minute mash and 90 minute boil. Has anyone else done the brews from this book with a 60 minute mash and 60 minute boil and following hop additions at 60 full volume per the 60 minute extract version or are you doing the 90 minute boil with reduced hops for 90 minutes. I would love to do 60 minute mash for a 10 gallon batch with 60 minute boil and 10 minute mash out with a small sparge if i can't get full volume in my 15 gallon pot..

MMJfan said:

Sure. I use two kettles (7.5 gal and 5 gal). I mash in about 6 gal. of water (give or take depending on my grain bill). Then, after the mash, I mashout in the same kettle by heating my kettle up to 170F or so. I then let it rest in that kettle for 10 minutes. While the big kettle is resting, I then take about 2.5 gal of water in my 5 gal kettle and heat it up to 170F and I use this for a sparge. I drain the bag in the 7.5 gal kettle before transferring to my sparge kettle. I then sparge for 20 min.

Once the sparge is done, I then let the bag drain again and then take the liquid from my sparge kettle and add it to what I have collected in my mash kettle and this usually gets me pretty close to my pre-boil volume. If I have to I take a colander upside down in a bucket and squeeze the bag to get a bit more liquid.

I'm consistently hitting 80-85% efficiencies. I tried skipping the mashout for a couple of batches and my efficiencies dropped to the 60's for each batch. Went back to doing mashouts and the efficiencies went back up fwiw.

So, this is the system that I have found works best for me. Others might say I could probably skip some steps, but I've tried and not gotten the results I'm happy with so I'm sticking with what works for me!

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Thanks for your response........if recipe calls for a 60 min mash I use 7 gallons in my 9 gallon pot, if it calls for 90 min boil I use 7.5 gallons....mash @148-150. I'll get as much wort from my bag without sparging,,,,,,,I have mashed out once but not the normal 170f for 10 mins,,I think I shorten the time. I need to check my ph next time. My beer is good, but not real good IMO. I'll try your method next time

I did my first All Grain today, Biab. A SMaSH Maris Otter/Cascade, everything went well. I got 82% efficiency as above, sparging the bag in a seperate pot with hot water. Because I only planned on 60%, my beer will be stronger and maltier than intended.

Congradulations John on your first BIAB.
Oh and with helping the lady in the kayak.

I just brewed my Bock up yesterday. Its my second BIAB and ended with 70% efficiency. Not as good as my 85% on my IPA. Not sure if my batch sparge threw it off, but i also went easy on bag squeezing. Next time I'll have to make sure I squeeze it like it owes me a favor.

Because fermentation pictures are like porn for homebrewers, I present to you: Bock!

Inkleg said:

Congradulations John on your first BIAB.
Oh and with helping the lady in the kayak.

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Thank you! It's been an exciting week.
Looking at my fermenter now, I let a lot of trub into it. Maybe more water. lower gravity, less trub next time. Brew and learn.

JohnSand said:

I did my first All Grain today, Biab. A SMaSH Maris Otter/Cascade, everything went well. I got 82% efficiency as above, sparging the bag in a seperate pot with hot water. Because I only planned on 60%, my beer will be stronger and maltier than intended.

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I just kegged my Maris Otter and Centennial SMaSH last week but it'll be a while before I have keg space open to try it. I did bottle 2 or 3 knowing it would be awhile.
Just a somewhat session beer and I really love MO and when used with 2 row, I can't always taste a big difference so using all MO is really a treat.

Well, I have four pounds of MO left, and four varieties of hops.

JohnSand said:

Well, I have four pounds of MO left, and four varieties of hops.

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Only four pounds

Yes, but I make two gallon batches. And I have some LME on hand....

So I will be doing my first all grain brew this weekend. Going for BIAB. I am in Mexico atm and getting good ingredients is a tough thing to come by. Havent brewed in almost 2 years so lets see how this goes. Got the ingredients from a guy in another part of mexico, can you guys take a look at the recipe and any tips or hints on a noobs first time with BIAB. 4.2 kg of grain, 90% pale malt, caramel malt 8%, 2% chocolate malt, hops additions on 1oz magnum and 1 oz crystal. Also using S-04

I have been brewing for only a short time, I have made 7 brews, of which 3 are BIAB. I make small 2.5 gallon batches, I like variety.

First, when I am mashing my temperature ranges from about 160F down to 150F. Is this range ok? I can either insulate better to hold in the heat, or I can turn my burner on to heat up the mash. I turned on the burner for my last mash and I let it get too high, I guess I don't have the control I thought I did. Is anyone way better then the other?

Second, My clips that I was using to hold the bag on have corroded because of the steam in the pot. Is it best to replace them every other brew or is there another option? The clip arms stick in the mash some, but it is the clip that is corroding.

Any help is appreciated.

raymadigan said:

I have been brewing for only a short time, I have made 7 brews, of which 3 are BIAB. I make small 2.5 gallon batches, I like variety.

First, when I am mashing my temperature ranges from about 160F down to 150F. Is this range ok? I can either insulate better to hold in the heat, or I can turn my burner on to heat up the mash. I turned on the burner for my last mash and I let it get too high, I guess I don't have the control I thought I did. Is anyone way better then the other?

Second, My clips that I was using to hold the bag on have corroded because of the steam in the pot. Is it best to replace them every other brew or is there another option? The clip arms stick in the mash some, but it is the clip that is corroding.

Any help is appreciated.

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It is best to try to hold the temp. Some use an old blanket or sleeping bag to wrap the pot for the mash. I had some leftover hot water tank wrap (Relfectix from Home Depot)) and some Velcro strips to make a koozy for the pot. It holds the mash temp to within 1 or 2 degrees at most. So I shoot for one degree high, wrap it and leave it for the hour. Here is a picture of it.





As for the clips I would get a Bag with an elastic at the top. There is someone on this board who makes custom BIAB Bags or you can use paint strainer bags or I have even seen a thread where someone found large laundry bags with a drawstring at Bed Bath And Beyond.

Looks good! are you trying to make like a mild? or brown?

ChrisL_ said:

It is best to try to hold the temp. Some use an old blanket or sleeping bag to wrap the pot for the mash. I had some leftover hot water tank wrap (Relfectix from Home Depot)) and some Velcro strips to make a koozy for the pot. It holds the mash temp to within 1 or 2 degrees at most. So I shoot for one degree high, wrap it and leave it for the hour.

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I have an old blanket I use but it really doesn't help that much. I have lots of the reflexive around that I could use to build a cover like you have. I was under the impression that I had to take it off to stir the mash, maybe that's part of my problem.

Also the clips stick up and have a large space where the heat can escape. I have a BIAB from wilserbrewer, but the strap won't hold the bag very tight. I could wrap the bag top onto the pot with a length of wire of some sort. Then I could trist it tight and eliminate the heat escape from the clips. Then with a koozy like you have would work.

Thanks for the help.

I've only done two mashes. But I put the kettle in the oven on warm and don't lose a degree. "Warm" is 170 on my oven, but the hot air doesn't heat the gallons of wort, too much mass, to little temperature difference.

raymadigan said:

Also the clips stick up and have a large space where the heat can escape. .

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If you are using a few binder clips, forl them back down into the pot, then the lid will fit on, and cover the pot with a few blankets...

Insulation is easier than trying to add heat, but if you do add heat, keep it low and stir and watch the temp with your free hand....cheers!

If you are making small batches, add the grain and put the whole pot in a warm oven...temps will be stable.

wilserbrewer said:

If you are using a few binder clips, forl them back down into the pot, then the lid will fit on, and cover the pot with a few blankets...

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I did this but the lid was still about an eights to a quarter inch off of the pot. I could feel the heat warming through the blanket.

wilserbrewer said:

If you are making small batches, add the grain and put the whole pot in a warm oven...temps will be stable.

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I am not able to brew inside, I am relegated to the garage. I have severe arthritis in both wrists and once I have the 5 gallons in the pot, there is no way I can lift it.

I figure my best option is to secure the bag with something on the outside somewhere close to the top, and to make a koozy container with the reflexiv I have laying around.

raymadigan said:

I did this but the lid was still about an eights to a quarter inch off of the pot. I could feel the heat warming through the blanket.

I am not able to brew inside, I am relegated to the garage. I have severe arthritis in both wrists and once I have the 5 gallons in the pot, there is no way I can lift it.

I figure my best option is to secure the bag with something on the outside somewhere close to the top, and to make a koozy container with the reflexiv I have laying around.

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I've seen some people use a nylon bunggie cord by wrapping it around the pot and bag towards the top

I figure my best option is to secure the bag with something on the outside somewhere close to the top, and to make a koozy container with the reflexiv I have laying around.[/QUOTE]

Cover the top with aluminum foil and you can wrap it around the clips to make sure heat stays in, then cover with your insulation.

raymadigan said:

Second, My clips that I was using to hold the bag on have corroded because of the steam in the pot. Is it best to replace them every other brew or is there another option? The clip arms stick in the mash some, but it is the clip that is corroding.

Any help is appreciated.

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Irishwhiskey said:

I've seen some people use a nylon bunggie cord by wrapping it around the pot and bag towards the top

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I started out using the clips to hold my bag in place, but I soon figured it would be much easier to just use a bungee cord. I just fold the bag over the top of my kettle and then wrap the bungee around the overhanging part of the bag and it works great...

+1 to mashing in a preheated oven. I preheat to 170 and turn the oven off when the pot goes in. That way when mash is done, no insulation / wrapping needs to be removed prior to the boil.

I also use the elastic paint strainer bags which I replace every 10 batches or so. Just remember to turn the heating element off when the strainer bag is in to avoid burning a hole in the bag - I learned that lesson the hard way (but still ended up with a good beer)

I brewed yesterday and had much better success.

First I ground my grain twice at the LHBS, I still think I had way too many whole grains.

I have one of the http://biabbags.webs.com/ bags and I just untied the knot at the end of the cord and used the cord to tie the bag to my pot. I felt pretty stupid, I tried so many times to tie it with the knot still in the end, just couldn't get it tight enough. I also made a koozy wrap for my kettle, I have to be outside in the garage so no oven. I also have severe arthritis in both hands so I probably couldn't lift the full kettle into the oven anyway. My strike temp was 158F and in an hour it went down to 150. About half the time it was uncovered because I made the koozy while I was mashing. Next time it will be better.

For the koozy wrap I used two layers for the sides and made a top piece that is 3 layers thick that I can use a bungie or velcro strap to hold it tight against the kettle. It is held together with blue tape and I will put it together better before my next brew.

I don't know how to compute all of those brewhouse efficiencies yet, but I took a gravity reading about a third of the way through filling my fermentor and it was at 1.054. I took another reading from the trub when i was cleaning up and it read 1.070. I'm not sure what that means yet.

Thanks for all of your help.

About the different SGs. I took a reading while I was draining my bag and it was much lower than I was expecting. After draining the bag completely, I stirred the wort and then took at reading and it was almost spot on. So I'd suggest stirring before taking a reading in the future.

Sounds like you got a pretty good process going. Cheers.

I am trying to figure out how to do a BIAB lager. I am having surgery in the end of August and want something in the fermentors so when I am done recovering, I don't have to start from scratch again.

My thought was to just do the basic BIAB mash and be done with it. All of the instructions call for a Decoction Mash and I have no idea how that would be done with the BIAB system. Is this rght or do I have to look elsewhere to figure this out.

raymadigan said:

I am trying to figure out how to do a BIAB lager. I am having surgery in the end of August and want something in the fermentors so when I am done recovering, I don't have to start from scratch again.

My thought was to just do the basic BIAB mash and be done with it. All of the instructions call for a Decoction Mash and I have no idea how that would be done with the BIAB system. Is this rght or do I have to look elsewhere to figure this out.

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It's easier than you would think with BIAB and most of us are doing it all the time (see the number of times this thread references a 'mash out' where we raise the temp to make extracting the sugars easier- that would be the most common form of a 'single decoction mash' used in brewing). Since you are able to direct fire your mash with the typical BIAB set up to move to the next target temp it is really easy, and all Decoction schedules are based on raising the temp followed by a rest period. To do it accurately you will either need to do some math, or spend some time with 'trial and error' on your set up to figure out how your set up's thermal mass will come into play. The trick is that once you shut off your burner, the temp will continue to rise because of the stored energy within the mass of your kettle, burner etc that will transfer to the mash over time, so you need to calculate what temp you will need to kill the heat at to make sure that your mash temp comes to rest within the range you want. Other than that, make sure that the grains aren't resting on the bottom so you don't scorch them (or your bag for that matter) stir constantly while you are heating and follow the standard recommendation for heating a mash- Do not exceed 2˚-4˚F/ minute rise in temp.

Technically this isn't a true Decoction Mash since you aren't removing part of the mash and boiling it to get the heat rise to the next rest and is instead a 'step mash' but the end result is basically the same as far as achieving the desired conversions at the various 'rests'. There are some who insist that the process of boiling the removed mash changes the flavor some over a step process (improving it) but I have yet to find anyone who can tell the difference between an actual Decoction brew vs the exact same recipe that follows the same step mash process like I outlined (be it from BIAB or some other temp adjustable mash processes- RIMS or HERMS)

You will need to know which Mash schedule you need to follow since different schedules are better for our modern, well modified malts than the traditional ones used by the Germans etc (they were just doing what they needed to to make great beer from the ingredients available to them at the time). A typical/traditional Triple Decoction schedule (the grandfather of all Decoctions for German Lager Styles- Pilsners, Dunkels, and Bocks) will typically have an Acid Rest (~97˚F for 1- 1.5 hours), Protein Rest (122˚-133˚F for about an hour), Saccrification Rest (the one that most home brewers know and care about- 149˚-158˚ for an hour) and a Mash Out (~170˚F for 10-30 minutes).

Check out the Wiki article on Decoction Mash on the site (https://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Decoction_mash)to see the various schedules and scenarios that they are better suited for to know which one you need to follow.

Anyone have issues with the bag melting on the bottom of the kettle with flame on? I have noticed my bag sticking to the rim of the kettle, presumably melting a little sure to the heat contact. On my last batch I did a mash out and stirred constantly with the heat on. After transferring to FV, I noticed a build up in one part of the kettle bottom. Could this be melted bag? Fyi - the bag looks fine.

I got bored today, its raining, so I decided to finish putting my Koozy together. The bottom is 2 layers of reflexiv thick and the top is three layers. It fits on pretty tight so I might not need to strap it on to keep it sealed. I had the reflexive laying around from another abandoned project and I bought 1 roll of the metal tape for about $4.

I've been doing BIAB for the past seven months or so. For my last few batches I've been crushing my own grain with a corona mill and have noticed that I'm getting extremely cloudy wort (but better efficiency). Now, for the most part and trub settles out in the fermenter, but it forces me to leave behind a significant portion of the wort in the boil kettle. Anyone have any advice on how to get clearer wort, or is that just one of the drawbacks with BIAB (no vorlauf to help filter particulates)?

That's why I make my batches .25 gal larger then my planned finish size. All the trub goes into the fermenter.

mb82 said:

That's why I make my batches .25 gal larger then my planned finish size. All the trub goes into the fermenter.

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I make small batches, 2.5 gallons, so I brew up an extra gallon. I never know how much will be evaporated, just having the burner up a little can affect how much wort I have left.

For me it is better to have a little more wort then I need then to have to take some wort from the bottom of the pot with lots of trub.

I stir the outside of the pot to vortex the trub to the middle of the pot, but before I started making more had to use some very thick wort.

Yeah that's my current solution, increasing the batch size. Just curious if there are other things people are doing.

Except standard trub management (irish moss, whirlpooling), sometimes I'm using cheese cloth. Sanitized by boiling and soaking in starsan. It fits perfectly into the big funnel. And wort is just poured through it. Always some tiny particles will find their way to the fermenter, but mostly what is left, it's a sludge from hops & cold break material

Anyone here tried going straight from a BIAB hot into a Sanke for a BIAB - No-Chill combo for max simplicity?

Did my first BIAB this weekend and i was shooting for 1.050 and hit 1.039. I used the recipe from here

My water temperature didn't change much after adding grains so I started mashing at 158. I didn't want to add cold water since I was pretty sure my amount estimate was going to be very close or high. Temp dropped about 1.5 degrees every 10 min.

I think part of the problem was I can't remember if I waited 10 minutes after getting to heating to 170, son was in the garage with me and it just slipped my mind to wait. So, basically after mashing, I raised temp to 170, then I think cut the heat, got pulley setup, then pulled it out, allowing it to drip for 15 min. Would it be normal to pick up that many gravity points from the 170 degree "sparge?" I also ended up leaving between .5 and a whole gallon in the kettle, most of which was trub, but some may have been viable wort. Ran out of room in the fermenter, hind sight i should've put it into 2 fermenters with a little more than 3 gallons in each.

Kinda sounds like you didn't get the evaporation you planned for if you ran out of room, which would definitely contribute to lower gravity.

After looking back at my plans, the recipe, and some calculations I think you're right. Pre-boil my gravity was 1.015, I had planned to do a 90 minute boil since I used Pilsner malt, but only ended up doing a 60 minute due to being distracted and just operating by habit from my first 6 or 7 brews.

The extra 30 min of boil would've "burned off" .5 gallon going by what I think my evaporation rate was. With a pre-boil of 1.015 and an OG of 1.039, looks like I was getting .012 per half hour. Add .012 to 1.039 and you get 1.051. So, maybe my estimation were pretty much spot on, just forgot to boil for an extra 30 minutes.

BrewHaas said:

Anyone here tried going straight from a BIAB hot into a Sanke for a BIAB - No-Chill combo for max simplicity?

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Even simpler, Sometimes I no chill in the stainless brew kettle, then pitch yeast and ferment in the same kettle, then rack to kegs...works well IMHO.

bolus14 said:

My water temperature didn't change much after adding grains so I started mashing at 158.

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I just finished my 4th BIAB this past weekend, and while I hit a 74% efficiency (thank you, BarleyCrusher) I still have the same problem with mash temps after adding grain.

I heated the water ten degrees about my target mash, but it seems like the temp just doesn't drop quickly - maybe a degree or so every 15 minutes. As a result my mash temps have tended to stay on the higher side of my target.

Without resorting to having to add cold water - which would throw off my water volumes - I'm not sure how to improve on that.

Perhaps the question should be: how long should it take - in theory - for temps to drop to a target range using room temperature grains in a BIAB brew, with strike water approx 10 degrees above target mash temp?