Monk
Well-Known Member
I'm not really new to all grain, but I'm still in the stage of learning quite a bit. I have a question regarding sparge volume:
I just made a 5 gallon batch and got pretty good efficiency, for me. The grain bill had
9 lbs Maris Otter Pale malt
1 lb. Specialty
I mashed in with about 3.25 gallons for a mash temp of 152-154F and allowed it to mash for about 75 minutes. I then topped up the mash tun with about 1 gallon of water at 185F. I mixed, vorlaufed and drained. Then I dumped in another 4 gallons of water, mixed, let it sit, vorlaufed and drained. At this point I had about 6 gallons of wort. I tossed in a last 1.5 gallons of sparge water to end up with about 7.5 gallons of wort.
My question is this: does that seem like a reasonable pre-boil volume? I had previously always done the 1 qt/lb for mash water and .5gal/lb for sparging. But that always seemed to leave me with an efficiency around 65%. This time I got around 78%. What have you guys found to be good amounts of mash and sparge water for a basic ale with approximately the same grist as this one?
Thanks in advance. I'm always appreciative of the wealth of knowledge handed out so freely around here. Cheers.
monk
I just made a 5 gallon batch and got pretty good efficiency, for me. The grain bill had
9 lbs Maris Otter Pale malt
1 lb. Specialty
I mashed in with about 3.25 gallons for a mash temp of 152-154F and allowed it to mash for about 75 minutes. I then topped up the mash tun with about 1 gallon of water at 185F. I mixed, vorlaufed and drained. Then I dumped in another 4 gallons of water, mixed, let it sit, vorlaufed and drained. At this point I had about 6 gallons of wort. I tossed in a last 1.5 gallons of sparge water to end up with about 7.5 gallons of wort.
My question is this: does that seem like a reasonable pre-boil volume? I had previously always done the 1 qt/lb for mash water and .5gal/lb for sparging. But that always seemed to leave me with an efficiency around 65%. This time I got around 78%. What have you guys found to be good amounts of mash and sparge water for a basic ale with approximately the same grist as this one?
Thanks in advance. I'm always appreciative of the wealth of knowledge handed out so freely around here. Cheers.
monk