Partial Mash Q's

Hey all, im brewing a belgian wit recipe today and its going to be my first partial mash. Im reaaaaallly confused though on mash temperatures and how to figure out the volumes and everything. Other than reading this BYO article, http://byo.com/feature/1536.html , im pretty lost. A few have tried helping me out, and have, but im still confused so I thought I would post this again, I really want to brew today.

Recipe -

Stats
OG 1.051
FG 1.013
IBU 15
ABV 4.9 %
SRM 8

Specifics
Boil Volume 3 gallon
Batch Size 5 gallons
Yeast : WLP400

Fermentables:
Mashed -
1.00 American Two-row Pale
1.00 Crystal 20L
1.00 Flaked Wheat
1.00 Belgian Carapils
1.00 American Wheat (its actually White Wheat, but was told American Wheat is the same and its all I could find in software)
Extract -
3.30 Wheat Liquid Malt Extract (Late addition, @15)


Hops:
0.50 Glacier @30
1.00 Liberty @10
- 1/2 tsp Coriander
- 1/2 oz Bitter Orange Peel
0.50 Glacier @5
- 1/2 tsp Coriander
- 1/2 oz Bitter Orange Peel


Im just assuming the mash temp will be 154F or so, and the sparge will be 170F or so, however, these are generic numbers that im just ballparking cuz I have no idea how to figure it out otherwise.

Any help would be appreciated!

I'm not sure what your questions are, but in terms of figuring out your strike water temp, you can use this calculator...

http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml

If your desired temp is 154, you measure the temp of your grains, enter the 2 numbers and it will tell you how hot your water needs to be...

This other BYO article will help as well...http://***********/feature/986.html

For measuring the temperature of my grains, do i literally just stick a thermometer in the bags they are in?

I suppose what I was asking was, how do I decide what temperatures to mash and sparge at? (remember this is my first time PM'ing) Why would one recipe call for 154F and another call for 156F? How do I decide what is the right temperature for my brew? Or maybe im just confusing myself here and it really doesn't matter. I donno

Sorry if im not being clear

What I would do bring 1.75 gallons to whatever the strike temp the calculator says it is.

When you reach that temp, put the water in the cooler, then add the grains, and stir it a bit to makes sure that the grain is all wet, put the lid on the cooler and leave it alone for 60-90 minutes...I usually mash for 90.

When you get near your time, then bring another 2 gallons of water to boil in another pot. That is your sparge water....

When your mash time is up, slowly drain off the wort into your kettle (Use a cup and recirculate the first runnings back into the cooler until any grain hulls don't come through. Then sparge the grain with the next batch of water into your kettle....

Then put kettle on stove abd bring it to a boil, then brew beer as normal....

EamusCatuli said:

For measuring the temperature of my grains, do i literally just stick a thermometer in the bags they are in?

I suppose what I was asking was, how do I decide what temperatures to mash and sparge at? (remember this is my first time PM'ing) Why would one recipe call for 154F and another call for 156F? How do I decide what is the right temperature for my brew? Or maybe im just confusing myself here and it really doesn't matter. I donno

Sorry if im not being clear

Click to expand...

Yes you stick a thermometer into your bowl/bag of grains....I usually dump them all into a big bowl and mix them together.....If they didn't come pre mixed from my HBS

For your first PM aim for the middle, 155 degrees...

Later read up in How to Brew and on here the discussion about all grain brewing and you will learn about the reasons for different mash temperatures...but for this time just split the difference...

Thanks a ton Revvy, that helps

My only question now is why you are mashing for 90 minutes? The article says 30-45, im assuming your just letting it sit longer to ensure everything converted?

Also, the sparge water, you said get it to a boil, but it should never be over 180 right? (tannnins are released if I read right)

Thanks again for your help

EamusCatuli said:

Thanks a ton Revvy, that helps

My only question now is why you are mashing for 90 minutes? The article says 30-45, im assuming your just letting it sit longer to ensure everything converted?

Also, the sparge water, you said get it to a boil, but it should never be over 180 right? (tannnins are released if I read right)

Thanks again for your help

Click to expand...

I do 90 on my mini-mashes to get as much out of it as possible (and 'cause they guy who talked me through my first PM told me to)...

I bring the sparge water to the same temp as my intended strike temp....so it would be 155...

When you're doing full volume ag boils, things like strike temp, alkalinity of water, length of mash become more crucial...for Partial mashes, the adding of the Extract and the top off water really sort of balances everything out for us...so it's less crucial

Revvy,

Couple more questions,


Do you even use a grain bag when you PM? The way you described things sounded like you just threw your grains in the cooler.

Also, did you get 1.75 gallons for mash and 2 gallons for sparge with a calculation based on my 5lbs of grain? How do you know how much water to be PM'ing with, in other words.


Thanks a ton

I know you were directing your questions to Revvy, but I just wanted to throw in my 2 cents.

For mashing, I always use 1.25 quarts of water per pound of grain- so that's 1.5 gallons for the strike water. If you use 1.4 quarts per pound, that would give you 1.75 gallons. That's right in there, but I'd suggest the lower amount just in case you miss your mash temperature- then you can add more hot or cold water to hit your temperature. Most people sparge with .5 gallons of water per pound of grain- that rinses the sugars without oversparging and risking tannin extracting. You want to raise the temperature of the grain bed to 168 with your sparge water, so you may want to have your sparge water at 172, and then add it to the drained grain bed. I've never done a PM longer than 45-60 minutes, so I'm not helpful with that.

I used a grain bed when I did PM, but if you have a braid or a false bottom, its not needed. If you do use a grain bag, make sure you really smush it around in the water, wetting all the grains thoroughly. Don't overpack the bag- it should be loosely filled so that the water can saturate.

EamusCatuli said:

Revvy,

Couple more questions,


Do you even use a grain bag when you PM? The way you described things sounded like you just threw your grains in the cooler.

Also, did you get 1.75 gallons for mash and 2 gallons for sparge with a calculation based on my 5lbs of grain? How do you know how much water to be PM'ing with, in other words.


Thanks a ton

Click to expand...

I do use a grain bag in my cooler.

What I do is put one of these folding steamers in the bottom (Get it at any grocery store, K-mart, Target, Walmart, etc.)



(Unscrew, or break off the center post)

The steamer lifts the grainbag above the spigot and prevents a stuck sparge.

Then I put in a grainbag, fold it over the threads and rubberband it in place.

I use 1.25 quarts/per pound of grain as a water to grain ratio...Since you're using 5 pounds of grain that around 1.75 gallons of mash water.

I rounded up to 2 gallons for the sparge to take into consideration water absorption by the grain in the mash, and evaporation due to boil off.

Your boil will begin then if all the water sparges out of the grain with 3 and 3/4 gallons of water (It won't all come out so you'll probably have somewhare between 3 1/4 and 3 3/4 gallons- Depending on like I said grain absorbtion, shape of cooler, yadda yadda yadda.)

Since you will be topping off in your fermenter, like in a normal extract recipes, the amount of wort you actually get at the beginning won't really matter.... After your boil you, probably will have close to 3 gallons of wort +/-

You'll top that off to 5 gallons later.

One thing you might want to consider doing is replacing the push in spigot from the cooler with a bottling bucket type...it will make it easier to empty....You can either buy a new one, or swap out the one from your bottling bucket...Just clean it out thoroughly both before and after use...

So basically I am making the temperature of the mash/ sparge water higher because once it hits the cooler temperature of the grains, the water temp. will drop. I think this is all coming together.

Thanks for the help guys. Im sure ill have more questions later.

What is a grain bed, btw?

EamusCatuli said:

So basically I am making the temperature of the mash/ sparge water higher because once it hits the cooler temperature of the grains, the water temp. will drop. I think this is all coming together.

Thanks for the help guys. Im sure ill have more questions later.

What is a grain bed, btw?

Click to expand...

Yes, but use the calculator I linked yesterday, it will take the guess work out of it...

Grainbed is just that a bed, or layer of grain....It just what they call the pile of wet grain in your mash tun/cooler.

One question of yours that hasn't really been addressed yet was why those temps.

You can mash between 148 and 160, but most go for the 150 - 156 range for single infusions or PMs. The lower your mash temp, the more the enzymes will have a chance to break the sugars down into their simpler forms, making it easier for the yeast to eat. So, lower mash temp means lighter bodied beer because the yeast eat more of the sugars. Higher mash temp leaves more complex sugars that will leave a residual sweetnes and fuller body in your beer, it just depends on the style you are brewing. With a wit I would probably aim for 152, but that's just me.

The sparge temp is going to always be about 170. The reason for this, is you don't want your mash temp to get to low while you are sparging, converting complex sugars down and making a lkighter bodied beer than intended. To keep this from happening you raise the temp of the grain bed to 170, which halts all enzymatic reactions, keeping the sugars from breaking down any further. Any higher than 170 though, and you can start to extract tannins. Happy brewing.

So I want to sparge asap after collecting the first wort of the mash to avoid further enzymatic breakdowns? And if I learned everything correct, my strike temp for the sparge water should be around 180 to hit 170? Or should I heat up the sparge water to 170 and throw it in without any calculation?

Also, I have been told that there should be water boiling in my kettle in addition to the mash/sparge water.....necessary?

EamusCatuli said:

So I want to sparge asap after collecting the first wort of the mash to avoid further enzymatic breakdowns? And if I learned everything correct, my strike temp for the sparge water should be around 180 to hit 170?

Click to expand...

Correct.

Also, I have been told that there should be water boiling in my kettle in addition to the mash/sparge water.....necessary?

Click to expand...

If you have an extra pot, it can come in handy in case you need to bump it up a couple extra degrees after adding your sparge water in case you don't quite reach 170, but not necessary.

One more question and I think im ready.....


How long do I sparge at? 5 mins, 10?

Sparging's not about time, it's about flow...it's a rinse, not another mash...

Sparging

Once recirculation stops, sparging begins. Gently deliver the hot sparge water over the top of the grain bed. There are special tools called sparge arms designed to sprinkle the water over the grain without disturbing the grain bed. You can also improvise by splashing the sparge water over a spoon or through a strainer before it hits the grain bed. The objective is to avoid boring holes in the grain bed with the sparge water.

When sparging, you should balance the inputs and outputs of the lauter tun so that the grain bed is always covered with liquid. As in recirculating, do not allow the grain bed to go dry until sparging is complete.

The sparge water should be about 170° F when it enters the lauter tun. This helps to maintain the temperature in the lauter tun, which aids in efficient sugar extraction. Avoid sparge water temperatures in excess of 175° F, as this promotes the extraction of tannins from the grain and leads to a harsh, astringent flavor in the finished beer.

Click to expand...

You sparge til your 2 gallons of sparge water has flowed through into your brew pot.

oh a small kitchen thermometer with a 5" probe is perfect for taking the grain temp, you can just stick it in the grain bed....



Best of all they're cheap at the grocery store...I use mine more than I use my big brewing thermometer....For boiling up 2 cups of wort for starters.

I also stick it right into my hydrometer sample flask along with my hydrometer when take gravity readings, that way I know the temp of the sample for making a hydrometer temp adjustment.

Well guys, thanks for all the help you have given me, sadly, I just tried to do the PM and I muffed it up. Just a small brain fart was all, I put in 2.75 gallons in the mash, not 1.75. After I was ready to add the 2 gallons of sparge water I realized that if I had, my 5 gallon kettle would have over 5 gallons boiling in it. (I set 1/2 gallons of water boiling in the kettle before I put the mash in it, just to make sure the mash temp. would not drop). Obviously by the time I realized this I decided to stop while I still had good hops, yeast, and extract.

SO, im going to have to eat the 6 or 7 dollars i spent on grains and re-schedule the brew.

Im going to look on the bright side though. I have more questions, haha! If you could answer them I would love it;

1) How can I ensure the temp. inside the cooler during the mash is staying at 152F for the entire 60 minutes that I decided to mash at?

2) Should the sparge water also be heated to about 11F more than intended? I wanted to use 170F, so should I have heated the water to 180F?

3) When I emptied the mash from the cooler to the kettle, I realized I didnt have the best setup to put the cooler above the kettle for transfer. After I figured out a way to make it work, the mash literally streamed out of the spigot into the kettle pretty vigorously, is this bad? I read somewhere that you should keep it as steady and light as possible. How can I do that?

4) Im worried about the time and temp. spent between emptying the mash into the kettle and sparging, I only have one pot so it cant be bang bang. I tried putting 1/2 gallon of boiling water in the kettle before emptying the mash into it to "fix" the grains, but obviously it didnt help as I had too much water volume in my pot.

Am i worrying too much about this stuff?? Im so aggravated. . . .... and confused.

So, you didn't finish the brew? Bummer.

Ok, some answers to those questions-

1. Preheat your cooler with some hot water (150 degrees-ish), cover it and shake it up a bit. Let it sit for 10 minutes or so, then drain. That will help keep the temperature steady. Also, add the water first, a little hotter than you need, and let the temp drop to your strike temperature. Then add your grains and stir well. And more hot water if needed to bring the temperature up, or more cold if you're too hot. But do that slowly- it takes a few minutes for the temperature to equalize.

2. No. You want to bring your 150-ish grain bed to 168. I use brewing software (Beersmith) to help figure it out. It's usually about 175, but it really depends on how much grain and what the mash temperature is.

3. Use tubing- don't let it splash. Plus, the siphon effect of the tubing helps drain the mash tun. You should be able to find something to fit over your ball valve, or into your spigot, depending on what you're using.

4. I heat up my sparge water in my spaghetti pot while my mash is taking place. Usually it's less than 3 gallons, so whatever pot you have will work. Or, drain your runnings into your primary fermenter, so you can start your sparge water heating during the mash. You have to have the sparge water ready when it's time to sparge! Pouring from the primary bucket to the brewpot isn't recommended, due to the possibility of hot side aeration, but many of us do it all the time. I do it with my final runnings, simply because I can't physically lift a brewpot full of 7 gallons of hot wort to my stovetop. So, I collect some runnings in my primary, and then gently pour it into my brewpot.

I'll see if I can find an easy demo of this- it's not nearly as hard as I'm making it sound! It's just like extract with steeping grains brewing in many ways.

Ok, here's a short write up from howtobrew.com on PM:

http://www.howtobrew.com/section3/chapter18-4.html

He's doing a fly sparge, so the sparging is a bit different than I do it, but that's the general way I've done it.

Okay, I think im a little more confused haha. Are you saying empty all the mash and the sparge water into my primary and THEN pour that into my brewpot to start brewing? I am worried that my mash temp's would drop if I do that, im already worried about that!

I just feel that im not comfortable with these different temperatures. Some people have told me to heat up my waters 11F more than strike, some say 5, some say just ballpark it. Then the calculators tell me whatever number they calculated, and I dont see how if I pour 166F into my cooler mash that it will then actually sit at 152F, for almost an hour at that. GAH!

Plus everyone is talking about a grain bed, but I dont have one, I have a bag of grain! I feel half the directions im using arent relevant because Im using a grain bag.

Ok, first-
go get a beer and relax a little!!!! Believe me, it's not that complicated. It sounds much more complicated than it is. If I can do it, anybody can! I'm a middle aged petite woman with very little mathematical or mechanical ability. If it was difficult or complicated, I would NEVER do it!

So, take a deep breath. Now..... you know, Beersmith offers a free trial. I would highly recommend this, as a way to get started with figuring strike temps. There are complicated formulas that some use to figure out their temps, but you have enough to think about for right now, so I think that will help with the "how much water, what temperatures,, etc" questions.

You DO have a grain bed. Yes, it's in a bag. But it's still going to compact down at the bottom, and sit nicely once you wet it well when you mash in. So, ALL of that stuff in howtobrew on the first page of the link applies to you. The only part that may vary is the sparging process- I assume you're batch sparging.

Now, you asked about the mash runnings and sparge runnings. Well, if you only have one possible pot (and maybe you have another possiblity somewhere- a canning pot? a spaghetti pot? a soup pot?), yes, you can drain your runnings into your primary. Or any other container than can hold it. Then, when your brewpot is empty, very gently pour your wort into the brewpot and put it on to boil. That's not ideal, but it will work until you get a second pot to heat up the sparge water. You should start heating your sparge water during the mash.

Sorry if I seem to be confusing you more- I don't seem to be able to explain this very well at all. You could re-read the howtobrew link again (since he explains it well) and maybe someone else can better answer any specific questions you may have.

haha, you are not confusing me, its the whole process. I feel that in the somewhat exact science brewing is, this partial mash thing has an awful alot of holes in it.


I guess il RDWHAHB, but my mind wont!

you know, I was thinking- my first PM was from austinhomebrew.com. It came with all the ingredients, and great instructions. I did the mashing in a grain bag in my bottling bucket. Maybe for your first time, consider a PM kit from them? Then it'll be much clearer as you follow the step by step instructions for your EXACT recipe. The strike water, etc, will all be correct. Then, the next time, you could attempt your own version. Just a thought!

Thats a heck of a thought! haha, but you see now that my first PM recipe defeated me, I must get back on the horse.....as they say. :rockin:


Thanks for all your help though, im a bit of a perfectionist and a worrier, not a good combo!

EamusCatuli said:

I feel that in the somewhat exact science brewing is, this partial mash thing has an awful alot of holes in it.

Click to expand...

Not really. You're confusing variables for holes. (Though brewing can be treated as an inexact science anyway--people have been brewing for thousands of years with no knowledge of the difference between beta amylase and protease.) Even when approached from a scientific standpoint, a lot of it ends up being up to the brewer's preferences. Everyone has a different approach.

You'll see different mash temps because different temps produce worts with different amounts of unfermentable sugars. Lower temps favour beta amylase and produce a more fermentable wort, while higher temps favour alpha amylase and produce a less fermentable wort. Not that it matters as much for a partial mash, since the fixed fermentability of your malt extract will help cover up any mistakes you make.

You'll see different ratios of water to grain in the mash because this, too, affects the fermentability of the wort. A thinner mash takes longer to convert because the enzymes are more diluted, but results in a more fermentable wort.

You'll see different lengths for the mash because this also affects the fermentability (the longer the mash, the more fermentable the wort) and because some people like to give the mash extra time just to make sure conversion is complete.

You'll see different sparge methods because different people prefer different approaches. I like to do a split batch sparge, but Bob over there likes to do a fly sparge with a separate mashout. It's not important. Particularly for a partial mash.

You'll see different temperatures for the sparge water because it's really not that important. Ideally it should be as hot as possible without raising the temperature of the grain bed above 170°F, to make the sugars more soluble without extracting excessive amounts of tannin, thus increasing your efficiency. But...in a partial mash you're mainly doing this for flavour and relying on malt extract for your sugars, so efficiency isn't extremely important.

You'll see different sparge volumes because (within reason--over-sparging will result in tannin extraction) sparging more results in higher efficiency, at the expense of having a larger volume to boil down.

However, you can ignore all of these variables and go for a middle-of-the-road approach and make perfectly good beer. 1.5 quarts of water per pound of grain, 150-155°F mash temperature, mash length of about an hour, sparge with water at 170°F and use 2.25 quarts of sparge water per pound of grain. Basically, as long as you stay within a reasonable range of these values it's really difficult to **** up a partial mash so badly that the beer's ruined.

To address a concern you raised below: You don't have to worry about your mash temperature (or the temperature of your wort) dropping after the mash, as conversion has already taken place and you're about to heat the wort to boiling anyway.

Even your mishap of adding too much strike water isn't difficult to recover from. Just check the temperature to make sure that you haven't gone above about 160°F (if you did, add some cold water or ice to bring the temperature down--enzymes take time to denature, so you should still be okay), then make sure you get complete conversion (remember that a thinner mash may take a bit longer) and reduce the volume of your sparge water by the amount of extra water that you added.

In closing, I sincerely recommend that you read through http://howtobrew.com/, as it does a fairly good job of teaching the basics of how to brew.

Wow, you went far and beyond right there, thanks alot. You really helped me calm down with my temps and whatnot. I think im okay to do this, im just a perfectionist and I dont want to ruin a good beer, ya know? BUT, i need to relax, i know this. Thanks for the advice.

I have pretty much read through palmers online book, but I was thinking about buying his hard copy (as I hear there is more in it).

Again, thanks