How many #s of grain can fit in a 5gal MT?

Hey y'all,

I just ordered the Austin Homebrew Belgian Quad (Westy/St. Bernardus clone).

It comes with just over 17 pounds of grain. I don't know if that's gonna fit in my MT. Anyone have any experience with this sort of thing? I could borrow a friends MT and just do side by side mashing?

Try this,http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml Scroll down to can I mash it.

The typical rule of thumb is 12lbs of grain for a 5 gallon MT. This rule has been broken on multiple occasions by yours truly, but 15lbs is about the max and this puts you at a grist/liquor ratio of .9, which is bordering on problematically thick. So the simple answer here, is you will need to explore other options. If you are fly sparging, I would recommend a larger tun. If batch, then loading your tun twice or using a second tun would suffice.

When in doubt, check out the "can i mash it" calculator on my club's page here:
http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml

Cheers.

13.5 is about it.....

tjpfeister said:

problematically thick.

Click to expand...

Could you expand on that a bit? Low efficiency? Could that be overcome if I vorlauf a lot and maybe do some extra sparging? I batch sparge, FWIW.

I'll probably end up borrowing my friend's MT and splitting the grain between the two. I'd hate to end up with a Quad at 5% because my efficiency sucked.

I would just say split it into two mashes. Then you can combine them again in the cooler for a sparge after collecting your first runnings.

i did 14 lbs. once and it was a pain in the a**. had to sparge 3 times and efficency was 7% lower than my normal.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f11/how-big-your-mash-tun-needs-123585/

A sticky in the equipment forum...