My first AG experience

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nyer

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First of all, thank you to everyone on the forum, I would never have tried this without all of the good information on here.

I brewed up a batch of Edwort's Haus Pale Ale. Things seemed to go pretty well and AG is much more fun and rewarding than extracts.

A couple of issues came up and hopefully someone can help me out.

After dough in I let everything sit for 1 hour at 152.6. I was supposed to add 5 qts. of 175F water but only 4 qts. would fit. I'm using a 5 gallon water cooler. I stirred in the 4 qts and waited about 5 minutes before draining. When it got low enough I added the 5th qt. How long should you wait after adding the 175F water before draining?

My OG after the boil was taken at 69.8F and it was only 1.042, it should have been 1.051. I don't know what caused this, could it have been the issue with the 5 qts. of water? I got the ingredients from AHS and to me the crush didn't look that great , but, I dont' have anything to compare it to either.

Even with the few issues it was tons of fun and the brew is happily bubbling away at 69F.
 
Can't comment too much on the finer points, but I've been splitting my sparge water into two equal amounts (sparge volume calculated @ .5 gallon/lb of grain). Once you've vorlaufed and taken your first runnings, add your first batch sparge. The temp of this water is usually 180 for me (using Bobby-M's all grain primer). Stir the grain and sparge water in, let sit for 10 minutes, drain. Repeat. This gives me a near perfect yield every time.

Jason
 
Not experienced, but one thing you can do is make sure the starches are converted before draining the mash. One was to do this is with iodine (buy at any drugstore/grocery store). Put a drop of wort on a saucer then add iodine a drop of iodine, if the color does not change then the starches are converted. If you don't have iodine, the wort should have a bit of an iridium glare too it after it is converted. After stirring the wort thoroughly there are usually some small bubbles. If those have an iridium shine to them the wort should be ready to be drained. I'm not positive that this is foolproof, but I've done 2 iodine tests and both times the wort was ready it had this iridium shine. On my last mash (first time AG) I had to mash an extra 15 minutes (1 hour 15 minutes) to get conversion (at 152). If I didn't wait I'm sure my efficiency would have been a lot lower.
 
It sounds like your efficiency was low, did you take gravity readings preboil? Flyangler has it right try splitting up your sparging you can usually extract more sugars with multiple sparges I usually hit around 80% extraction with this method. By the way I had a Edwort's pale ale that came out that low on gravity once and it still came out to be a pretty good beer, it was more of a summer refresher. Congrats on your first AG, it will get easier over time and your going to love the results.
 
Not bad for your first brew. I recommend stirring a couple times during the mash to keep the sugars in suspension. You corrected O.G. is 1.043 and the beer should finish dry around 1.010 or 1.009, so you will have a nice drinkable beer around 4.5% abv.

It works this way sometimes. I kegged my Bavarian Hefe this morning and because the Blichmann Boilermaker evaporates more, my Hefe came in at 6.9% abv. That's going hurt one morning. :D
 
It sounds like your efficiency was low, did you take gravity readings preboil? Flyangler has it right try splitting up your sparging you can usually extract more sugars with multiple sparges I usually hit around 80% extraction with this method. By the way I had a Edwort's pale ale that came out that low on gravity once and it still came out to be a pretty good beer, it was more of a summer refresher. Congrats on your first AG, it will get easier over time and your going to love the results.

My preboil gravity at 70F was 1.032. This was with 6.5 gallons.

I thought of another question, when you vorlauf do you let in drain as fast as it will go? Mine drained pretty fast, I wondered if I should close the valve a bit to slow it down.

I'm doing Edwort's bavarian wheat next. I have to figure a time and do the sterter. I may use a larger rectagular cooler I have since the 5 gallon water cooler was to small.
 
Not bad for your first brew. I recommend stirring a couple times during the mash to keep the sugars in suspension. You corrected O.G. is 1.043 and the beer should finish dry around 1.010 or 1.009, so you will have a nice drinkable beer around 4.5% abv.

It works this way sometimes. I kegged my Bavarian Hefe this morning and because the Blichmann Boilermaker evaporates more, my Hefe came in at 6.9% abv. That's going hurt one morning. :D

I would love to watch you brew. I would probably ask dozens os questions and take pages of notes. I learned alot watching videos but it would be nice to be able to see the entire process from start to finish.
I'm pretty sure the beer will turn out well and I'm more than happy with how things turned out for a first try.
 
My preboil gravity at 70F was 1.032. This was with 6.5 gallons.

I thought of another question, when you vorlauf do you let in drain as fast as it will go? Mine drained pretty fast, I wondered if I should close the valve a bit to slow it down.

I'm doing Edwort's bavarian wheat next. I have to figure a time and do the sterter. I may use a larger rectagular cooler I have since the 5 gallon water cooler was to small.

Just vorlauf until your runnings are clear (or clearer) and then start running your wort into you boil kettle or bucket, you can drain as fast as it will go but if you have troubles with stuck sparges I would slow it down a bit. It sounds like your preboil was on the low side you probably wanted more in the 1.042 range or so preboil, as Edwort said give those grains a good stir and try sparging twice next time and like I said before you'll still have a good beer on your hands there.
Edit: The other thing is don't worry too much about efficiency right now just keep some DME on had if you don't hit your gravity or live with the lower gravity, you will eventually figure out the efficiency of your rig and then be able to make adjustments such as increasing you grain bill to compensate, that being said I think you have a fairly solid rig you probably just need to try double batch sparging and then you'll be there.
 
I did make sure the runnings were clear, it only took 1 1/2 qts. Then it ran drained as fast as I would let it. I think I may try sparging twice when I do the wheat. I might try that one Wednesday morning.
 
Make sure to check the calibration of your hydrometer... I have been taking readings forever with the same hydrometer and there was usually a trend of slightly lower gravities than I would have liked. Just yesterday, when I did a batch, I realized my hydrometer is supposed to be read at 60deg F and I was typically reading it around 70deg. I think it is fairly standard for hydrometers to be calibrated at 68deg. Try checking yours and adjust your read accordingly.
 
After dough in I let everything sit for 1 hour at 152.6.

Next time mash for 2 hours to compensate for not milling your own. My efficiency went way up as a result. You can also use PH 5.2 PH Stabilizer for lighter brews.
 
I had the same issue of low efficiency on my first two AG batches of Ed's House Ale. By moving to doing no mash out, two sparges pushed me up to 75-77%.
Basically it is collecting your first runnings, then split the remaining volume you need for your boil into two sparges of 180F to 185F, I have gone as high as using 190F without pushing the grain bed above 170F.
Here are some notes from my AG, I should have used 190F sparge water in hindsight.
09:00-10:00 Mash at 150F for 60 minutes.
First runnings 1.071 2Gal
10:40 Batch sparge with 2.5 gal at 183F. 159F Bed.
Second runnings 1.048 2.5 gal.
11:00 Batch sparge with 2.5 gal at 185F. 164F Bed.
Third runnings 1.022 2.5 gal.
 
If your doing a wheat beer next, take your time in the mash, on sparge outs stir well, wait 15 minutes before collections. AG wheat seems to kill my efficiency.
 
I just did my first AG this weekend doing batch sparge, the Bobby M method, and had a low EF%. I also noted that the crush from AHS on my grains was very coarse. The hulls were most entirely intact and most grains were just cracked in half. I did the Midwest Liberty cream ale recipe and Promash predicted a SG of 1.052, Midwest says 1.042 and I came up with 1.036.

Anyway, it looks like I had some of the same problems you had.
 
Next time mash for 2 hours to compensate for not milling your own. My efficiency went way up as a result. You can also use PH 5.2 PH Stabilizer for lighter brews.

I don't know how much of an increase in efficency you are going to get with a two hour mash. There are probably other issues that could be addressed first.

+2 for two sparges. I believe it is Bobby_M's method I use. Split your sparge in half. I actually added about .5 gal extra just to be sure. Add the first sparge water stir and let sit for 10 min. Vorlof and collect runnings. Add second sparge addition, stir and let sit for 10 minutes. Vorlof and collect runnings. For my first two AG batches I reached 82% and 78%.
 
I think I will try the Bobby M method with the wheat this Sunday. Last night I told my wife I was buying her a nice barley crusher for her birthday. I figured since she was drinking the beer she should contribute to the equipment purchases. For some reason she didn't agree with my logic. Maybe I better ask for it for christmas.
 
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