Tannin extraction?

On an earlier post I explained how I determined my boil off rate to be 1 gallon per half hour. My first all grain batch will have a 10 pound malt bill. So my question is if I am doing a Batch sparge and a 90 min boil at what point do I worry about tannin extraction. Should I do two sparges and just check the wort gravity until it hits 1.010 then stop on the second sparge? If I dont make it to my 8.5 gallon preboil volume do I just top off to get to my preboil?
With such a small grain bill(relatively) do I have to be concerned?

Thanks, Tim.

Tannin extraction is one of the big bogeymen of homebrewing. My understanding is that to extract significant tannins from grain husks you need at least two things: mash/sparge temps above 170F, and high pH. I acidify my sparge water slightly with 1ml 88% lactic acid per 4gal and sparge at 170 plus or minus a couple.

So I could just do enough sparging to get my preboil and RDWHAHB?. With my current set up I have to do 2 sparges to get to my preboil volume. It of course is no problem for me I just want to be as prepared as possible for my first All Grain batch.


Thanks for the response Dwarven.

Tim27 said:

So I could just do enough sparging to get my preboil and RDWHAHB?. With my current set up I have to do 2 sparges to get to my preboil volume. It of course is no problem for me I just want to be as prepared as possible for my first All Grain batch.


Thanks for the response Dwarven.

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Yeah, I would expect you to be fine. I have pretty hard and alkaline water (the reason I acidify) and I'm fine when double sparging.

I have to use bottled water because my tap water is absolutely too hard for anything even drinking:cross:. It just tastes bad and leaves scale on everything.Should I use half spring half RO water? Or just straight RO water?

Tim27 said:

I have to use bottled water because my tap water is absolutely too hard for anything even drinking:cross:. It just tastes bad and leaves scale on everything.Should I use half spring half RO water? Or just straight RO water?

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Straight spring water, .88 cents a gallon at the walmart where I live.

Awesome, wish I could find spring water at that price. Guess I will have to shop around.