Muslin OK for countertop Mash?

Hey folks!

Well, it's time for something new...so I am movin on up to the partial mash world. I am going with the BYO Countertop/2 gallon cooler/lazy man's mash. My question - he talks about punching and poking the bag of grains. I am used to using muslin to steep in, but he mentions using nylon. Is muslin not strong enough to be poking or jostling like that? Do I need to get the nylon bag? Thanks for your help!!!

Muslin is very pliable, and doesn't has as durable of a mesh as Nylon does. It will probably work, but it will let off a lot of fine particles. A very "tight" nylon bag will retain more of these.

Many people report success with the Large-size "Paint Strainer Bag" from Home Depot. Costs less than $4 for a 2-pack. (That way you have a spare, iffins you poke all the way through it and it leaks!)

I have five brews already on a pillow case sized nylon bag from my LHBS. I am running 2.5-4# grain per batch.

I probably could have gotten two brews out of muslin before it broke.

I wonder about cleaning muslin also. With the nylon I dump the grain out when it cools down to "warm". Then I let the thing dry out on the edge of the sink for 24 hours or so, turn it inside out to get the rest of the grain off, then launder in cold water.

I think pulling dried grain husks off the muslin would be pretty destructive to the muslin. Haven't tried it, but at the molecular level nylon is smooth like baby bottoms, muslin and grain husks are both coarse.

Thanks! I went with the nylon......definitely the right choice. HOw many times can you reuse the nylon?

Average numbers seem to be well above 5 - with TLC, probably 10+

Same for the HD Paint Strainers, I think.

Just to add an opinion on the reason for the nylon bag...

The nylon, paint strainer type bags also aren't stretchy, so they aren't constantly compressing the grain. I think it's important to have the mash water really infuse the grain, more so than with a simple steep, so having something that's constricting, like a muslin bag isn't the best choice for PM.

As for re-use, I think that as long as it's still whole, it's still good. ETA: sorry, re-reading that statement I realized how stupid it is. As in Duh! of course it's still good. Go with chriso's numbers.