First all grain...have many questions...

Sorry, kinda long but I'm trying to figure this out...

Did my first all grain the other day, Anchor Steam Liberty Ale clone. Efficiency turned out at 59%. Looking to get this better for next time...what did I do wrong? This is what I did...

1.) Added my 3.75 gallons of 170 degree strike water to mash tun...ratio of 1.25 qt of water per pound of grain.

2.) Let it sit for a couple of minutes covered.

3.) Added grain, stirred, checked mash temp to see if it reached 154, which it did, covered for an hour.

4.) Did mash out....added couple of gallons of 175 degree water. Did vorlauf, couple of beer pitchers worth.

5.) Started to sparge....kinda of quickly then slowed it down a little.

6.) After I collected about three gallons I added another 3 gallons of 175 degree sparge water. Vorlauf, collected 6.5 gallons total.

Looking back to see why my efficiency was off, I realized I should have stirred the grain after I added the sparge water and let it sit for 10 mins before collecting my runnings. I also should have sparged slower and should have drained the mash tun fully in the first runnings before adding more water. Am I right in these assumptions?

Questions:
Can a mash out decrease efficiency?

How hot should my mash out/sparge water be?

What else can I do to increase efficiency?

Thanks for the help guys!

Shoemaker said:

Sorry, kinda long but I'm trying to figure this out...

Did my first all grain the other day, Anchor Steam Liberty Ale clone. Efficiency turned out at 59%. Looking to get this better for next time...what did I do wrong? This is what I did...

1.) Added my 3.75 gallons of 170 degree strike water to mash tun...ratio of 1.25 qt of water per pound of grain.

2.) Let it sit for a couple of minutes covered.

3.) Added grain, stirred, checked mash temp to see if it reached 154, which it did, covered for an hour.

4.) Did mash out....added couple of gallons of 175 degree water. Did vorlauf, couple of beer pitchers worth.

5.) Started to sparge....kinda of quickly then slowed it down a little.

6.) After I collected about three gallons I added another 3 gallons of 175 degree sparge water. Vorlauf, collected 6.5 gallons total.

Looking back to see why my efficiency was off, I realized I should have stirred the grain after I added the sparge water and let it sit for 10 mins before collecting my runnings. I also should have sparged slower and should have drained the mash tun fully in the first runnings before adding more water. Am I right in these assumptions?

Questions:
Can a mash out decrease efficiency?

How hot should my mash out/sparge water be?

What else can I do to increase efficiency?

Thanks for the help guys!

Click to expand...

Mashout will NOT decrease eff.
MO and Sparge water, 170-180F typically


Eff. could mean a lot of things. #1 you have to determine what your conversion eff. was, and then what your lauter eff. was. Until then, you cannot point to a single process.

Water chemistry, PH will affect eff.
Temperature will affect eff. (are your thermometers accurate)
Grain crush will do a lot to affect your eff. (how fine)
Doughballs in the mash will affect eff.
Not mixing well when batch sparging will affect eff.
Runoff rates when batch sparging, not really an issue. The wort in the MLT should be homogenous, you just want to open the valve and drain, you arent really "rinsing". You are diluting and draining.
Your lautering device should not affect the eff. much when you are batch sparging, since you are mixing and draining, you arent really concerned about how evenly you sparge the grain bed.

Lastly, did you measure your gravity/eff. correctly?

Hi. When I started milling my own malt, my efficiency jumped up, FWIW.

Another thought is that efficiency isn't really that important - the real goal is to have the right amount of wort that's close to the gravity you were aiming toward. Higher efficiency does not mean that your beer will be better. Just a friendly reminder!

Cheers!

Yeah, I forgot to take a preboil reading. The recipe said the gravity should be 1.061, my pre yeast reading was 1.050. Recipe was 11 lbs of 2-Row Malt and 10 oz of Crystal 20L. I ended up with 5 gallons after boiling 6.5. I believe this is 59%.

So it doesn't matter how fast you drain? And how thorough do you mix the grain when you first mash and after adding more water?

Shoemaker said:

Yeah, I forgot to take a preboil reading. The recipe said the gravity should be 1.061, my pre yeast reading was 1.050. Recipe was 11 lbs of 2-Row Malt and 10 oz of Crystal 20L. I ended up with 5 gallons after boiling 6.5. I believe this is 59%.

So it doesn't matter how fast you drain? And how thorough do you mix the grain when you first mash and after adding more water?

Click to expand...

If you are batch sparging, how fast you drain doesnt matter.

How well you mix when you mash in, and when you sparge are important.

ProMash shows 56% eff. but that will depend on the extract portential of your 2 row.

Thorough stirring at the start of the mash and during sparges certainly makes a difference and will lead to better efficiency.

Pappers said:

Hi. When I started milling my own malt, my efficiency jumped up, FWIW.

Click to expand...

+1, I went ahead and purchased a barley crusher before I attempted my first AG because I had heard quite a bit of negativity on HBS milling practices. My first AG turned out an 81% brewhouse efficiency. FWIW, I also use 5.2 stabilizer to ensure the correct mash pH, it is inexpensive insurance.

OK so what are the ideal strike and sparge water temps as well?

Shoemaker said:

OK so what are the ideal strike and sparge water temps as well?

Click to expand...

Your STRIKE temp wil vary with each brew based on grain qty and temp. Your Sacc. rest temp will vary between 149F and 159F typically depending on how malty you want the beer to be.

Sparge water, 170-180F.

Shoemaker said:

OK so what are the ideal strike and sparge water temps as well?

Click to expand...

The Pol said:

Your STRIKE temp wil vary with each brew based on grain qty and temp. Your Sacc. rest temp will vary between 149F and 159F typically depending on how malty you want the beer to be.

Sparge water, 170-180F.

Click to expand...

To add to that, add your strike water to your MLT at about 180-185F, close the lid and wait 15 minutes allowing your tun to preheat, once the water cools to your strike temp, dough-in. After doing this once you can adjust your water temperature accordingly to hit your ideal strike temp after pre-heating the tun for 10-15 minutes.

I use a 5 gallon home depot cooler by rubbermaid. *Have found that the tun as well as the grain bill each absorbs ~12F.

So:

1) Heat mash liqour to 174
2) Temp should settle to 162
3) Dough in!
4) While stirring should settle to 150
5) MASH
then you can go one of 2 routes: a or b:
A is mashout procedure. The point is to stop conversion before you sparge.
B is a non-mashout, using instead the sparge water to end conversion as you are sparging.
6a) Add enough boiling water to bring temps to 164-169ish and mix
7a) Vorlauf and take first runnings
8a) Sparge (double or single up to you) with 170F water. Mix well and wait 10 minutes after each sparge.
(the closer you can get the grain bed to 170 the better to maximize dissolved sugars being extracted but not too high to avoid tannin extraction)
9a) Boil Kettle
OR
6b) Add first half batch of sparge water at 185 or other predetermined temp to bring grain bed as close to 170 as possible
7b) Mix well and wait 10 minutes for bed to settle
8b) Vorlauf and run off
9b) Add rest of sparge at 170
10b) Mix well and wait 10 minutes for bed to settle
11b) Vorlauf and take final runnings
12b) Boil Kettle

Remember to take gravity readings of each runnings. It's not wasting either because you can just out it back in as this is pre-boil.

I use the non mashout procedure as it is easier, but I think I'm going to start doing decoction mashes. I'm going to try my pilsner as a decoction because it just looks so fun!

The biggest confusion I see here is that you're mixing batch sparge and fly sparge techniques and that's much less efficient than doing one or the other. How is your mashtun built? If you want to batch sparge using a mashout:

A couple gallons of 175F is not a mashout. A mashout should get the whole mash up to near 170F which actually requires a couple gallons of 190F water.

Yes, you want to stir the heck out of the whole thing after your addition, vorlauf, then run off at whatever speed you want. Slow in the first 3 minutes, then open the valve all the way and drain it all.

Add the rest of your sparge at about 175F and stir like nuts again, vorlauf, drain.