BIAB bag lift suggestions

For 10 gallon BIAB, with a grain bill of 35 pounds, how much does that weigh after mashing? I assume most of the sugar is dissolved, and that makes up a fair amount of the grain dry weight, but its been replaced with water.
Does it weigh 50 pounds? OR does it weigh 50 pounds, and then water immediately drains out so it only weighs 40 pounds?

Can Voile support 55+ pounds of weight for 60 seconds, before the weight drops down to a more comfortable 40 pounds?

ArcLight said:

For 10 gallon BIAB, with a grain bill of 35 pounds, how much does that weigh after mashing?

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60 lbs would be my guess.

ArcLight said:

Can Voile support 55+ pounds of weight for 60 seconds, before the weight drops down to a more comfortable 40 pounds?

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If stitched properly...the voile will easily take the weight IMO. 35 lbs of spent wet grain won't weigh 40 lbs IME??? For that size grain bill, it is nice to have a rope or strap, as the bag will need to be raised slowly as it drains...initially the bag will be very heavy and quite full of water.

You can raise the bag slowly so its total weight placed on the lift will only be a little more than the grain weight + water absorption. For my BIAB experience, absorption is never more than .1 gallon per pound of grain that I start with, so for 35 pounds of grain you would be looking at 3.5 * 8.3 = 30 pounds of absorbed water for a 35 pound grain bill. However, if you figure that you took 10 gallons of wort to 12 % sugar by weight, that's 1.2 gallons less of weight, so you are looking at about 54 pounds for a wet 35-pound grain bill.

I have been factoring about 1/2 gallon of water for each 10 lbs of grain for my BiaB batches. I do squeeze the grains some so that might change with I install the rope ratchet.

This is my initial set up. In this picture I have a hook in my garage ceiling screwed securely into a support beam that I have a come along strap hanging from. Once the mash is complete I hook the strap onto the 11 gal pot insert, I lift it and the bag out, then use a kitchen pot lid to press the remaining wort out of the grain. Since this picture I've modified the lift system slightly in that I've installed a small pulley onto the hook that's in the ceiling, I measured out a length of rope and tied two snap hooks on both ends. I hook one end onto the pot insert handle, lift it out of the wort then snap the other rope end to it. The reason for the modification is that with the force pressing the wort from the grain, the come along strap would sometimes give.

ArcLight said:

For 10 gallon BIAB, with a grain bill of 35 pounds, how much does that weigh after mashing? I assume most of the sugar is dissolved, and that makes up a fair amount of the grain dry weight, but its been replaced with water.
Does it weigh 50 pounds? OR does it weigh 50 pounds, and then water immediately drains out so it only weighs 40 pounds?

Can Voile support 55+ pounds of weight for 60 seconds, before the weight drops down to a more comfortable 40 pounds?

Click to expand...

if you look at the absorption rate, 10 LBS of dry grain holds 10 lbs water. 20 lbs total.

But the grain is 80% extract and most of that should be removed by the time you lift the bag.

Take this with a grain of salt, I only do six gallon batches and the largest grain bill I've had was 18 pounds...

I have two five gallon buckets. One of them I perforated with a drill so that it acts like a strainer. When it comes time to lift the grain bag out I place the perforated bucket inside the non-modified bucket and place the nested buckets near my brew kettle. I lift the bag out using my hands ( my grain bag is rather large so it is easy to get a handle on it without burning my hands). I hold it over the pot until the majority of the water has drained out or I'm tired (whichever comes first) then quickly transfer the bag into the nested buckets. I allow the bag to drain and on occassion will use a third bucket as a plunger to squeeze the bag. I just add the strained wort back to the brew kettle until i hit the volume i am after.No burnt hands...arms not that tired...and relatively low stress on the bag. I can try to get some pictures of the buckets if you are having a hard time visualizing.

Is this the only way to do it? Of course not but it works for me and you never know, it might work for you. The cost of two 5 gallon buckets is pretty marginal, in fact you might have them just lying around.

I've been using the SS Bayou Classic Basket. I put a step ladder over my pot and I have a rope loop on the top step with several pre-measured loops that allow me to suspend the basket above the pot allowing it to drain. After the bulk of it drains, I put a Corelware crepe dish on top of the bag and squeeze/press it really hard. Hard enough that I might break a regular dinner plate. I'm confident that with the spongy mash that there isn't any concern about extracting tannins with the amount of pressure you can apply by hand.

This is how i do it as well and its easy to get 70-75% efficiency with a double crush and a light press from the kettle lid. If I need higher efficiency I'll pour sparge water over the grain after I press it to get anything remaining but this is only if I'm dealing with 16lbs of grain or more.

I used the rack from my microwave for no additional cost. I don't see why anyone would do it differently. If you can't lift the bag out of the pot without a hoist BIAB is probably not the best brewing method for you.

Drunk_Mick said:

I use 5 gallon paint straining bags from Lowes. Pull the elastic over the handles, it give me about 6 inches of clearence between the bottom of my grain bag and pot. When its time to pull the bag I put a wire cooling rack (2 bucks at Reading China and Glass) across the top of the pot, then the fryer basket from my turkey pot on top of that. Holds it in place while I use my bottling bucket to slowly sparge the bag with 1-2 gallons of water. This way if I have to walk away to do something else I don't have to worry about where to put the bag.

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