start boiling during sparge?

I've only done 2 ag batches and have not built up much in the way of pots or equipment yet. I use a 7.5 gallon bayou classic turkey fryer for the boil, and a SS 5 gallon pot inside on the stove to heat the strike & sparge water...

If I complete the entire sparge before starting a boil, it takes that 55,000 btu turkey fryer nearly 45 minutes to bring it from 150-170 to boil... I can't imagine how long it would take to boil 6.5 gallons of cold tap water in the thing, but I sure would not have the patience. My flame looks blue, but I'm no expert on adjusting it for maximum heat. I try to adjust it so the blue flame can be seen barely jumping the bottom edge of the pot. Any suggestions here? Or should I be getting ahead of the game by starting to heat it while the sparge is only partially done?

I start heating my runnings once I have around a gallon collected and by the time I am at my boil volume I am not far from the boil. I have read many places to not waste any time and just start heating, it's not going to hurt anything. Remember the boil is to reduce the volume through evaporation concentrating your sugars and caramelizing the flavors and some other business with the protiens, but it won't hurt anything.

You may also want to consider upgrading to a high pressure regulator, like a 10 psi if you want to generate more btus and get a boil much quicker.

rtrevino said:

You may also want to consider upgrading to a high pressure regulator, like a 10 psi if you want to generate more btus and get a boil much quicker.

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I do 12 gallon batches and fly sparge. My pre boil volume is about 14 gallons. What I do is wait till I get about 4-5 gallons in the kettle then start the burner on a medium high flame and then try and maintain 180* to 190* until I get to the 10 gallon mark then I crank it! By the time I collect the last 4 gallons I am almost at boil. I may have to wait 5 minutes but that's about all. Over time you will get to know what your system is capable of.

Be sure your burner can handle the high pressure first. Not all low pressure burners can be ran on high pressure.

Cheers
Jay

If I'm batch sparging, I start the kettle to boil right away, since I don't do a mash out. When I fly sparge, I wait until I get about three gallons in the kettle, then start the runnings on to boil.

You could also search on here for info on making a heatstick. Since using mine, I've cut my time it takes to come to boil down in half. Only cost about $30 to make

I'm not an expert on fluid dynamics but I've been trying this my last few brews and each time my flow from my MLT to my brew kettle stops at around 5 or so gallons and I have to hand-fill the remaing two gallons using the pitcher used to clear first runnings. It's not a stuck sparge it just seems gravity quits working.

Now it may be that my MLT is not high enough above my brew kettle (even though the highest point of liquid in the brew kettle is about 8+ inches below the ball valve of my MLT), but I don't recall having this problem when I wasn't pre-heating while sparging.

Any advice?

Thanks for all the useful info!

I just made brewed a stout today, and I fired up the burner when I had about 5-6 inches of runnings collected in the brew pot. This helped a whole lot. By the time I collected around 6.25 gallons I was at boil temp and ready to go! This saved quite a bit of time. I did also notice that the particular grains used for stout were thicker and it seemed that sparge process took longer than my last batch of pale ale. The last half gallon of runnings took forever, likely because the grains were creating heavier blockage. I guess I could have added extra sparge water for more weight, but it all came out eventually.

Yooper said:

If I'm batch sparging, I start the kettle to boil right away, since I don't do a mash out. When I fly sparge, I wait until I get about three gallons in the kettle, then start the runnings on to boil.

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+1 I Fly sparge recycle first 1/2 gallon then get 3 gallons and start burner

I light the burner as soon as I have the bottom of the kettle covered. Every minute you wait is time tacked onto your brew day. What happens is that I get up to 210ish quickly but it never quite hits raging boil as new 170f entry wort pulls it back.

I put first runnings on the burner, and they are usually boiling by the time I collect the seconsd...I get 2 hot breaks, which I am guessing is not a big deal...I try to be watchful for boil off rate...the first 3 gals or so heats up pretty quickly...so far with this method the beer is good !