Sparge Volume

Hello,

I'm doing a IPA this weekend and here is the ingredient list

14 lb. 2-row pale malt
8.0 oz. crystal malt (30 °L)
1.1 oz. Saaz hops (first wort hops)
1.6 oz. Chinook hops (90 mins)
1.8 oz. Northern Brewer hops (5 mins)
1.8 oz. Cascade hops (5 mins after knockout)
1.5 oz. Cascade hops (dry hop)
Wyeast 1968 (London ESB) 2.5 qt. yeast starter

I'm mashing with 1.25 qts per gallon. so 4.5 gallons of water.
The question I have is how much sparge water I need for a 5 gallon batch?
The math and beer tools pro suggest 7.25 gallons for a total water used of 11.75 gallons.

That seems like a lot of water to be using for a 5 gallon batch.

I am fly sparging at 168 I want to collect 6.5 gal. for pre boil and then boil
down to 5.25 gal.

I want a OG of 1.070 - 1.075.

I usually get about 75%-80% efficiency.

Last time I brewed this batch I got more like 40% using the amount of water that was suggested.

Thanks for the help.

Tim

Well, you can just sparge up to your boil volume, especially since you're fly sparging. Just stop when the boil volume is reached, no matter how much is left in your HLT.

But a good estimate of how much water you'll need is pretty easy.

You have 4.5 gallons going into the mash. Since the grain will asorb approximately .12/gallons per pound of grain, you can estimate that you'll lose about 1.68 gallons to absorption. So, 4.5 gallons - 1.7 gallons = 2.8 gallons of first runnings. If you want to end up with 6.5 gallons of preboil wort, you could plan on putting 4 gallons into the HLT and stopping when you get to 6.5 gallons (you should need right around 3.75 gallons of sparge water, but a little extra is always good so you're not scrambling to heat more water at the last minute!).

That's a total of 8.25 gallons of water to get 6.5 gallons preboil. I usually start with closer to 9 to get 7 gallons preboil. That puts you in the same ballpark, depending on how many pounds of grains you have since that changes the absorption a bit.

Thanks, That helps a lot.

I do pretty much the same as Yooper, but need about an extra 1.5 - 2gallons to get the same results. The difference is caused by different equipment, different methods, and possibly different ingredients.
I like to end up with 5.25 gallons in the fermenter, but I usually add a 1 liter starter, so I only need to collect 5 gallons of wort.
Like Yooper, I start with a pre-boil volume of 7 gallons (or 7.5 gallons for a lager which I boil for an extra 30 minutes).
I also use whole hops, and they typically absorb about 1.5 qt wort. If I'm brewing a very hoppy beer like an IPA, I'll increase the pre-boil volume to account for the extra hop absorption.
I fly sparge, and use a sparge arm to deliver the sparge water. I need about 1.5 gallons in the HLT to actually deliver any water to the MLT. This means that I need to prepare about 1.5 gallons extra sparge water because of my equipment limitations.
The one area where I would disagree with Yooper is to stop when you reach your pre boil volume.
I stop sparging when I reach the pre boil volume, or when the gravity of the runnings drop to 1.010 (whichever occurs first). If I stop before reaching the required volume, then I just make up the volume by transferring the sparge water directly from the HLT to the kettle.
This prevents excessive tannin extraction that can occur if the sparge pH gets too high.

-a.

Good pointers - subscribing.