1st all grain tomorrow - couple easy questions

Well I am moving into my first all grain brew day tomorrow and I have a couple quick questions.

1) Before your first runoff from the mash, is it required to raise the temperature up to 170 deg. F to stop conversion, or would this just be needed during the batch sparging??? I seem to have found conflicting information as to this step. I know not to go over 170 with the grain bed to reduce the amount of tannins extracted from the husks, but do I need to raise the temp before I start draining out my mash, or is only for the sparge water?

2) To calculate my efficiency I know that I need to take a hydrometer reading. Is this done after all of my sparging and I have my full pre-boil volume or is this reading done at my post-boil volume.

3) Does anybody know of an expected boiling evaporation loss for a 10 gal. blichmann kettle.

Any answers would be greatly appreciated!!!

1. I prefer to raise my mash to 170 before I begin any sort of runoff. I don't believe it's absolutely neccessary, but I do it either way and hit 80% efficiency consistantly.

2. You'll want to take a reading of your total pre-boil volume.

3. Can't help ya here... testing it out on your own is the only way to know for sure.

I don't raise the bed temp before my first runnings. I do batch sparge with 180ish water though. I take a reading after I collect all my runnings (pre-boil) and also after the boil. Beersmith makes it easy to do your efficiency calculations by taking these two samples, giving you your mashing efficiency and your 'brewhouse' efficiency.

1) I raise temp after first runnings. So I drain, then add sparge water at 170

2) I do both also, but I think most people are concerned with post boil because you have boiled off some water and you will have a higher OG. This is what you will use to find out alcohol percent. But Pre boil would probably be a better indicator of how close to your 100% potential efficiency would be. In any case take both for consistency to see how close you are coming to the estimates (use beersmith for this. I love it and it is free to try.)

3) can't help you here. I can't afford a Blichmann.

1) I don't raise bed temp...I just drain and then sparge hot.

2) I only measure post boil, but that's because I don't worry about it.

3) Total guess, 1 gal/hr.

1. Raising the grain temp will stop conversion, not raising it will not stop conversion. Either way, by 60 minutes into your mash your grains will be 99.9999999% converted so Im not sure it really matters either way. I have tried both ways and have made good beer both ways, so I dont mash out. Just an extra step that I dont really think does much to the finished product.

2. If you measure pre-boil you can calculate your efficiency if you can get an accurate measurement of your pre-boil volume...which you can if you're using a 10 gal boilermaker pot. There are calculators available online where you can plug in your grain bill, your pre-boil gravity and pre-boil amount and it will tell you how efficient your mash/lauter was. This is important when trying to recreate a recipe or fine tune your system. If you take it post-boil, then you can compare it with your final gravity to determine ABV. Both are useful measurements and should be recorded in whatever form of log you keep for each batch. (if you dont keep a log, you should start. great for reproducing a beer, and learning from past experiences)

3. I boil off about 1.5 gallons per hour in my 15 gallon Blichmann kettle. Thats at a nice rolling boil. If you back it off to a simmer you might do less, but I wouldnt do that.

1 & 2 have been pretty well covered.

3. kind of takes trial and error to find out. On my system, 15 gal converted keg, I been averaging a boil off of about 1.8 gals in 90 mins. with a soft rolling boil. However, I've recently changed burners and my boil off rate seems to have increased. Your results may vary.

Good luck with the brew day.

If your target volume is 5 gallons you should measure the gravity of the 5 gallons to get your efficiency. Also make sure your sample is chilled to around 70* to get an accurate gravity reading from your hydrometer.