No sparge mashers - how do you mash your big high gravity beer?

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ALExanderH

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I usually no sparge for up to 1.070 and get around 70% efficiency with my brew in a basket 60min mash+10min mashout.

I'm trying to figure out how I should mash for bigger beers in the 1.090+ range.

One idea I had was to mash thick for 60min then drain and add rest of the water - let sit and then mash out

Would be nice to get personal experience from other no sparge brewers
 
While I haven't done anything over 1.085, I usually just assume a lower efficiency, like 60% (70-75% is typical for me). Unfortunately this means more grain and an even thicker mash. I've never sparged, sounds like a lot of extra work for minimal returns.

What you suggested sounds like a dunk sparge, which is common. You could heat the sparge water to mash out temp?

Other options are to add DME or sugar after mashing.
 
I usually no sparge for up to 1.070 and get around 70% efficiency with my brew in a basket 60min mash+10min mashout.

I'm trying to figure out how I should mash for bigger beers in the 1.090+ range.

One idea I had was to mash thick for 60min then drain and add rest of the water - let sit and then mash out

Would be nice to get personal experience from other no sparge brewers

How about placing the grain bag in a bucket drilled w/lots of holes and then that bucket into another bucket w/o any holes and using something solid to press the hell out of the wet grain
 
Adding more water later as the OP suggested is a batch sparge. And it is precisely what I would recommend. Expect only around 55-60% efficiency anyway, as it is not easy to do any better on a high gravity beer in my experience.
 
I usually no sparge for up to 1.070 and get around 70% efficiency with my brew in a basket 60min mash+10min mashout.

I'm trying to figure out how I should mash for bigger beers in the 1.090+ range.

One idea I had was to mash thick for 60min then drain and add rest of the water - let sit and then mash out

Would be nice to get personal experience from other no sparge brewers

If you can drain out the first runnings and add water to sparge, I would do as you mention.
The second batch of water can even be cooler and still extract much of the remaining sugars.
You'll just have to calculate the addition of sparge water/wort and boil down to gravity you desire.
I do this routinely, and for a 1.075+ beer usually get second runnings with gravity around 1.030-1.040.:mug:
 
I do a traditional mash (1.25 - 1.5 qt/lb) and then raise the bag and sparge through the bag. I have pulley setup for that. With this setup I can get to about 1.080 with my 9 gal pot. I recently did a 1.109 BDSA and just made 3.5 gal instead of 5. Five gallons is not etched in stone. Brew whatever you can fit.
 
Split the grain bill in half and do a double mash. Run your full volume mash, mash out, drain and use that as strike water for the second mash. If need be sparge the second mash to reach preboil volume. This is something I have to do on the Braumeister if I want to do big beers without using extracts. I did this with the Weizenbock I have on tap and the RIS I have in primary.
Something Ive learned for wheat/flaked grains FWIW... if your going to step mash the first mash and single infuse the second, make sure all the grains that need to be stepped go in the first mash. If you just weigh everything and split it up evenly you'll end up with a stuck sparge on the second mash.
 
I did a dunk sparge drained and then did a pour over sparge using the dunk sparge water on a 1.112 barleywine. Was a 3.5g batch with an extended boil I did in a 10g pot. Was a bit of a pain but I kept my normal efficiency numbers
 
I take the easy way out and do MY version of a partial-mash! Which means I substitute DME for some of the base malt.

I've been trying to clone the original New Glarus IIPA for a few years now. An interview with Dan Carey, brewmaster at New Glarus gave me some hints. The first time I tried to make it, I used 19lbs of grain. That overloaded my setup, I couldn't even stir the mash without making a mess! One of his hints was that it was a mix of Maris Otter and local malt. So, what I do NOW, is mash about 8.5lbs of Maris Otter, 3/4lb of Crystal 120 and add 6lbs of Breiss Golden Light extract in the boil. SO much easier to work with! :)
 
How about placing the grain bag in a bucket drilled w/lots of holes and then that bucket into another bucket w/o any holes and using something solid to press the hell out of the wet grain

I started doing this, and I probably will for all my brews, not just high gravity. I drilled a bunch of holes in a 5 gallon bucket, then set that into my 6.5 gallon bottling bucket. Bag and grains go in the 5 gallon, then I pour 1-2 gallons (depending on recipe) of heated water through to wash the grains. Then squeeze like hell and add the collected "sparge", or rinse, or whatever you want to call it to the kettle. In beer smith I just make sure I fill in the rinse water amount as kettle top off so that all my volumes come out right.

Doing this I'm finally starting to hit my numbers and not get crap efficiency.
 

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