Sparging with suspended grains

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pretzelb

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For my single vessel system I may try to sparge in the future by holding off a few gallons from the full volume calculations. But since my setup has my grain basket suspended above my kettle, the only "technique" I can think of is to simply dump the water from a picture over the grains. While this should be quick I can't imagine it is efficient. But with a grain bag or grain basket suspended over a kettle I'm not sure what other method is possible. Any suggestions on what might be the best way to lauter given the limits of the equipment?
 
You can use a lot of different things to distribute the water to increase the efficiency. A bucket with little holes drilled in the bottom or a colander would work.

But, if you have a sufficiently sized kettle to no sparge, then my opinion is that's really the way to go. I've done sparges every which way with a single vessel system. Finally upsized my kettle so that now I don't have to. Going no sparge is one of the best decisions I've made with my set up.
 
I do this quite often, and while I don't have hard numbers to support my opinion, it appears to work well. I hoist the grain bag and let it drain over the kettle. I then slowly pour a small quantity, like.a pint at a time over the bag a little bit at a time distributing the water.

Let that soak in and pour another small amount.

I do not "dump the water" as your post says, but pour a few ounces at a time here and there to try and rinse the bulk of the grain.

I'd love to get numbers on this efficiency wise, but frankly grain is relatively cheap and I'm too lazy to bother, lol.

Try it....spend about 5-10 minutes pouring your sparge water over the bag while you come to boil....
 
What limits? Don't you have a 20 gallon kettle?

For a double batch of 1.086 OG wort you are tight at the mash but have about 7" headspace for a boil.

You can do a full volume mash no problem.


As a side note, my 20 gallon Spike at the etched mark is actually 21.75 gallons. So if you are relying on kettle markings, don't .
 
What limits? Don't you have a 20 gallon kettle?

For a double batch of 1.086 OG wort you are tight at the mash but have about 7" headspace for a boil.

You can do a full volume mash no problem.


As a side note, my 20 gallon Spike at the etched mark is actually 21.75 gallons. So if you are relying on kettle markings, don't .

By limits I was thinking of suggestions that I take the mash basket and use it in another kettle. Being able to put the basket in another kettle would probably give the best numbers since I could also give the grains a good stir as well. But that would require I have another large sized kettle sitting around. I just thought I'd throw out the word "limits" to avoid suggestions I use a second kettle.
 
I do this quite often, and while I don't have hard numbers to support my opinion, it appears to work well. I hoist the grain bag and let it drain over the kettle. I then slowly pour a small quantity, like.a pint at a time over the bag a little bit at a time distributing the water.

Let that soak in and pour another small amount.

I do not "dump the water" as your post says, but pour a few ounces at a time here and there to try and rinse the bulk of the grain.

I'd love to get numbers on this efficiency wise, but frankly grain is relatively cheap and I'm too lazy to bother, lol.

Try it....spend about 5-10 minutes pouring your sparge water over the bag while you come to boil....

At what temperature is your sparge water?
 
At what temperature is your sparge water?

I typically sparge with hot water, say around 160 - 170. IMO, the only benefit to using hot water to sparge is that it doesn't drop your kettle temp and therefore is a little quicker than using cold water. Brukaiser did a bit of research and found sparge water temp irrelevant, more or less...

I typically do a small pour over sparge for a couple reasons. One being is that it removes the burden of doing water volume calculations. I typically mash in close to preboil volume, so my pour over volume is only what I lose to grain absorption. This allows one to measure and adjust the preboil volume during the process very simply by sparging to a volume rather than sparging a predetermined calculated volume. I simply have a few crude marks on my mash paddle for pre boil and post boil volumes, that's all that REALLY matters IMO. :) and NOT pre calculating water volumes out to 0.001 gallons lol

The other reason I do a pour over sparge is to max out my kettle when making large batches that won't fit full volume, or won't conveniently fit full volume without being at the kettle rim, which is messy and inconvenient.

I also employ a technique where I mash in with limited strike water to save a bit of time vs heating full volume, after 20 -30 minutes of mashing, my sparge water is up to 170 and I will infuse an addition (IDK maybe 10 - 30% total water) of hot water to bump the mash temp slightly to compensate for losses, also a time saver avoiding the time to heat full volume to strike. This is typically with 15 gallon batches, so the time savings can be significant to get the mash started asap.

I prefer to do a small volume pour over sparge not as an efficiency improver, but rather just to simplify the process by sparging to a desired pre boil volume. I find it much easier to measure the actual volume in the kettle rather than attempt to pre calculate the volume to be obtained.

:) Yea I'm an engineer yet despise calculations and prefer to use a dip stick, go figure. Kind of like how an experienced carpenter will use a storyboard or template, while the engineer will calculate dimensions...what's easier???
 
I do this quite often, and while I don't have hard numbers to support my opinion, it appears to work well. I hoist the grain bag and let it drain over the kettle. I then slowly pour a small quantity, like.a pint at a time over the bag a little bit at a time distributing the water.

Let that soak in and pour another small amount.

I do not "dump the water" as your post says, but pour a few ounces at a time here and there to try and rinse the bulk of the grain.

I'd love to get numbers on this efficiency wise, but frankly grain is relatively cheap and I'm too lazy to bother, lol.

Try it....spend about 5-10 minutes pouring your sparge water over the bag while you come to boil....

Say it isn't so! You're the spokesmen for keep it simple stupid and full water additions and now I read that you're sparging sometimes? My world has been thrown upside down!! :):mug::fro:
 
Say it isn't so! You're the spokesmen for keep it simple stupid and full water additions and now I read that you're sparging sometimes? My world has been thrown upside down!! :):mug::fro:

Read above, we posted simultaneously. I find a small pour over sparge to be the pinnacle of the KISS program. Cheers and thanks for the compliment of nominating me as chairman of the KISS homebrewers party :mug:
 
Read above, we posted simultaneously. I find a small pour over sparge to be the pinnacle of the KISS program. Cheers and thanks for the compliment of nominating me as chairman of the KISS homebrewers party :mug:

OK, seeing that definitely makes sense. Great way to get an exact pre-boil volume. You're still the chairman in my eyes!

BTW, bags look great and fit in my new 20g Megapot perfectly. Can't wait to put em to use.
 
You can use a lot of different things to distribute the water to increase the efficiency. A bucket with little holes drilled in the bottom or a colander would work.

But, if you have a sufficiently sized kettle to no sparge, then my opinion is that's really the way to go. I've done sparges every which way with a single vessel system. Finally upsized my kettle so that now I don't have to. Going no sparge is one of the best decisions I've made with my set up.

Part of me agrees with you, and that part takes over on brew day when I'm behind schedule and the last thing I want to do is add more time. And that is nearly every brew day.

I do like the simplicity of full volume mash, but when I look at the numbers after it always seems to irk me. Maybe after another 10+ brews on the new system I will start to change things again.
 
.....the last thing I want to do is add more time. And that is nearly every brew day.



I do like the simplicity of full volume mash, but when I look at the numbers after it always seems to irk me.


A small pour over sparge doesn't add any time to your session as it is done concurrent with heat in to boil.

As far as efficiency, the grain bag seems a lot less sticky with a pour over sparge compared to full volume.

How's that for scientific reasoning :)
 
Plus, when I pour a gallon of water over my grain bag and my wife asks what I am doing I can say "I'm sparging, sweetheart". Use buzz words whenever you can! ;)
 
A small pour over sparge doesn't add any time to your session as it is done concurrent with heat in to boil.

As far as efficiency, the grain bag seems a lot less sticky with a pour over sparge compared to full volume.

How's that for scientific reasoning :)

It will take more time if I want to try and gather the stats. I would first need to raise the basket and let it drip for at least 5 minutes so then after I can take a gravity reading and also a volume reading. Then I'd have to do my sparge and give that another 5 minutes at least to drip so I could take readings again. Then I would do a squeeze and take some final readings. Believe it or not my new electric is a beast when it comes to heating. It doesn't take long at all to go from mash temp to near boil.

I might brew tomorrow so maybe I will give it a try. Only issue is I'm in a high gravity phase now and tomorrow is a 22 lb beast Wee Heavy recipe. To avoid re-circulation issues I might need to keep it a full volume mash.
 
Pretzelb this is what I now use to sparge. It started out just as a way to hold the grain bag to keep from flpping over the side of kettle, but quickly evolved to sparge. After mash hoist the bag up, place slotted pizza pan over kettle to hold slotted bucket, drop bag into the bucket, open the bag over lip of bucket, hot sparge top of grains up to my pre-boil volume! It really doesn't add much time or hard clean equipment. Still fits my KISS profile.

IMG_1867.jpg


IMG_1868.jpg
 
I typically do a small pour over sparge for a couple reasons. One being is that it removes the burden of doing water volume calculations. I typically mash in close to preboil volume, so my pour over volume is only what I lose to grain absorption. This allows one to measure and adjust the preboil volume during the process very simply by sparging to a volume rather than sparging a predetermined calculated volume. I simply have a few crude marks on my mash paddle for pre boil and post boil volumes, that's all that REALLY matters IMO. :) and NOT pre calculating water volumes out to 0.001 gallons lol

The other reason I do a pour over sparge is to max out my kettle when making large batches that won't fit full volume, or won't conveniently fit full volume without being at the kettle rim, which is messy and inconvenient.

I also employ a technique where I mash in with limited strike water to save a bit of time vs heating full volume, after 20 -30 minutes of mashing, my sparge water is up to 170 and I will infuse an addition (IDK maybe 10 - 30% total water) of hot water to bump the mash temp slightly to compensate for losses, also a time saver avoiding the time to heat full volume to strike. This is typically with 15 gallon batches, so the time savings can be significant to get the mash started asap.

I prefer to do a small volume pour over sparge not as an efficiency improver, but rather just to simplify the process by sparging to a desired pre boil volume. I find it much easier to measure the actual volume in the kettle rather than attempt to pre calculate the volume to be obtained.

:) Yea I'm an engineer yet despise calculations and prefer to use a dip stick, go figure. Kind of like how an experienced carpenter will use a storyboard or template, while the engineer will calculate dimensions...what's easier???


Very clever! I'm wondering, though, if you do any water treatment. If yes, do you treat only your original strike water? Or, do you also treat the water used to warm up the mash? I'd think it'd be tough to control mash pH if you're unsure of exactly how much water you'll be using.
 
Very clever! I'm wondering, though, if you do any water treatment. If yes, do you treat only your original strike water? Or, do you also treat the water used to warm up the mash? I'd think it'd be tough to control mash pH if you're unsure of exactly how much water you'll be using.

Mash needs to within a range, not an exact pH. While I sometimes like to be scientific, other times I conclude that an estimate is "close enough".:rockin:
 
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