10 Gallons of wort....with a 5 gallon brew pot..Help

[DeepWoodBrew]

I have a brew pot large enough for a 5 gallon batch...However my mash tub can hold enough for a 10 gallon batch...Could I mash enough for a 10 gallon batch..collect the wort and the boil enough for one 5 gallon batch...and then boil the remaining wort..for another 5 gallon batch? Or will the wort turn sour?

Cheers...

 

[TopherM]

You'd be fine, besides the fact that this would be a LONGGGG brewday. Lots of peeps do 24 hour mashes without issue, and this is basically just mashing 1/2 of the wort for 2 hours, which isn't going to hurt it one bit.

 

[hypergolic]

Are you going to batch sparge? fly sparge? No sparge? Just wondering, because unless you collect all of the wort in a large container and mix it you might end up with two different gravity beers. But this may also be what you are going for.

 

[DeepWoodBrew]

My intent is to batch sparge...and throughly mix prior to serparating..

What do you think?

 

[chickypad]

I think the tricky part is going to be mixing it - since the whole reason you're doing this is you don't have a big enough kettle to hold all the wort. Do you have another big cooler or something to mix in?

There's the alternative option to do parti-gyle - brew a big beer from the first runnings and a small beer from the sparge collection.

 

[TyTanium]

...option to do parti-gyle

+1 Perfect candidate.

 

[DeepWoodBrew]

I was thinking of collecting the wort in 3 six gallon buckets...and then mixing all together..and back and forth...then filling my brew kettle.....

I like your idea..about a bigger beer then a lighter one ...

Thanks...for the suggestions..

 

[stratslinger]

The other thing to keep in mind is that a 10-gallon mash tun does not necessarily mean room to mash a 10 gallon batch of beer. Remember that your grist is going to take up a good chunk of that volume.

But for a low to mid gravity beer, sure, you could mash 10 gallons worth in a 10 gallon cooler. What kind of recipe are you thinking about?

 

[chickypad]

It said mash tun big enough for a 10 gallon, I assume it's 15gal or something.

With the parti-gyle you have to go pretty big on the first beer. I've never tried it but should be able to find lots of info on the forum and elsewhere. I did come across this chart that supposedly shows the first and second beer OG's. While the first beer is big because it's first runnings only, the recipe for the whole batch is not that crazy if I am reading this chart right (i.e. recipe for a 1.065 beer looks like it will give you 1.087 first runnings and 1.043 for the second beer). Not sure if this is accurate but seems to make sense mathematically - splits the difference.

http://brewingtechniques.com/library/backissues/issue2.2/moshertable.html

 

[helibrewer]

Your grain will take up about .08 X Lbs of grain in equivalent space. So a 12Lb grain bill would take up 1.25 qts x 12 lbs = 3.75 gallons and the grain takes up .08 x 12 = .96 gallons so you would need a mash tun that was more than 3.75 + .96 = 4.7 gallons

 

[DeepWoodBrew]

Thanks...everybody for all your advice...I think I am going to try this...on a Maibock recipe..