All-grain newbie...having issues.

[tamorgen]

Good morning all,
Yesterday I did my second all-grain brew. I've been brewing for about 3 years now, but I've stuck mostly to LME, simply because it a) takes less time b) harder to screw up. I started sanitizing my equipment around 1 pm yesterday, and pitched my yeast around 9 pm.

I was using this recipe for a German style Hefeweizen.

I'm using the two cooler style all grain method. They are the 10 gallon Igloo coolers. I don't have any pumps or stands yet, so there is no recirculating other than the Vorlauf from the mashing.

The issues I ran into.

1) I already soft of figured this one out. The water I used for my mashing didn't stay at the temp I expected. I solved it by draining the cooler, and heating the water back up to 180 °F, and filled the cooler 14.5 quarts of water, for the 9.7 lbs of grain. This time, the cooler hit the right temp spot on at 151 °F. Lesson learned, preheat the cooler. (Says so in the sticky)

2) I let the grain mash for an hour, and I checked the wort for starches, and the iodine cleared up right away. I did my Vorlauf until I didn't see grains in my wort. The recipe tells me to "Infuse the mash with near boiling water while stirring or with a recirculating mash system raise the temperature to mash out at 168 °F". It took a lot of water to get it up to 168 °F. Much more than I expected. In fact, I pretty much drained my HLT, and had to heat more water to do my sparging. Maybe that is normal, and my lack of experience with All Grain just didn't know what to expect. I gathered my wort into my preboil kettle at a rate of about 1 gallon every 12 minutes. I gathered about 6.7 gallons of wort, and took a gravity reading. Here's my problem: Recipe says it should be at 1.038 (9.4 °P). I got 1.028.

I looked online, and I read that I could correct the issue with DME after the boil, before pitching. I began my 90 minute boil, put in my hops at 60 minutes, put in my chiller at 80 minutes to sanitize, turned off the heat, turned on the water, and chilled to 62 °F per the recipe. I will say this goes much faster when there is more volume to chill and have contact with the wort chiller. I wasn't expecting that. That, and my well water comes out of the tap about 45 °F.

So, in the end, I ended up with 5 gallons of wort, and my OG came out to 1.048 or so ( as accurately as I can tell with the hydrometer ). So my OG and volume are right on for the beer, but I think I lucked out by boiling off much of the diluted wort.

Any advice on what I may have done wrong?

 

[McKnuckle]

I don't think you did anything truly wrong here. Congrats on hitting your OG! Now you just have to get a handle on water volumes.

It sounds like you did not estimate, or estimated incorrectly, the amount of boiling water to infuse into the mash to reach 168F. There are calculators for that, such as the one on Brewer's Friend. That's probably at least partially why you missed your pre-boil gravity. Correct that for next time.

I assume you fully drained the mash tun (first runnings) before you sparged at 168F. You don't explicitly state that, so just checking.

A quick aside; pre-boil gravity is easy to mess up if you don't stir the sample very well. Wort tends to stratify with the heavier, sugary wort sinking and the lower gravity stuff on top. In fact, I checked a dilution calculator and if your volumes were correct (6.7 to start, 5 when finished), then your pre-boil gravity was actually closer to 1.036!

Record your boil-off rate for future reference as well, so you can fine tune your expectations. But it seems you may have been closer than you thought.

 

[IslandLizard]

Did you mill your grain at your LHBS, or mill your own?
Most LHBS mills mill quite coarsely (set at a relatively wide gap). This is mostly to prevent stuck mashes and sparges so customers don't complain. But...

...especially with wheat and rye, which are smaller kernels, they can go mostly uncrushed or marginally crushed using that wider gap. One reason your pre-boil gravity was lower than expected could be due to too coarse a grist, especially since you got 50% wheat in there.

Crushing on a narrower gap helps with quicker mashes and better mash efficiency. On a LHBS mill, running it through 2x or 3x helps in getting a better crush, but not better than crushing once, right. Most LHBS don't let you tinker with their mills, so...

Also possible is that a lot of good sugars stayed behind in your mash tun due to insufficient fly sparging since you used most sparge water to reach a mash out.

Although you got the right gravity at the end of the boil, did you get your intended post boil volume? Gravity and volume are like a rubber band, thinner but longer or thicker and shorter.

I recommend trying the batch sparging route. Much easier, faster, and you can crush your grist a lot finer. The final wort and beer wouldn't know the difference.

Batch sparging:
At the end of the mash, stir well, let settle for a few minutes, vorlauf and lauter. Always drain the tun totally before adding the sparge water. Start heating the wort in your kettle as soon as you collect. That will denature the enzymes quickly.

Batch sparge 2x, using half your sparge water volume for each round: Add sparge water, stir well, let sit for a few minutes, vorlauf and lauter until empty. Repeat.

With batch sparging there little to no need for a mash out. If you use 180-190F sparge water, it kinda mashes out during sparge.

Water:
Are you using your well water for brewing water? What is your well water like, mainly its mineral composition?

 

[RM-MN]

I let the grain mash for an hour, and I checked the wort for starches, and the iodine cleared up right away.

The wort should never have starches in it. It's the grain particles that may have unconverted starch.

The recipe tells me to "Infuse the mash with near boiling water while stirring or with a recirculating mash system raise the temperature to mash out at 168 °F".

A recipe is a record of what someone else did. A mash out is only needed for fly sparging. If you did not fly sparge you didn't need it. In fact, you could batch sparge with water right from your tap (provided it doesn't have chlorine or chloramine in it) with no heating at all.

 

[tamorgen]

Did you mill your grain at your LHBS, or mill your own?
Most LHBS mills mill quite coarsely (set at a relatively wide gap). This is mostly to prevent stuck mashes and sparges so customers don't complain. But...

...especially with wheat and rye, which are smaller kernels, they can go mostly uncrushed or marginally crushed using that wider gap. One reason your pre-boil gravity was lower than expected could be due to too coarse a grist, especially since you got 50% wheat in there.

Crushing on a narrower gap helps with quicker mashes and better mash efficiency. On a LHBS mill, running it through 2x or 3x helps in getting a better crush, but not better than crushing once, right. Most LHBS don't let you tinker with their mills, so...

Also possible is that a lot of good sugars stayed behind in your mash tun due to insufficient fly sparging since you used most sparge water to reach a mash out.

Although you got the right gravity at the end of the boil, did you get your intended post boil volume? Gravity and volume are like a rubber band, thinner but longer or thicker and shorter.

I recommend trying the batch sparging route. Much easier, faster, and you can crush your grist a lot finer. The final wort and beer wouldn't know the difference.

Batch sparging:
At the end of the mash, stir well, let settle for a few minutes, vorlauf and lauter. Always drain the tun totally before adding the sparge water. Start heating the wort in your kettle as soon as you collect. That will denature the enzymes quickly.

Batch sparge 2x, using half your sparge water volume for each round: Add sparge water, stir well, let sit for a few minutes, vorlauf and lauter until empty. Repeat.

With batch sparging there little to no need for a mash out. If you use 180-190F sparge water, it kinda mashes out during sparge.

Water:
Are you using your well water for brewing water? What is your well water like, mainly its mineral composition?

Hi IslandLizard,
Thanks for the lengthy reply.

I used the mill at my LHBS. I never considered that it might have to be run through multiple times. I'll consider that next go around, or until I get my own mill.

I did get close to my intended post boil volume, although I started with slightly higher start volume than the recipe called for.

I'll give batch sparging a shot next brew. As I said, this was my second all grain brew, and I'm still learning.

I am using well water, and this was the first time using it. Previously I had used bottled water (deer park), but we had our water tested, and the results were actually better than bottled water in regards to dissolved solids. The water was slightly acidic, and was slightly hard, so we ended up adding a PH neutralizer and water softener to our home.

 

[tamorgen]

The wort should never have starches in it. It's the grain particles that may have unconverted starch.

Yes, understood. My understanding is that's why you do the iodine test, to ensure there aren't any unconverted starches left in your mash.

 

[IslandLizard]

Who's your LHBS?

The water was slightly acidic, and was slightly hard, so we ended up adding a PH neutralizer and water softener to our home.

Generally, water softener water is not suitable for brewing, the Sodium levels tend to be pretty high. But it all depends on how much of the unwanted ions were "replaced." Your TDS meter is a good indication of that. The lower the readings the better.

For brewing water, pH itself is not that important, hardness (alkalinity) is. If you haven't done so study up brewing water on our Brew Science forum. Water quality and its mineral composition are very important with all grain brewing.

It takes a few brews to get all your variables and parameters in place. Keep good notes, and adjust to hone in on your targets.

If I need or want to do step mashes, I do them in my (thick bottomed) kettle over low heat and constant stirring, especially scraping the bottom with the wooden paddle and bring that bottom grist to the top. Slow and steady is key to prevent scorching. When the mash is done, I do a 10' mashout, then transfer the grist to the awaiting mash tun that is then just used for lautering and sparging. Clear wort goes back into the (rinsed out) kettle.

 

[tamorgen]

Who's your LHBS?

My go to is MDHB in Columbia, but the Flying Barrel in Frederick is pretty decent as well. Just depends where I am when I need to get supplies.

Generally, water softener water is not suitable for brewing, the Sodium levels tend to be pretty high. But it all depends on how much of the unwanted ions were "replaced." Your TDS meter is a good indication of that. The lower the readings the better.

I found the analysis before I added the water system to my house.

pH is 6.25
Hardness 3 gpg
Iron 0 ppm
Nitrates 2 ppm
TDS 44 ppm
Copper .4 ppm
Chlorine 0 ppm (well water)

I use KaCl for my softener, and not NaCl, so the Sodium effect doesn't come into play. I don't know if Potassium is good or bad for brewing.

What I could do, is next time put either the PH neutralizer or the Softener into bypass mode, and use more of the straight well water, and see how that effects my brew. Even if this past brew comes out okay, I think I may just use it as a base for a shandy and try again this weekend on the Hefe, using lessons learned.

 

[IslandLizard]

Untreated, hardness at 3 gpg seems high to me, so I understand your need for a water filtering/treatment system.

Your TDS of 44 ppm is fairly low, but there's probably a load of undissolved minerals in there, the TDS can't pick those up. It may be very decent brewing water once those are removed.

Potassium is more flavor neutral than Sodium, but does taste salty. It's used in 'reduced Sodium' salts for those who need to limit Sodium intake. But too much Potassium isn't good for one either. Even if half of your 44 ppm became all Potassium, it's still nothing to worry about, though.

 

[tamorgen]

Untreated, hardness at 3 gpg seems high to me, so I understand your need for a water filtering/treatment system.

Your TDS of 44 ppm is fairly low, but there's probably a load of undissolved minerals in there, the TDS can't pick those up. It may be very decent brewing water once those are removed.

Potassium is more flavor neutral than Sodium, but does taste salty. It's used in 'reduced Sodium' salts for those who need to limit Sodium intake. But too much Potassium isn't good for one either. Even if half of your 44 ppm became all Potassium, it's still nothing to worry about, though.

So, I've been reading about water this week, and there are opinions out there that you should test your water every brew with a home kit like LaMotte's (expensive), but home test kit's aren't as accurate as professionally done (like Ward Labs). I've read some posts that say water doesn't really change, so they get the professionally done ever couple of years. That's probably fairly true for well water, which comes deep in the ground from aquafers a state away, after being filtered by the earth, but I'm sure municipality water is much more varied by season. Since I have well water, I'm leaning more towards having it professional tested, when I can spend $40 and have it done right, and maybe just testing the PH to look for indications of it fluctuating. I guess my only decision in that case would be to send in my softened water to test, and adjust it from that, or send in the well water, and adjust from that.

 

[kh54s10]

I read this as follows: In doing the mashout, you used a lot of water. So there was more water in the mash at the start of the fly sparge than there should have been. Did you drain down to the top of the grainbed before starting the fly sparge?

I use the batch sparge method so I can't be sure, but it sounds like you had a really diluted drain from the mash tun, leaving a lot of sugars behind in what was left after the sparge.

 

[IslandLizard]

So, I've been reading about water this week, and there are opinions out there that you should test your water every brew with a home kit like LaMotte's (expensive), but home test kit's aren't as accurate as professionally done (like Ward Labs). I've read some posts that say water doesn't really change, so they get the professionally done ever couple of years. That's probably fairly true for well water, which comes deep in the ground from aquafers a state away, after being filtered by the earth, but I'm sure municipality water is much more varied by season. Since I have well water, I'm leaning more towards having it professional tested, when I can spend $40 and have it done right, and maybe just testing the PH to look for indications of it fluctuating. I guess my only decision in that case would be to send in my softened water to test, and adjust it from that, or send in the well water, and adjust from that.

If your water is indeed stable there's little need for additional water tests. But it may change slowly over time. A water test is only a snapshot, yet, may help in laying a baseline. A (cheap) TDS meter can then keep track of changes in ion amounts from there and over time. So if it remains, say around 40 ppm, you know not that much could have changed.

That LaMotte's test kit is way overpriced. It contains $10 worth of agents, if that. Many much cheaper pool and aquarium test kits can get you some of those numbers too.

When you send Ward a small bottle with your water sample, the test is only around $28. No need to order a $40 test 'kit.' All they send you for the extra $12 is a box with a small bottle in it.

 

[tamorgen]

If your water is indeed stable there's little need for additional water tests. But it may change slowly over time. A water test is only a snapshot, yet, may help in laying a baseline. A (cheap) TDS meter can then keep track of changes in ion amounts from there and over time. So if it remains, say around 40 ppm, you know not that much could have changed.

That LaMotte's test kit is way overpriced. It contains $10 worth of agents, if that. Many much cheaper pool and aquarium test kits can get you some of those numbers too.

When you send Ward a small bottle with your water sample, the test is only around $28. No need to order a $40 test 'kit.' All they send you for the extra $12 is a box with a small bottle in it.

So, I have good news to report. I added a RO system to my home. A bit pricey for the initial setup, but the water it gives me is near distilled, so I I have a pretty good baseline for water. I decided to go this route, because of all the other filters I have in my house for the refrigerator, coffee maker, Keurig, pet water, etc, is just overwhelming and a bit of a waste of money. The filters for my refrigerator are $50 every 6 months or less, so adding a $300 RO system does eventually pay for itself.

So, this past weekend I brewed a pilsner using Beersmith and it's water calculator to adjust for the style of beer I was making. Everything was exact to Beersmiths calculations, from start gravity, pre boil volume, post boil volume, post boil gravity, everything. And I mean exact. Even my yeast starter was smack in the range. I'm glad I took the time to read up on water and invested in good filtering. My pre filter water had a TDS of around 40 PPM, and post RO it was 4 ppm. I have pretty good confidence in the quality of my drinking/brewing water. The only downside is I need to plan a few days ahead of time to gather the amount of water I need and store it in my HLT until brew day.

Now I have to wait 3 or 4 weeks for it to lager. Time to brew something that will be done before then!

 

[IslandLizard]

Now I have to wait 3 or 4 weeks for it to lager. Time to brew something that will be done before then!

Lagering in kegs? That's what I do, under CO2, no oxidation.

Congrats with your RO system! And saving all that money on 'filters' you don't have to buy anymore.
Do you bypass them or just leave the last one in there till eternity?