Batch sparging how much water

[2xbrewing]

Hey guys I'm making an amber ale first time with my own recipe. I'm doing a 5 gallon batch and mashing 12lbs total of grain. Had a mash of 3.75 gallons of water. How much water should i use for the sparge water??? Thanks for help!

 

[anico4704]

I found the easiest way is to just measure your first runnings then subtract that from your preboil voulume and add that amount of water to sparge. The grain does not absorb anymore water after the first runnings.

 

[feinbera]

This has worked well for me:

- Treat and heat a little more than the batch size of sparge water; e.g., maybe 6 gallons for a 5-gallon batch; this will probably be too much, but better to have too much than too little
- Measure first runnings
- Do a first sparge of half the difference between the first runnings and the total pre-boil volume, plus half a gallon or so "just in case"
- Measure first runnings + first batch sparge
- Do a second batch sparge of remaining volume needed to hit total pre-boil volume, plus half a gallon or so "just in case"
- Only collect enough of the runnings from the second sparge to hit your pre-boil volume on the head

If everything goes perfectly, I end up wasting a little bit of the second batch sparge, but at that point, you'll be down to 1.020 or lower, so, not missing out on that many fermentables, and I like having a bit of margin of error.

 

[2xbrewing]

Thanks a lot