Fly-Sparge – How Slow is “Too Slow”?

[philm63]

I’ve been slowly figuring out my 3-vessel eHERMS setup and have been creeping up on finally getting a 60-minute sparge. Tricky getting those valves set just right – have to mess with them a bit, but it’s doable. Question is; is 60 minutes too long? I ask, because the last couple of times I brewed a Kolsch, the final runnings were at 1.009 and 1.006 respectively. It’s all RO and the pH of my final runnings has never gone above 5.6 even when SG goes down to 1.006.

I like that I can pull what seems to be pretty much all the available extract from my grain, but do I really need to pull that slow – 60-minutes? Am I spending (wasting) an extra 15 minutes sparging just to get a couple more points out of my grain? Could I back off a couple percentage points on my BHE in Beersmith 2, add a few more ounces of grain, pull a 45-minute sparge and end up with the same volume in the BK and the same calculated gravity (about 1.038 pre-boil)? This last time where I pulled it down to 1.006, I wound up 3 points high for my pre-boil SG – hit 1.041 instead of the calculated 1.038. Yeah I got more extract, but how much is too much? Am I over-sparging?

 

[Gnomebrewer]

It's really a personal preference thing. I aim to start sparging fairly quickly to cover the element on my BK, then just fast enough to stop the wort from boiling with the BK element turned on. It normally takes about 20-30 minutes on a 10 gallon batch. For me, the extra efficiency from sparging slower isn't worth it (I go from about 85% to 90% efficiency, which equates to about one to two dollars worth of grain on a 1.050/10gallon beer.

 

[Dland]

Usually takes me around 45 min to do 3 vessel, 10+ gallon fly sparge. I have gone longer, but do not see much increase in yield.

I believe you can take too long, after a couple of hours you might pick up some tannin from grain hulls, so I've read.

 

[bracconiere]

equates to about one to two dollars worth of grain on a 1.050/10gallon beer.

damn man, that like tacks on 22 cents to the price of a twelver!

 

[day_trippr]

fwiw, I run my autosparge system at one quart per minute. At my average 13.25 gallon pre-boil volume that takes almost an hour.

It does have the benefit of killer mash efficiency (low 90's is not unusual) but one could easily counter another pound of grain could save me the better half of that hour doing a double batch sparge and running off as fast as the bed can handle...

Cheers!

 

[philm63]

Yeah, my mash efficiency is pretty high but perhaps I am just working too hard to get those high efficiencies when I could instead be relaxing about it a bit more and not worrying so much about getting every possible little bit out of the grain. I think a few extra ounces of grain and a couple points lower on the efficiency number is a fair price to pay for shaving 15 minutes off the brew day - more time to spend with the kids on a Saturday morning!

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

Efficiency has it's place, and if you're running much below 70% brewhouse, you may have a hard time brewing high gravity beers. Why? As the grain percentage grows relative to the batch size, efficiency drops. So your 60% efficiency drop down to 50% or worse. Just add more grain you say? Sure, but now your efficiency drops even more. The problem compounds.

So if you're below 70%, I think worrying about efficiency might be warranted. Especially since just about any system should be able to achieve that level.

If you're already running 85%, chasing that extra 5% seems crazy to me. Definitely not worth it IMO.

 

[philm63]

BHE is already 82% for my Kolsch so it is as you say; chasing a few percentage points is not worth the 15 extra minutes of sparge time.

 

[kevin58]

My Blichmann Rip Tide pumps start to whine if I slow down the flow too much. Don't know if I'm doing something wrong or if it's just going so slow it's starving the pump. At any rate, I go just slow enough for that not to happen.

 

[ba-brewer]

I have a converted march pump with a riptide head, it too has issues running slow. If you can reduce the head(how high you push the water) you can go slower.

I run as slow as I can then manually throttle the water on and off a couple times.

 

[doug293cz]

My Blichmann Rip Tide pumps start to whine if I slow down the flow too much. Don't know if I'm doing something wrong or if it's just going so slow it's starving the pump. At any rate, I go just slow enough for that not to happen.

Are you controlling the flow with a valve on the output side of the pump? Throttling the input of a centrifugal pump can lead to pump damage.

Brew on

 

[kevin58]

Are you controlling the flow with a valve on the output side of the pump? Throttling the input of a centrifugal pump can lead to pump damage.

Brew on

So I should open the flow valve on the pump full open and control the wort flow using the ball valves on the kettles?

 

[doug293cz]

So I should open the flow valve on the pump full open and control the wort flow using the ball valves on the kettles?

No, the valve on a Rip-Tide pump is on the outlet side. That is where you want to throttle the flow. Pump shouldn't have a problem with flow throttled way down with that valve.

Brew on

 

[ba-brewer]

With a 3ft lift/head 2 quarts per min is the slowest I can run my riptide conversion. That is using the outlet valve on the pump.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/blichmann-riptide-issues.669501/#post-8664022

 

[day_trippr]

If one gets disconcerting impeller rattling at low rates it might be worth checking to see if the small SS thrust washer has thinned out or even disappeared. Somewhat amazingly, it turns out that's a wear item...

Cheers!

 

[ba-brewer]

The condition I see is not a rattle, just an oscillating surge and no flow. As a side not the original march pump head with a ball value attached run in the same setup at a trickle.

Fiddle parts are also easy to roll away if dropped, good to have an extra or two for such an occasion.

 

[bkboiler]

I thought in How to Brew, Palmer actually gives an SG of your final runnings where you should stop sparging...I thought it was around 1.010.
Not 100% about this as I'm still in the process of moving to fly sparging.

 

[day_trippr]

That sounds about right - I think Brad Smith says the same thing in his BeerSmith guidance - but the other important parameter is pH of the final runnings wants to stay below 5.6-5.8.

If I was a betting person I'd say more people run into the sparge pH limit than the residual sugar limit...

Cheers!

 

[ba-brewer]

That sounds about right - I think Brad Smith says the same thing in his BeerSmith guidance - but the other important parameter is pH of the final runnings wants to stay above 5.6-5.8.

If I was a betting person I'd say more people run into the sparge pH limit than the residual sugar limit...

Cheers!

think you want pH to stay below that range

 

[day_trippr]

Doh! Fingers outran brain.
Thanks. Fixed...

Cheers!

 

[Bobby_M]

...I aim to start sparging fairly quickly to cover the element on my BK, then just fast enough to stop the wort from boiling with the BK element turned on....

It's curious to me is why everyone thought, and continues to think that you have to wait for the full pre-boil volume to be collected before you start the boil and/or start counting the boil. Once the element is covered, you can and should get the full on boil going. Go ahead and start your hop schedule. The only case where I think it would have an impact is majority Pilsner malt recipes where the last of the runnings wouldn't boil long enough to drive off all the DMS.

 

[Dland]

^^^ I agree in theory, though it can't get to full on boil on my set up until all sparge runnings finish flowing into BK. Boil starts within 5 min of end of sparge.

 

[bracconiere]

BHE is already 82% for my Kolsch so it is as you say; chasing a few percentage points is not worth the 15 extra minutes of sparge time.

depends on what you have fun doing! with my homemalt i have to do a step mash, and when i found out the second step at 162f with store bought malt, bumped my BHE from 83% to 88-89-90%, i damn near jizzed....lol

 

[sicktght311]

Takes my on average about 20-30 minutes to fly sparge on my 5 gallon herms system, and i'll typically shut off the sparge water when i have about 1.5 gallons to go to my target boil volumes. My mash tun has almost 2 gallons of dead space under the false bottom so this accounts for that. I'm consistently 70-75% efficiency and the only time i've ever dipped lower is when i have a large grain bill

 

[JohnMc]

It's curious to me is why everyone thought, and continues to think that you have to wait for the full pre-boil volume to be collected before you start the boil and/or start counting the boil. Once the element is covered, you can and should get the full on boil going. Go ahead and start your hop schedule. The only case where I think it would have an impact is majority Pilsner malt recipes where the last of the runnings wouldn't boil long enough to drive off all the DMS.

I have heat on, but it boils after the sparging is done. I do use first wort hopping sometimes, FWIW.

As to the OP's question, I shoot for 45 minutes to an hour, regardless of batch size, from my 5 gallon Rubbermaid mash tun to my 100 qt cooler tun.

 

[johnnysoj]

I’ve been slowly figuring out my 3-vessel eHERMS setup and have been creeping up on finally getting a 60-minute sparge. Tricky getting those valves set just right – have to mess with them a bit, but it’s doable. Question is; is 60 minutes too long? I ask, because the last couple of times I brewed a Kolsch, the final runnings were at 1.009 and 1.006 respectively. It’s all RO and the pH of my final runnings has never gone above 5.6 even when SG goes down to 1.006.

I like that I can pull what seems to be pretty much all the available extract from my grain, but do I really need to pull that slow – 60-minutes? Am I spending (wasting) an extra 15 minutes sparging just to get a couple more points out of my grain? Could I back off a couple percentage points on my BHE in Beersmith 2, add a few more ounces of grain, pull a 45-minute sparge and end up with the same volume in the BK and the same calculated gravity (about 1.038 pre-boil)? This last time where I pulled it down to 1.006, I wound up 3 points high for my pre-boil SG – hit 1.041 instead of the calculated 1.038. Yeah I got more extract, but how much is too much? Am I over-sparging?

You mentioned getting the valves just right. I had that problem, and it was a pain to balance them. I ended up buying a blichman autosparge. It was the best 70-something bucks I've ever spent. I just open my HTL full, and the autosparge takes care of maintaining a nice level of water on top of the grain bed.