Giant headache with my first all grain brew

[TheVandal]

Hello there. longtime reader, first poster. I want to clarify that I did spend the better portion of 2 hours or so skimming around with the search function, and still don't quite know what to do. Been homebrewing a bit over a year now. got in about 5 or 6 extract brews in before deciding I wanted to give all grain a shot. Made a mashtun out of a rubbermaid 10 gallon cooler easy enough, went out and got a giant 60 quart stock pot, along with a burner from lowe's. Kind of thinking I could have gone a little bit smaller, but I didn't want to be between a rock and a hard place. I figured I'd rather have the extra room and not need it, than need it and not have it. (might still be overkill though ha!) and formulated my own recipe on beersmith. Figured I'd give that a shot since I was going all in.

So with most of the background stuff out of the way, here's my problems / questions

1. I had a bit more in the brew kettle than I could fit into my fermenting bucket. So I wound up having to dump, what I'm approximating was a gallon or so (I really need to get several more buckets or better bottle or something). I don't quite understand why I had so much, but I'm going to look into it again. Anyway, I set the program for a batch size of 6 gallons, and obviously wound up with more than enough (the bucket can easily hold 6 1/2 - 7 gallons, this however leaves no room for the krausen, so I decided 6 gallons was good enough) so the specifics going in was 23lbs of grain total, mashed in 8gal of water in a 10gal mashtun at 158F, sparged with 4gal after 75 minutes, and had the total amount go back into my giant ass brew kettle. boiled for 60 minutes, Ice bath, and then most of it into the fermenter. Did I not let it boil long enough? or did I do something wrong for beersmith to give me wrong variables?

2. Shipped in my ingredients from Northern Brewer as my local homebrew supply store doesn't crush grains for you (unless i read their site wrong), and I dont quite have the money to shell out for a grain crusher after dropping close to 200 for the new additions for my AG foray. Philly has been hot and humid the past few weeks. So I'm worried that the 6 or 7 day trip here in 90 - 100 degree heat killed my yeast, as I brewed it on Tuesday (2 days ago) and have nothing going on in the airlock as of yet. I took into account the amt of time it takes for yeast to activate, and checked the seals, and even opened up the top of the bucket just enough for me to peer inside. All I saw was some bubbles laying on the top, no krausen, and no bubbles coming to the surface and popping. upon my reading around on here, I've seen similar questions and the first question always asked is, "did you make a starter?" No, I didn't make a starter. I've never had to. I usually saw fermentation activity within 12 or so hours. I used White Labs Irish ale yeast. (http://www.whitelabs.com/beer/strains_wlp004.html) Should I shake the bucket up? maybe rousing the yeast / wort will kick flocculation up? or should I run to my homebrew shop and get a new vial?

3. Also, my gravity reading was about about .02 off from where beer smith told me it would be. It stated 1.098, but I measured 1.07. Could this be attributed to (tying in with my first question/issue) too much water being used in the mashing / boiling process?

Thanks for any help that can be imparted, I really appreciate it. Also, I apologize in advance for the wall of text haha, I just want to explain things to be as thorough as possible.

 

[a6ladd]

Welcome to the joy of all grain

Ill start with your third question and say yes, you undershot your gravity due to an excess amount of water used during your mash/sparge. I usually like to overshoot by about .25 gallons and dump the remaining wort to keep all the trub out of my fermentor. Once you get your water dialed in a little better you should have no problem with this.

Now back to number 1. I typically leave about 1.5 gallons worth of head space for my 5 gallon batch of brew to ferment in my 6.5 gallon fermentor, seeing as how I do not have a blow off system this helps keep the lid attached to my bucket during fermentation :cross:. I use Beersmith as well and set my batch size to 5, this seems to work out pretty well. What ratio of grain:water are you using for your mash? With 8 gallons for 23lbs of grist its about 1.75qt:1lb which is pretty high. Most sources recommend 1qt:1lb - 1.25qt:1lb for the mash. This is probably why you ended up with so much extra wort. Double check Beersmith's water to grain ratio for the mash.

If you peeked into the kettle and saw no activity I would head down to the LHBS and pick up another vial of yeast. Not to say that your yeast is completely toast but 1.070 is a tall order even for a healthy vial of yeast and I would say impossible for a vial that's been that hot for 6 or 7 days. You should really try and make a starter for it next time. It may be a pain but it requires just a little bet of extra planning and has huge benefits.

Cheers!

 

[BigB]

You definitely used way too much water. Assuming grain absorbtion of .1 gal/lb, you should have lost approximately 2 1/3 gallons to absorbtion and likely .5 - .75 gallons for tun design. Which would leave you with approximately 9 gallons going into the boil. So, you would have needed to boil off a full 3 gallons to get to your desired 6 (which is still too much for a 6.5 gal bucket). I didn't see anywhere you took any volume measurements in the kettle. So to sum, you had way too much water and didn't boil nearly long enough to compensate for this, so that left you with a lower than expected OG and too much wort left in the kettle.

As far as a slow start... you definitely WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY underpitched with that OG and the condition the yeast was in. I would give it at least 72 hours then check with a hydrometer to see if the gravity is lower. If not, then pitch a fresh package of yeast.

 

[PKLehmer]

Just my opinion but maybe on your second batch, dial your ambitions down a bit. Going for a high gravity beer straight out the gate with all grain is going to be harder to dial in your system real well. Maybe start with a light ale just to get your experience in (messing up a batch with 12 lbs of grain is a lot cheaper than messing up with 23 lbs.) get a couple easy batches under your belt before trying to go big.

And I'm going to ditto the starter comment, starters are a great way to check viability of your yeast and a must for any high gravity beer.

 

[tyll-matic]

I definitely agree with those above me and will add this - Beersmith will work much better for you if you create a custom equipment profile (because your system is unique, as is mine, and almost everyone's). Measure your liquid volumes to find out how much you lost in the mash tun, from boiling, into the fermenter, etc. Make sure you use the right mash profile. Beersmith is a great program, but one needs to input the right variables for it to work properly.

 

[tre9er]

Absorption can be as high as 0.19g/lb. which would have yielded 7.6g. in the kettle and typical boil-off and trub-loss would have gotten you down to around the 6g. mark. How much did you collect in the kettle pre-boil? Mark your mash-paddle, get a sight-glass, or mark the kettle so you know what your pre-boil volume is. If it's high and your gravity is low, boil longer and don't add the second and subsequent hop additions until your back at the specified pre-boil volume/gravity. Most guys just do a 90m boil instead of 60m if they find their volume is high (unless gravity is dead-on for pre-boil).

My absoprtion is slightly less than the high-end, probably more in the 0.15g/lb. range and I've been meaning to adjust it even further. I don't take good enough notes but I know what's going on/what happened on during brew-day. Gotta work on that.

Lower your absorption in beer smith. However much you dumped (a gallon?) take the recipe you made and lower absorption until it tells you that you'll end up with 1g less pre-boil, then use that absorption number going forward.

 

[Draken]

I make brew 2.5 gallon batches only, I still make starters for most brews with liquid yeast.

And yes the extra water is the cause of your problem. I would check the water absorption, mash tun loss, boil off rate, and kettle trub loss settings. Start tweaking those to match your setup. You will get closer next time and can continue I tweak till your nearly dead on.

 

[kh54s10]

I also agree with the other responses. When you work on your equipment profile you will need to work back from the amount you want to end up with in your fermenter. You need to account for boil off, grains absorption and equipment loss. Once that is dialed in getting the right volumes is easy.

Also double check the batch size on the recipe page. It seems to default to 10 gallons which throws off all the other calculations if you are trying for a 5 gallon batch.

Make starters whenever you are using liquid yeast! You can ferment your beer with a smackpack or vial but you will make a better beer pitching the proper amount of yeast.

For information on starters look at mrmalty.com and yeastcalc.com.

 

[tre9er]

With that size kettle, your boiloff should EASILY be 1+g/hr. Trub loss would be relatively high with 23lbs. of grain, too. That's why I go back to absorption. That's why I ask how much you had pre-boil.

 

[jCOSbrew]

On the next All grain batch make sure you measure the volume and SG into the boil kettle to determine your efficiency and refine your all grain process. Let the wort cool to room temp for an accurate hydrometer reading. If you are half way through the boil and realize you have too much water you can increase the boil time (or add DME) to hit your target OG into the fermenter. Volume measurement can be as simple as filling the kettle 1 gallon at a time and marking your brewing paddle or spoon.

 

[BigB]

Absorption can be as high as 0.19g/lb. which would have yielded 7.6g. in the kettle and typical boil-off and trub-loss would have gotten you down to around the 6g. mark. How much did you collect in the kettle pre-boil? Mark your mash-paddle, get a sight-glass, or mark the kettle so you know what your pre-boil volume is. If it's high and your gravity is low, boil longer and don't add the second and subsequent hop additions until your back at the specified pre-boil volume/gravity. Most guys just do a 90m boil instead of 60m if they find their volume is high (unless gravity is dead-on for pre-boil).

My absoprtion is slightly less than the high-end, probably more in the 0.15g/lb. range and I've been meaning to adjust it even further. I don't take good enough notes but I know what's going on/what happened on during brew-day. Gotta work on that.

Lower your absorption in beer smith. However much you dumped (a gallon?) take the recipe you made and lower absorption until it tells you that you'll end up with 1g less pre-boil, then use that absorption number going forward.

That is an awfully high absorbtion rate... are you sure you are not inadvertantly considering tun design loss as part of your calculation??? Using your .19 number would leave 7.6 gallons behind, but then that assumes zero loss to tun design- which is highly unlikely. Also, tun design loss is an important consideration separate from absorbtion because although grains may slightly absorb more or less depending on the crush and type, but tun design loss could vary drastically from one tun to the next and remains a relative constant regardless of the size of the mash.

 

[Jwood]

You need to definitely pitch more yeast...a lot more. For that size of a batch with that OG you would probably need at least 4 fresh vials. That's why starters are necessary. You can spend as much as you want on brew equipment, but if you don't treat your yeast perfectly (proper pitch rate, enough dissolved 02 in the wort, correct fermentation temp) you will not be haPpy with the final result. Please keep it in mind for the next batch, it will make a world of difference..

 

[Pie_Man]

I agree with most everyone's comments about water volume and yeast pitching. Being that you're using beersmith, you'll need to dial in your water volume assumptions to match your system. Grain absorption rate should be pretty standard. You can estimate boil off rate with water, a gallon per hour is probably a good starting point. All of these estimates are set under the equipment profile in beersmith.

One other thing, it seems very odd to me that a HBS wouldn't mill grain. I've never heard of such a thing.

 

[tre9er]

That is an awfully high absorbtion rate... are you sure you are not inadvertantly considering tun design loss as part of your calculation??? Using your .19 number would leave 7.6 gallons behind, but then that assumes zero loss to tun design- which is highly unlikely. Also, tun design loss is an important consideration separate from absorbtion because although grains may slightly absorb more or less depending on the crush and type, but tun design loss could vary drastically from one tun to the next and remains a relative constant regardless of the size of the mash.

What? Using that number would YIELD 7.6g pre boil, not lose it. You'd only lose4g or so . It's a common staring point for absorption. I factor in slight tun loss but absorption is the greatest loss

 

[TheVandal]

Thanks for the input. I did go back and look at the equipment profile. It probably did default on me or something of the sort. Not quite sure what happened, but I'm not quite sure which to pick. Should I just go with the pot and cooler (5g/19L) setup? or is there a way to set up my own? Still trying to get the hang of this program.

Also, wasn't aware that the single vile of yeast wasn't enough. I'll definitely make a starter from now on. Going to pickup another bucket to ferment in, and hopefully brew up another batch in a week or two. Going to see if I can fix the problems here.

Also, I did misread about the crushing bit, sort of. But that's irrelevant at this point. I have to pay more attention. The ADD kills me when it comes to these things.

Do I have to worry about the presumed dead yeast causing off flavors for this current batch? And is there a way to make improvised blow off tubes for the buckets, or do they sell those? Been a long night at work, but I'll head over to the LHBS in 4 or so hours to hopefully get some stuff sorted. Thanks for the help everyone!

 

[Draken]

If you don't have any fermentation after 72 hours, pitch more yeast. But check for tht with a hydrometer not by looking for bubbles. The yeast should still ferment your beer, they are just going to be overworked and stressed, so give them plenty of time.

 

[Pie_Man]

I would create a customized equipment profile in beersmith. If you're unsure of a variable, leave the default setting for now and adjust it later. And don't worry about any dead yeast.

 

[BigB]

What? Using that number would YIELD 7.6g pre boil, not lose it. You'd only lose4g or so . It's a common staring point for absorption. I factor in slight tun loss but absorption is the greatest loss

23 X .19= 4.37 (23 Lbs grain per OP. .19 absorbtion rate per you)

12-4.4=7.6 (8 gals mash in and 4 gals sparge per OP. 4.4 is merely 4.37 rounded up to 4.4).

Your post indicated:

Absorption can be as high as 0.19g/lb. which would have yielded 7.6g. in the kettle and typical boil-off and trub-loss would have gotten you down to around the 6g. mark.

Where is the factoring for tun design???

My point is that you can easily calculate your tun design loss by adding a couple gallons of water to your tun, drain it, and measure what you have left. In my case, I always lose .5 gallons. This is the same whether I have a 23 lb mash or a 10 lb mash... so the .5 is a constant. Now lets assume that my crush and grain bill actually absorbed .1 gallons per pound:

In the case of the 23 lb mash, I would have lost 2.3 gallons to absorbtion and .5 gallons to tun design, for a total loss of 2.8 gallons ((23 x .1) + .5). If we wrap the tun design loss into the absorbtion calculation, then we would have an absorbtion rate of .12. (2.8 gal/23 lbs). Now using the exact same mash tun and using the same grain, but reducing the amount of grain to 10 pounds we would lose 1 gallon to aborbtion and still have the .5 gal loss for tun design leaving us a total loss of 1.5 gallons ((10 x .1) +.5). But here is where it gets interesting... So now we are calculating the entire 1.5 gallon loss, like it appears you are doing, our absorbtion rate would be .15 (1.5 gal/10 lbs). This is a full 20% difference! Did the exact same grains and crush absorb 20% more water? No... the only variable was the amount of grain.

Certainly the greatest loss is usually the grain absorbtion, but that is not a constant and can drastically affect ones calculations from one beer to the next and from one mash tun to the next. (As a side note, a good example is that I use a 48 qt ice cube cooler with a copper slotted manifold and lose .5 gallons. My friend uses a 40 qt igloo cooler with a false bottom and loses approximately .8 gallons). Can grain absorbtion rate be different? Absolutley - it will vary by grain type, crush, water profile, altitude, temperature, relative humidity, grain dryness, etc. Is it realistic to be as high as .19 in most situations-absolutely not. It has been reported that many brewers experience a .12 grain absorbtion rate. Mine and my friend's is usually .1, but we have had loss rates up to .13 before.

 

[kh54s10]

Answers in red

Thanks for the input. I did go back and look at the equipment profile. It probably did default on me or something of the sort. Not quite sure what happened, but I'm not quite sure which to pick. Should I just go with the pot and cooler (5g/19L) setup? or is there a way to set up my own? Still trying to get the hang of this program.

Use the help in Beersmith and find the video for setting up you own equipment profile. If your equipment is not exactly like one of the selections you will not be able to be accurate.

Also, wasn't aware that the single vile of yeast wasn't enough. I'll definitely make a starter from now on. Going to pickup another bucket to ferment in, and hopefully brew up another batch in a week or two. Going to see if I can fix the problems here.

Having extra fermenters and a "pipeline" is the best way to keep from wanting to rush things. Plus you get to try what you learn sooner. It is also nice to be able to go to the fridge and have a choice of several homebrews.

Also, I did misread about the crushing bit, sort of. But that's irrelevant at this point. I have to pay more attention. The ADD kills me when it comes to these things.

Do I have to worry about the presumed dead yeast causing off flavors for this current batch? And is there a way to make improvised blow off tubes for the buckets, or do they sell those? Been a long night at work, but I'll head over to the LHBS in 4 or so hours to hopefully get some stuff sorted. Thanks for the help everyone!

It would not be the dead yeast but the under pitching or temperature of the fermentation that would cause off flavors. I would expect that you will have some, but not extreme off flavors and quite probably not serious enough that any but a very discriminating taster would notice.

There are several ways to make blow off tubes for buckets. You can get a tube diameter that fits in the hole tightly. Or, if you have a 3 piece airlock you can fit tubing on the inner part that the cone covers. If you use the 3 piece airlock you might want to cut off the X on the bottom that can clog up.

 

[tre9er]

23 X .19= 4.37 (23 Lbs grain per OP. .19 absorbtion rate per you)

12-4.4=7.6 (8 gals mash in and 4 gals sparge per OP. 4.4 is merely 4.37 rounded up to 4.4).

Your post indicated:


Where is the factoring for tun design???

My point is that you can easily calculate your tun design loss by adding a couple gallons of water to your tun, drain it, and measure what you have left. In my case, I always lose .5 gallons. This is the same whether I have a 23 lb mash or a 10 lb mash... so the .5 is a constant. Now lets assume that my crush and grain bill actually absorbed .1 gallons per pound:

In the case of the 23 lb mash, I would have lost 2.3 gallons to absorbtion and .5 gallons to tun design, for a total loss of 2.8 gallons ((23 x .1) + .5). If we wrap the tun design loss into the absorbtion calculation, then we would have an absorbtion rate of .12. (2.8 gal/23 lbs). Now using the exact same mash tun and using the same grain, but reducing the amount of grain to 10 pounds we would lose 1 gallon to aborbtion and still have the .5 gal loss for tun design leaving us a total loss of 1.5 gallons ((10 x .1) +.5). But here is where it gets interesting... So now we are calculating the entire 1.5 gallon loss, like it appears you are doing, our absorbtion rate would be .15 (1.5 gal/10 lbs). This is a full 20% difference! Did the exact same grains and crush absorb 20% more water? No... the only variable was the amount of grain.

Certainly the greatest loss is usually the grain absorbtion, but that is not a constant and can drastically affect ones calculations from one beer to the next and from one mash tun to the next. (As a side note, a good example is that I use a 48 qt ice cube cooler with a copper slotted manifold and lose .5 gallons. My friend uses a 40 qt igloo cooler with a false bottom and loses approximately .8 gallons). Can grain absorbtion rate be different? Absolutley - it will vary by grain type, crush, water profile, altitude, temperature, relative humidity, grain dryness, etc. Is it realistic to be as high as .19 in most situations-absolutely not. It has been reported that many brewers experience a .12 grain absorbtion rate. Mine and my friend's is usually .1, but we have had loss rates up to .13 before.

We are saying the same thing two different ways. My post indicated that with a 0.19g/lb absorption rate, the YIELD, not loss, would be 7.6g. I assume hardly any tun loss, or at least in my system there isn't much if any. I have it in there somewhere but it's minimal, perhaps a quart. Many manifolds are within a few millimeters of touching the bottom of the tun. Sure, if you have tun-loss (and you need to measure if you do) then that is in addition to absorption. My point was without knowing his tun-loss, and assuming it wasn't stark, his absorption was likely off.

Doing a brew knowing your tun loss would in-turn tell you your absorption rate. That's how I got mine, which has changed as my tun changed.

 

[BigB]

We are saying the same thing two different ways. My point was without knowing his tun-loss, and assuming it wasn't stark, his absorption was likely off.

Doing a brew knowing your tun loss would in-turn tell you your absorption rate. That's how I got mine, which has changed as my tun changed.

Agreed. That is what I didn't get of your post. Thanks for clarifying.

 

[TheVandal]

Hoping that this post wasn't too far in the backlist that I'm bringing it back up, but I just wanted to update and thank everyone for their input.

So, I dropped another 2 vials of yeast in that bad boy, set up a blow off tube, and everything went smoothly. At least I thought it went smoothly, as everything went normal as far as I know. Come today, when I get home from work at 5am this morning, ready to bottle it up and as I'm racking into my bottling bucket, I decide to take a hydrometer reading, and wanted wailed at the reading. It sunk all the way down and read 1.001/1.002. Barely at the 1% alcohol mark. I tried it a few more times, spinning the hydrometer in frustration each time; the result never changed. I go up to check on the rest of the beer as it was being racked into the bottling bucket, and I trip over it knocking everything over, soaking myself in the process. All in all, first all grain brew a total disaster hahaha. I'm sitting back now trying to find the humor in it.

I never took an OG reading, I meant to but it did slip my mind. I'm assuming the ridiculously low gravity was due to inefficient mashing? Or did something not occur properly in the fermenting portion? There was a good amount of krausen residue in my bucket, and the blow off tube was letting out air like crazy for the few days after I set it up. It did have that "beer smell" That I've grown accustomed to from brewing the extract stuff in the past as well. I'm quite confused why it would read so low. It has to be the mash efficiency right?

I was debating doing another one this thursday, but I might just freeze the grain that I got the other day from the LHBS and wait a little bit.

I want to thank everyone again for their help and comments. This is so depressingly funny how bad this turned out for me. -.-

 

[Pie_Man]

1.001/1.002 is a very low fg. I thought your OG was 1.070?

(OG - FG) * 131 = ABV%

.069 * 131 = 9.4 abv

 

[BigB]

1.001/1.002 is a very low fg. I thought your OG was 1.070?

(OG - FG) * 131 = ABV%

.069 * 131 = 9.4 abv

^^^THIS^^^

Sounds like you have (had) a strong beer there! Sorry to hear you knocked it over, I bet that would have been a good beer.

 

[TheVandal]

Weird work hours make it really hard for me to get on here, so I apologize for late replies. I'm late by like a week here too. Also yea, lack of sleep made me forget I DID take an OG reading.

*face palm* Damn.... looks like it did essentially turn out right then. I was going to bottle it for the hell of it, but then I did knock it over. ****. Well I know better for next time. It's frustrating to read that even with everything that went wrong it did still turn out pretty much how I wanted it to, and then to knock it all over. I feel like such an ass