Bought a mill for our homebrewing operation with intentions of controlling efficiency better. Here is a sample of first runs. Any grains not busted are at least cracked it appears. How does it look?
How Does My Grain Look?
- Thread starter jrsdws
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Crush more, jmo
OP
OP
This is the Cereal Killer mill and it's set at 0.050". I ran a pound at .035" and another at .040" and it appeared to be too fine.
I can tighten her down and rerun some.
Agreed. I'd tighten the gap more. I usually run my mill at a thickness where the flat side (no raised characters) of a credit card can slide through. On my old Barley Crusher I had it set where the credit card (I used a blank cable TV card from the mail) would provide just enough resistance to roll the rollers and I'd get 81% efficiency almost every batch. When I moved up to the Monster Mill 2 (standard roller size) my efficiency increased a ton. So I backed off the gap a little so that now the card slides through without moving the rollers and I get 86% efficiency for nearly every batch. The standard credit card thickness is 0.030 inch, so yeah you can go tighter and all your grains don't look at least halved.
For the record, I do have two sets of feeler gauges and have used them. I've just gone back to the simple trusty blank credit card thingy as it does the job just fine
Rev.
OP
OP
Rerun at about 0.037" gap.
OP
OP
Gap at 0.030" credit card setting
I must've had too many homebrews last night when testing this thing out. I was testing on small amounts of roasted barley and some caramel 60....so maybe they are just more brittle than 2 row.
I must've had too many homebrews last night when testing this thing out. I was testing on small amounts of roasted barley and some caramel 60....so maybe they are just more brittle than 2 row.
motobrewer
I'm no atheist scientist, but...
malt conditioning would go a long way here.
dwhite60
Well-Known Member
Yep! Tried it for the first time last brew day. Will continue to use it.
All the Best,
D. White
Roadie
Well-Known Member
I was looking at building a motorized grain mill but after pricing out just the mill (MM2 Pro SL) plus hopper and extension then the motor (Dayton 1AGG3) I was at $640. By the time I added up the other required parts I was at $825 and decided whatever the LHBS has theirs at is fine for me! Of course this is overkill - but that's how we roll.
OP
OP
I can try that next time...but this time everything is already crushed once.
How does the last run at 0.030" look?
FloppyKnockers
Well-Known Member
Can't really tell. The picture came out a bit...grainy.
I was looking at building a motorized grain mill but after pricing out just the mill (MM2 Pro SL) plus hopper and extension then the motor (Dayton 1AGG3) I was at $640. By the time I added up the other required parts I was at $825 and decided whatever the LHBS has theirs at is fine for me! Of course this is overkill - but that's how we roll.
Look into a corona mill, 30 bucks shipped and a 1/2 drill and your on your merry way...
Bulk grain by the sack ftw
Cheers
I think that pic at 0.030 looks perfect. At least it's what my grain looks like when crushed. I use a bazooka screen and have never had any issues with stuck runoff/sparges and run clear wort after vorlaufing. Of course, things might differ on your system but I think it looks good to give it a try and see how it goes. If you do have any issues try at 0.035.
Rev.
That's pretty good. That's a "standard crush". You could go finer, say, .035 or so. Or finer.
There's a great saying that old homebrewers use- "Crush 'til you're scared"!
OP
OP
Excellent!! Thanks for the help. I'm using a bazooka screen also. We've been counting on LHBS to crush our grain but been burned too many times. There's nobody to blame now but ourselves. We have a big day of brewing tomorrow, doing four different 5 gallon batches.
theseeker4
Well-Known Member
Wow, hope you have multiple burners and kettles, that would be insane to do back-to-back.....
Although your .037 looks great, I would lean toward your .030 grist, which is similar to what I do and get 80-85% mash efficiency using a converted cooler mash tun with manifold. Never had a stuck mash or (batch) sparge.
Run your smaller kernel grain (wheat, rye, etc. and flaked adjuncts) at a narrower gap, like .024-.028" for better efficiency from those grains, or much will pass through mostly uncrushed.
If you BIAB you can mill even finer.
Run your smaller kernel grain (wheat, rye, etc. and flaked adjuncts) at a narrower gap, like .024-.028" for better efficiency from those grains, or much will pass through mostly uncrushed.
If you BIAB you can mill even finer.
augiedoggy
Well-Known Member
On the opposite end of the spectrum you can build a motorized mill for less that $200 as well... I used a cereal killer and some pulleys from tractor supply with an old dc powered salvaged motor. I powered it with a $3 bridge rectifier and $7 dimmer light switch to cheaply convert the ac power to a DC waveform... It works very well with no issues to date...I was looking at building a motorized grain mill but after pricing out just the mill (MM2 Pro SL) plus hopper and extension then the motor (Dayton 1AGG3) I was at $640. By the time I added up the other required parts I was at $825 and decided whatever the LHBS has theirs at is fine for me! Of course this is overkill - but that's how we roll.
I made a nice stand with pressboard from an old entertainment center I had disassembled to toss out.
As far as crush...its different for different people depending on their mash filtering system... finer you go the more flour you produce but the higher your efficiency (obviously)... like others have mentioned you can keep going finer until you have stuck mash/sparge issues... this is a key reason I use a false bottom with a bazooka tube under it, and a finer last chance braided filter inside the bazooka tube to catch the finer particles from entering my small DC pumps. with a larger pump this wouldnt be a concern. my gap is a huge .45 BTW which always nets me over 75% where I have my setpoint in beersmith but it varies... my last brew was 83% efficiency I recirculate with a rims which I believe helps a great deal to break the starches down.
OP
OP
Yeah we built a new mash tun this morning so we had 2 tuns, two burners/boil kettles, and a hot liquor tank running. All said I think we had about 6 hours into it roughly. Kinda lost time after we hit the homebrews.
Over the 4 batches, Beersmith calculated average efficiency at 73% so I'm happy with that. There's room for improvement, and we'll work on that, but it was a good day.
ftmfw!!
I left my Cereal Killer as set by the vendor - .38" or so. Crush looks like the one you describe as .37" (which makes sense!). It seemed a little fine to me, and more flour than I had in mind, but I went ahead and tried it today. I told Brewsmith to expect my usual 80% efficiency and hit predicted og with an extra gallon in the kettle so efficiency was up some. No issues with the HERMS or sparge, so I think I'll leave it as it is.
