Whats the most you've gotten into a 5 gallon igloo mash/lauter tun?

So without doing the math until just now, the night before brewday, I realized i have 14lb and 10oz of grains plus a pound of rice hulls to cram into my 5 gallon MLT.
The guy at my lhbs gave me the rice hulls free because he felt he milled the grains a little too fine.

Brewmex41 said:

So without doing the math until just now, the night before brewday, I realized i have 14lb and 10oz of grains plus a pound of rice hulls to cram into my 5 gallon MLT.
The guy at my lhbs gave me the rice hulls free because he felt he milled the grains a little too fine.

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I don't think that you will make it. See this for a better understanding of mash tun volume: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f11/how-big-your-mash-tun-needs-123585/

Nothing wrong with doing two back-to-back mashes and combining them for the boil. I would do a mash out though to set the profile on the first mash.

I did 13 or so once on a barleywine. I needed more than that, so I added a little extract to the boil.

Here's a good calculator (second one from teh bottom) that'll help. Remember to account for dead space under the false bottom, too. http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml

I've done three 15 lb grainbills in my 5 gallon. I mash in with a 0.9:1 water:grist ratio until everything is in, and then I top up with strike water to within 1/2" of the top. I usually end up about 1.1:1 water:grist when all is said and done. I've got an IIPA kegged right now that used this size grainbill in fact . I still get ~73% efficiency when doing this size grainbill.

If the crush doesn't look terrible then just use a half pound of hulls and save the rest for another batch. You'd then be right at almost 15 lb.

I'm going to do it all at once, anyways. Last time I was at the lhbs I asked the same question. The guy helping me pulled up a calculator and figured at a thickness of 1 qt/lb I can get 15lbs.
I was just curious how many others have jammed their mlt full.

The most I've done is 13lbs in the MLT and I steeped a couple lbs of crystal.

I ended up filling my 6 gallon carboy with about 5 1/2 gallons plus an additional 1 gallon carboy with 1.060 rather than the 5 gallons of 1.080 I was expecting. I won't try anything this big for a while.

Brewmex41 said:

I ended up filling my 6 gallon carboy with about 5 1/2 gallons plus an additional 1 gallon carboy with 1.060 rather than the 5 gallons of 1.080 I was expecting. I won't try anything this big for a while.

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What happened? A 6.5 gallon batch at 1.060 is about equal to a 5 gallon batch at 1.080, just need to boil about 1.5 hours longer. Did you oversparge? Overall, 1.060 in 6.5 gallons is ~72% efficiency which is good in my book for what could have been a high gravity beer.

Im not really sure what happened. I collected my mash and sparge water until my 30qt stock pot was nearly full. I noticed the sparge was still a good amber color so i boiled for an hour then collected another 2 gallons or so and boiled that about 45 minutes. They both ended up about 1.060

A nearly full 30qt stock pot = ~28qts (guessing), ~ 7 gallons. This was boiled for an hour and your OG was 1.060. If this were me, I would ended up with about 5.5 gallons post boil.

2 gallons extra was collected (separate pot I assume). This was boiled for 45 minutes and your OG was 1.060. This was probably about 1 gallon post boil.

Add the two together and you have about 6.5 gallons post boil of 1.060, which is exactly what you said

After typing this "aloud", I'm assuming somewhere in the sparging process lead to poor extraction of the sugars from the grain. You should have been able to drain nearly all of that sugar in your initial ~28 quarts. I don't know if you were batch sparging or fly sparging. I batch sparge. On my 15 lb batches, after the mash has finished sitting it's hour or so, I stir it up really well for a couple minutes, vorlauf, and then drain the first runnings (sometimes I have to proceed slow due to limited liquid and thick wort). After collecting my first runnings, I fill the cooler back up with 180+F sparge water, and stir very well. This stirring session is probably the most important since you are attempting to rinse most of the remaining sugars that were not collected in the first runnings, and there is still a significant amount remaining in the MLT. So I stir really well for 5 minutes, vorlauf, and drain the second runnings (grainbed should be close to 170F at this point because I used 180+F water). At this point I still need to reach pre boil volume so I take note of how much more volume I need; add them much hot sparge water to the MLT; stir really well for a few minute minutes; vorlauf; and drain the third runnings until I reach pre boil volume. Mix up my BK wort and get a gravity reading. If you batch sparge, is this about how your MLT runnings went?

I batch sparge in two additions. I heated up 5 2/3 gallons and added as much as I could fit. I didn't stir however. I also only vorlauf once. Those two things might have factored in, here. But the mlt was full to the brim with grain and liquor so I didn't have much space to stir.

The vorlauf shouldn't matter much - just leads to clearer runnings.

However, the stirring of the sparge water would make a BIG difference. After draining your first runnings, you basically have sugars (solution) stuck to the grains. Pouring water over them will release some of this sugar solution but stirring them up really helps to rinse the sugars into your new sugarless sparge water. It's worth leaving 2" head space on your second runnings (first sparge) just so you can stir it up really well. It doesn't have to be vigorous but it does need to be stirred around for a few minutes - and it doesn't matter what size your grainbill is, it should always be well stirred to get the most sugars out. No worries though; it's still gonna be good beer!!

Yeah I want to try this brew again in the future. I think my IBUs jumped from about 50 to more like 60. We shall see.