Sparging

After mashing the grains when you go to rinse. I believe that's what is called sparging. With 185 degree water. How long are you supposed to let that rest?

Thanks,
Mike

 

I batch sparge with 2 batches of 185 degree water and I let each rest for 10 to 15 minutes but Im no expert. Hopefully others will chime in too.

 

I sparge with 170f water for 15 minutes but only have a few batches with less than stellar efficiency under my belt.

 

Give it a good stir and just let it rest for another 15-20 minutes. You can double-up your sparges as bjz stated by simply dividing your sparge water in half. 15 minutes for each sparge will help extract any additional sugars left in the grains. Just try to keep the grain bed at a temperature as close to 170F as possible. Going over will result in off flavors caused by tannins being leached out of the grains.

 

I've heard people talk about efficiency. How is this calculated. Actual OG compared to OG suggested on the kit?

 

You're right in thinking that sparging is just a fancy name for rinsing, but there are two ways of sparging.
Batch sparging is done by adding a batch of sparge water, stirring well, vorlaufing, and then draining into the kettle. Repeat this process again as often as is necessary.
Fly sparging is done by vorlaufing, then dribbling sparge water into the mash and draining it out in a continuous process.
In both cases, you want to raise the grain temperature to 165 - 170F.
Going hotter than this can extract unwanted tannins from the grain, resulting in an astringent taste.
Going lower than this can reduce your efficiency as the sugars are not as easily dissolved at the lower temperatures.
From your description, I assume that you are batch sparging. Adding the batch sparge water at 185F will raise the grain bed temp to 165 - 170F. Give it a good stir, and the sugars will get dissolved in the sparge water. Once the sugars are dissolved, you should be able to drain the wort without any further resting time. Some say that a 10 - 15 minute resting time is beneficial. It won't hurt, but I've never seen any evidence to show that it is necessary.
If you're fly sparging, things are a little bit different. At the start of the sparge, your grain temp will probably be in the low 150's. Dribbling in sparge water will not raise the grain temp sufficiently to dissolve the sugars. In this case, I would recommend a mash out to raise the mash temp to 165 - 170F, and then sparge with a lower temp water to keep the grain temp less than 170F.

hope this helps
-a.

 

Thanks for the help.

 

With batch sprging, should the second batch of sparge water be closer to 170 degrees, with the idea that the first batch of 185 degree water had raised the temp to (or near) 170?

 

First, get over the idea that you need to do batch sparging in 2 batches. IME, that's effort you expend for a very small gain....not worth it to me. Second, there's no need to let the batch sparge water sit at all. I've done _many_ tests letting it sit from 30 min. to 0 min. and found that it made absolutely no difference to the finished beer.

People, batch sparging is simple...it's easy....don't make it more complicated than it needs to be!

 

Probably a bit cooler than the first, but the grain bed will cool down as you drain the sparge

-a.

 

But it could be necessary if the lauter tun isn't big enough to do a single batch.

-a.

 

Yes, that's about the only situation I can think of that might make it worthwhile. But if I needed to do it for every batch, I'd get a bigger MLT.