5 or 10 gallon MLT. Is there a set number?

[Conodor]

How many pounds of grain before you move to the 10 gallon?

Made a 11 lbs mash yesterday, thought the 5 gallon would be plenty. big under estimate. I'm still having trouble doing an accurate mash schedule.

I have beer tools, beersmith and checkd an online site and I still jAcked it up.

Thanks.

 

[Yooper]

I have a 10 gallon cooler, and I find that I can do about 23 pounds at 1.5 quarts per pound.

I like this mash calculator here: http://www.rackers.org/calcs.shtml

Go down to "can I mash it?" to see if your mash will fit.

 

[Bobby_M]

Check this out https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f11/how-big-your-mash-tun-needs-123585/

 

[barleynhops]

Beersmith has a great feature where it specifies the mash tun capacity needed for the recipe. It's never let me down.

 

[Conodor]

I thought I had it calculated correctly. But I was wrong again. I did hit the temp this time around.

Looking at the link posted above, I think I read it wrong. I think I read it as put in 3.5 gallons. but I think it is telling me that the grain will take up 3.5 gallons.

(I made the 7 gallons of cream of 3 crops in case anyone is wondering)

 

[shelly_belly]

I have a 5 gal cooler and my largest grain bill (Edwort's Robust Porter) was 14 pounds. I got 1.1qt/1lb grain ratio and the cooler was filled to the very top. Very hard to stir but the beer turned out great.

 

[Conodor]

That's close to what I put into my 5 gallon and it also was to the top. Maybe since I had corn and rice.. Mine absorbed more. Because I think I was at like under 2 gallons after my 90 minute mash. I was high on my OG and I tried the iodine test for the first time. It looks like I got a good result... Just had to fill to the top for my ummm brain fart here what's The second step of batch sparging called...