A few questions about 10 gallon batches

[Yesfan]

My cousin and me are thinking about going in and getting enough ingredients for a 10 gallon batch of Dead Ringer, then splitting it. We'll save about $17 doing it this way vs buying two DR kits, even if we left the yeast and priming sugar off those kits.


We both have have 10 gallon tuns and 10 gallon boil kettles. What I was thinking to save time was mashing in one tun and then just divide the wort to our boil kettles when draining the tun. I don't feel comfortable doing a 10 gallon batch in a 10 gallon kettle, but wonder if I can do the mash in one vessel. The grain bill would be 24lbs of grain, 22lbs being 2 row and the other two lbs being caramel 40. Worst case scenario, I could steep the 2lbs of caramel if the tun is too small for the total grain. Can I fit the total grain bill in a 10 gallon tun, or will I have to steep the caramel 40? Thanks for any suggestions.

 

[chickypad]

There are some simple mash calculators here. Looks like 24 lbs at 1.25 qt per lb should take up about 9.42 gallons so will be tight but doable I think. I'd probably add the grain first, or at least midway through, in this case then top it up.

 

[Yesfan]

There are some simple mash calculators here. Looks like 24 lbs at 1.25 qt per lb should take up about 9.42 gallons so will be tight but doable I think. I'd probably add the grain first, or at least midway through, in this case then top it up.

Thanks for the advice. I think that's what I'm going to do.


Thanks for the link too! (bookmarked)

 

[westo2]

I'd probably add the grain first, or at least midway through, in this case then top it up.

if I'm going to be close on tun volume, I always add in a few gallons of water to the tun be for adding any grain. Adding the grain first is a good way to form an impenetrable blob of semi-wet grain around the braid.

 

[jekeane]

The problem I see with this is your 10g pots. If you are doing 1 mash you will need a way to evenly mix your wort between the two pots so they are the same OG in each pot. I am assuming you will have 12g or so preboil volume.

 

[Yesfan]

The problem I see with this is your 10g pots. If you are doing 1 mash you will need a way to evenly mix your wort between the two pots so they are the same OG in each pot. I am assuming you will have 12g or so preboil volume.

Dang, I didn't take that into consideration. So let me ask......would it be better to do a partial mash and steep the caramel 40 (individually for each pot) or would it be best to just treat this as two separate batches being brewed at the same time. I'm thinking the latter.


Guess, I'm going to have to really consider a 15 gallon kettle in the future huh.

 

[feinbera]

The problem I see with this is your 10g pots. If you are doing 1 mash you will need a way to evenly mix your wort between the two pots so they are the same OG in each pot. I am assuming you will have 12g or so preboil volume.

A plastic half-gallon pitcher with quart and pint volumes marked with a sharpie, and a couple kitchen pots, one to collect runnings into while you're distributing out of the other, should allow you to distribute the wort evenly between the two kettles as you collect it. It's a bit of a pain, but it won't be nearly as bad as trying to stir a 10-gallon cooler with 9.5 gallons of mash in it...

 

[chickypad]

Yeah forgot about mixing the wort. I guess it could work if you batch sparge. The first runnings should yield about 4.5 gal or so after absorption, collect those in a bucket, measure and split into the 2 kettles. You'll probably need 2 sparges, do the same thing for those second and third runnings. At that point it does seem more hassle though than just making 2 separate batches since you have 2 tuns.

Edit: ah, another good point about needing to stir the batch sparge with little room. Two separate mashes is sounding better and better!

 

[Yesfan]

I guess two mashes it will be then.


Appreciate the input gang!

 

[Spinout]

I guess two mashes it will be then.


Appreciate the input gang!

That's exactly what I did on a batch I split just to experiment with different water. Split my grain evenly and did back-to-back brews. It may take you longer this way, but you won't have any capacity worries....boil over issues....and just lifting/moving that much wort wouldn't be fun.

 

[halzhirou]

I'd probably add the grain first, or at least midway through, in this case then top it up.

 

[halzhirou]

he first runnings should yield about 4.5 gal or so after absorption

 

[Grannyknot]

My 10 gallon recipes are 13.3 gallons pre boil wort.
You might be able to get away with a scaled back recipe and 8 gallons final volume.