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BaylessBrewer

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I just brewed a brown ale consisting of:
9lb Maris otter
8oz Golden Naked Oats
4oz Special Roast
4oz Victory
4oz Special B
4oz Pale Chocolate
1oz Midnight Wheat ( needed to use it or toss it)
Projected OG was 1.056 and the actual OG is 1.070. That's 93% Brewhouse Efficiency in the fermenter @ 5.25 gal and that is exactly the volume I ended up with.
I mashed in with 12qt @ 165 and settled at 151.9 for an hour long mash. Temp dropped to 149.6 over the course.
Dunk sparged in 4gal of 170* water and stirred like it owed me money for a few min. Let it rest for 10 min.
Pre boil was 6.5gal and after a 60 min boil I came in at 1.070 on 5.25 gal of wort.
I've never achieved this kind of efficiency before. Been BIAB Brewer for over a year now.
 
I just brewed a brown ale consisting of:
9lb Maris otter
8oz Golden Naked Oats
4oz Special Roast
4oz Victory
4oz Special B
4oz Pale Chocolate
1oz Midnight Wheat ( needed to use it or toss it)
Projected OG was 1.056 and the actual OG is 1.070. That's 93% Brewhouse Efficiency in the fermenter @ 5.25 gal and that is exactly the volume I ended up with.
I mashed in with 12qt @ 165 and settled at 151.9 for an hour long mash. Temp dropped to 149.6 over the course.
Dunk sparged in 4gal of 170* water and stirred like it owed me money for a few min. Let it rest for 10 min.
Pre boil was 6.5gal and after a 60 min boil I came in at 1.070 on 5.25 gal of wort.
I've never achieved this kind of efficiency before. Been BIAB Brewer for over a year now.

Sorry, the highest OG that I can project with your grain bill, and volumes, is 1.064, which assumes 100% conversion efficiency and 90+% mash efficiency. Most likely some measurement errors somewhere.

Brew on :mug:
 
did you measure your pre-boil gravity?
I agree you don't have enough grain there for an og of 1.070
 
did you measure your pre-boil gravity?
I agree you don't have enough grain there for an og of 1.070


No pre boil measurement.
What is the math formula you guys are using to determine that I don't have enough grain to achieve my OG? Are you going off ppg?
 
(PPG x lbs) / (Boil Volume x Predicted Mash Eff.)

Do that for each grain, then sum the resulting values and you'll get your predicted pre-boil gravity. I get about 1.063 at 100%, 1.047 at 75% with 7 gals. total water and 6.4 gals. boil volume.

PPG for M.O. = 38
PPG for Victory & Special B = 34
The rest are all 33
 
What was your temperature when taking OG?

My guess is that the 1 oz of wheat pushed your efficiency over the top lol....
 
I put the numbers into Brewersfriend and came up with 1.074 at 100% efficiency. 1.070 gives him 94%. That still seems high. If you are using a repeatable method, it would be odd to miss by that much.

Are you measuring with a hydrometer or refractometer? Forget to adjust for temperature? What efficiency numbers have you gotten in the past?
 
What was your temperature when taking OG?

My guess is that the 1 oz of wheat pushed your efficiency over the top lol....


Temperature was 68*. Sample was taken just prior to pitching yeast.
If it wasn't the wheat then it was that magical bag I bought from you!! Lol
 
I put the numbers into Brewersfriend and came up with 1.074 at 100% efficiency. 1.070 gives him 94%. That still seems high. If you are using a repeatable method, it would be odd to miss by that much.

Are you measuring with a hydrometer or refractometer? Forget to adjust for temperature? What efficiency numbers have you gotten in the past?


I did change my mash last nite from full volume to a thick mash because I wanted to see the effects of it on flavor for a malty beer. Normally I go all in and come out around 75% give or take a few from brew to brew. I don't see the change in mash changing my efficiency that much.
Measuring with a hydrometer and sample was taken @68* F
 
I did change my mash last nite from full volume to a thick mash because I wanted to see the effects of it on flavor for a malty beer. Normally I go all in and come out around 75% give or take a few from brew to brew. I don't see the change in mash changing my efficiency that much.
Measuring with a hydrometer and sample was taken @68* F

Sounds like the 1.070 number is legit. Is it possible you added an extra pound or two of grain?
 
Sounds like the 1.070 number is legit. Is it possible you added an extra pound or two of grain?


I don't think any extra grain was added. I wrote down the recipe and the owner of my LHBS put it together. I guess it's not totally impossible but he has never messed up any of my bills before.
 
Either bad weight of grain bill, or bad gravity reading, or bad volume measurements. You probably got an extra half lb of grain in there.

Getting that high of efficiency, while theoretically possible is pretty unlikely without specific techniques to do so.
 
Either bad weight of grain bill, or bad gravity reading, or bad volume measurements. You probably got an extra half lb of grain in there.

Getting that high of efficiency, while theoretically possible is pretty unlikely without specific techniques to do so.

I would say that that high of efficiency is NOT theoretically possible (with batch sparge.)

Brew on :mug:
 
I haven't ran the maximums in awhile, I've seen some scenarios get close to 94 with a two stage batch sparge, and so i suppose a perfect fly sparge might get a couple % higher and that's what I was referring to. Definitely agree that a single batch sparge should've been in the 80-85% range for a 1.055-1.065 brew. (on mobile and don't want to run the numbers)
 
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