BIAB Brewing (with pics)

[Mysticmead]

weight of grain x absorption + boil off +trub loss + batch size = water needed.

try 10.5 x .074 + boil off + trub loss + batch size.

for me that would be 10.5 x .074 =.777 (round it to .75 gallon) + 1.5 gallon + .25 gallon + 5.50 gallon = 8 gallons of water needed. now of course that won't fit you 7.5 gallon pot much less the grains. What I would do it have 4 gallons of water in the 7.5 gallon pot, add the grains and mash, then transfer to another pot with the remaining water to dunk sparge. or get a bigger pot

 

[jr14]

Thanks mysticmead. I actually read all 42 pages and I know this is approximately the tenth time you've posted that equation.

I actually have it on a post it note on my wall.

I'm going with your equation.

 

[jr14]

Well, I feel a little silly. I can always bring 6 gallons of water up to mash temp, then slowly add the grains. If the water gets too high, I can just open the spigot and let some water out.

Then I can heat my 2nd kettle of sparge water, and top up after the mash in complete.

 

[stux]

Well, I feel a little silly. I can always bring 6 gallons of water up to mash temp, then slowly add the grains. If the water gets too high, I can just open the spigot and let some water out.

Then I can heat my 2nd kettle of sparge water, and top up after the mash in complete.

Better to take the water out first, put it in your second pot, add the grains, then add back the water.

I don't know it in US units, but grain displaces about 0.7L per KG.

So

Max Strikewater in L = Max Volume of Kettle in L - (Kilograms of Grain * 0.7)

Then when you've worked out your total water, subtract your strike water volume and use the remaining water to sparge with, doing it this way should get you 80-85% efficiency into your kettle

 

[jr14]

Thanks stux. In US, Your equation looked something like this to me.

Converted Grain Displacement .18 Pounds per gallon

Max Strikewater in Gal = Max Volume of Kettle in Gal (7.5 for me) - (Pounds of Grain (10.5 for me)* .18)

This = 1.89 Gal (I rounded up to 2). So I'm going to start with 5.5 Gal.

 

[Riseabovebb]

Hey all - looking for some help regarding my ability to brew the HopSlam clone recipe offered by Schweaty. Looking to do this as a no-sparge, but not sure if I have the capacity.

What I have available:

44Qt Bayou Classic boil kettle (with matching basket)

Grain bill per Schweaty is 19.5 lbs. with a starting boil size of 7.11 gallons. I used the formula offered by MysticMead a few posts above to determine my strike volume and came up with 8.69 gallons (I used Mystic's trub and evaporation figures as I'm new to BIAB).

I've looked at the 'Can I Mash It?' calculator on rackers.org (Green Bay Rackers--Mash Calculators), but I'm not 100% sure of the mash thickness ratio. I know I would enter 19.5 in the weight field. For the mash thickness, would I take 8.69 Gallons x 4 = 34.76 Qts and divide the 34.76qts by19.5lbs to get a 1.78 mash thickness ratio?

Using 19.5 lbs and 1.78 mash thickness ratio in the calculator tells me I would need 10.24gallons worth of space. If my math is correct, and 10.24 gallons of space is needed, should I attempt this (no sparge) in an 11 gallon kettle including the basket? I'm I asking for trouble?

Thanks in advance!

Matt

 

[Antler]

Well, I feel a little silly. I can always bring 6 gallons of water up to mash temp, then slowly add the grains. If the water gets too high, I can just open the spigot and let some water out.

Then I can heat my 2nd kettle of sparge water, and top up after the mash in complete.

What I did when doing my first BIAB 6 gallon batch, was mash with ~4 gallons, then topped up to my pre boil amount after the mash.

 

[JimTheHick]

What I did when doing my first BIAB 6 gallon batch, was mash with ~4 gallons, then topped up to my pre boil amount after the mash.

Or sparge with the two gallons. It's often mentioned that BIAB is no sparge, but damn it's pretty easy to pour the extra two gallons back through the bag while it rests on a grate over top of the kettle while heating to boil.

 

[Seven]

Hey all - looking for some help regarding my ability to brew the HopSlam clone recipe offered by Schweaty. Looking to do this as a no-sparge, but not sure if I have the capacity.

What I have available:

44Qt Bayou Classic boil kettle (with matching basket)

Grain bill per Schweaty is 19.5 lbs. with a starting boil size of 7.11 gallons. I used the formula offered by MysticMead a few posts above to determine my strike volume and came up with 8.69 gallons (I used Mystic's trub and evaporation figures as I'm new to BIAB).

I've looked at the 'Can I Mash It?' calculator on rackers.org (Green Bay Rackers--Mash Calculators), but I'm not 100% sure of the mash thickness ratio. I know I would enter 19.5 in the weight field. For the mash thickness, would I take 8.69 Gallons x 4 = 34.76 Qts and divide the 34.76qts by19.5lbs to get a 1.78 mash thickness ratio?

Using 19.5 lbs and 1.78 mash thickness ratio in the calculator tells me I would need 10.24gallons worth of space. If my math is correct, and 10.24 gallons of space is needed, should I attempt this (no sparge) in an 11 gallon kettle including the basket? I'm I asking for trouble?

Thanks in advance!

Matt

I brewed this exact same recipe using a 10-gallon kettle. My kettle was definitely maxed out but it worked. This turned out to be one of the best beers I have made so far. You should be able to do it with your 11-gallon kettle.

 

[jr14]

Or sparge with the two gallons. It's often mentioned that BIAB is no sparge, but damn it's pretty easy to pour the extra two gallons back through the bag while it rests on a grate over top of the kettle while heating to boil.

This is exactly what I was going to do as I had it suspended above the kettle.

 

[Riseabovebb]

I brewed this exact same recipe using a 10-gallon kettle. My kettle was definitely maxed out but it worked. This turned out to be one of the best beers I have made so far. You should be able to do it with your 11-gallon kettle.

Thanks, Seven. Today is brew day. I'm already excited to get started.

While I don't have a pulley system rigged, I'm going to try using my Park Tools brand bicycle repair stand to drain the wort. I'll test it out first to make sure it withstands the weight, but it can easily hold my 30+ lbs touring bike (including racks, mounts, etc.).

Might be a good multi-use system for those who have a bike stand.

 

[Seven]

Thanks, Seven. Today is brew day. I'm already excited to get started.

While I don't have a pulley system rigged, I'm going to try using my Park Tools brand bicycle repair stand to drain the wort. I'll test it out first to make sure it withstands the weight, but it can easily hold my 30+ lbs touring bike (including racks, mounts, etc.).

Might be a good multi-use system for those who have a bike stand.

Also, Hopslam was a big siphon-clogger for me. You may want to research ways to prevent siphon clogging because I had a hell of a time transferring from the fermentor to the keg with all of the dry hops. I haven't tried dry hopping using mesh bags or other tricks to contain the hops yet so I don't know how well those methods work.

 

[Riseabovebb]

I ended up brewing the vanilla bourbon porter recipeby denny conn. The 17 # grain bill with 8.5 gallons of water maxed out my 11 gallon kettle. I had about a cm of space available during the mash.

The bike stand worked great for draining the mash!

 

[Kaz]

Woot! Brewed a Robust Porter yesterday and with doing a double milling of my grain with a gap of .040", a 10 minute mash out and squeezing the crap out of my grain bag, I landed a 89.9% efficiency. I was thinking about getting a cooler mash tun just to try out the 'traditional' method of AG brewing, but why bother?

 

[ResumeMan]

Whew, another epic thread!

Since I already have a mash tun and have scarcely brewed in years, I really need to make sure I have my old process dialed in before I start fiddling. But I'm intrigued, and I think after I have run a few "traditional" batches to get my rhythm back, I'm going to seriously think about this.

Huge amounts of info in this thread, but I'm not sure all of my questions were answered in it. A couple...

1. All thru this thread people are talking about sewing up bags from this voile (sp?) material, but right in the OP, Seven you said you just used a big paint strainer. Are you still using that? How big? How big do they go? Anyone else?

2. I am (at least for now...) brewing in a half-barrel [Edit: 1/4 bbl] (7.75 gal) pony keg. I typically run up to about 6.75 gal of wort. This thing won't be big enough to do a no-sparge BIAB, so I'll need to do something else. I am assuming that would just be to fill up a second vessel with hot sparge water and do a dunk sparge. The one thing I don't think I've seen in this thread is how long to dunk sparge for? Is it just a few quick bobs of the bag, or does it have to sit there for awhile?

Thanks!

 

[Mysticmead]

yep... dunk sparge.. but instead of bob it up and down, stir it real well and let it sit for a 10 minutes.. btw.. you have a 1/4 barrel pony keg.. a half barrel is 15.5 gallons

 

[ResumeMan]

yep... dunk sparge.. but instead of bob it up and down, stir it real well and let it sit for a 10 minutes.. btw.. you have a 1/4 barrel pony keg.. a half barrel is 15.5 gallons

Yes, excuse me, quarter-barrel. It's half a regular keg, but a keg is half a barrel so I always mix that up

 

[Mysticmead]

lol..no prob.. and I also wanted to say.. as far as how you sparge.. either dunk and stir or dunk like a tea bag, or any other way you can think of.. they'll all make beer. there are no true absolutes in brewing and what ever works best for you to make the beer you like to drink is all that really matters

 

[Antler]

As an update to my previous posts, my first ever all-grain attempt and BIAB has failed. After returning home with 3 weeks in secondary I came back to mold floating around the beer. Don't know what happened but I'm pretty bummed as I won't be able to try amines BIAB for quite a while.

 

[stux]

Are you sure it was mold?

 

[Antler]

Yes I'm sure. There was 3 clumps floating around the size of a credit card. My local brewing store owner said it could have been the grains? I bought my grains last may and did the BIAB a month ago. He said even vacuum sealed they have a shelf life of 6 months max. Some of the grains and hops got into the fermenter but I thought I was rid of it when I racked to secondary.

 

[stux]

But the boil should have killed anything left in the grain :-/

More likely you got the infection from your secondary

 

[Charlieatthedisco]

Hey guys I was going to make my own mesh bag because I have been milling my grain pretty fine to get a better efficiency as suggested, what kind of cloth do you recommend and how large should it be? My g/f is a seamstress so this should be a fairly easy task!
thanks

 

[Mysticmead]

Yes I'm sure. There was 3 clumps floating around the size of a credit card. My local brewing store owner said it could have been the grains? I bought my grains last may and did the BIAB a month ago. He said even vacuum sealed they have a shelf life of 6 months max. Some of the grains and hops got into the fermenter but I thought I was rid of it when I racked to secondary.

when you went to secondary did you add anything like dry hops? if not, then sip the secondary. was the secondary glass or plastic? if plastic, it may have a scratch in it allowing bad bugs a place to hide. what do you use in your airlock? a friend didn't use vodka as I suggested and was in a bucket for an extended period. his cat walked across the lid and when it hopped off it sucked in some nasty water. ruined the batch. just a few things to look at. the grains should have been fine.

 

[Mysticmead]

Hey guys I was going to make my own mesh bag because I have been milling my grain pretty fine to get a better efficiency as suggested, what kind of cloth do you recommend and how large should it be? My g/f is a seamstress so this should be a fairly easy task!
thanks

most of us use Voile. make the bag big enough to slip your boil kettle into.

 

[ResumeMan]

most of us use Voile. .

How the heck do you pronounce that anyway? vwa-LAY?

 

[Mysticmead]

How the heck do you pronounce that anyway? vwa-LAY?

like foil with a v instead of an f

 

[Antler]

when you went to secondary did you add anything like dry hops? if not, then sip the secondary. was the secondary glass or plastic? if plastic, it may have a scratch in it allowing bad bugs a place to hide. what do you use in your airlock? a friend didn't use vodka as I suggested and was in a bucket for an extended period. his cat walked across the lid and when it hopped off it sucked in some nasty water. ruined the batch. just a few things to look at. the grains should have been fine.

This is quite possible, I've just been using water in my airlocks. In 25+ batches (I'm a fairly new brewer) this is my first batch to have problems.

 

[Mysticmead]

This is quite possible, I've just been using water in my airlocks. In 25+ batches (I'm a fairly new brewer) this is my first batch to have problems.

all it takes is one.. get a bottle of the cheapest vodka you can find and use that in the airlocks. if it ever gets sucked back into the beer it won't hurt anything

 

[robcj]

like foil with a v instead of an f

Actually, it's pronounced vwal. Rhymes with wall.