BREWMERGENCY!!! In progress sparge question

[JetSmooth]

So, I took advantage of my wife and son going to the in-laws this weekend and put together a simple SMaSH.

I drove the family three hours to meet the in-laws and drove back. OBVIOUSLY, I got back much later than I expected. But what the heck, I figured I'd brew anyhow.

This is my first brew on a new setup. I'm using a Bayou SP-50 burner, Keggle, and 10 gallon Rubbermaid cooler MLT up on a six foot brewladder. My pump is a Little Giant MD-3, which I've used before.

My setup is a little different than most. I had this same setup with a nine gallon kettle ad the same MLT but sitting just at table level on a shorter burner. With this ladder, I apparently have "lift" problems with my pump!!! I set everything up earlier this week to test and had no issues. But now, the pump can't seem to raise the liquid up to the mash tun.

So I put the MLT on the deck and drained my sparge amount into it. Then lifted to the ladder shelf for the initial mash. Temps seem okay. But my problem will be pumping what's left in the keggle up into the mash tun and starting the recirculation.

So I figure I'll drain the remaining "sparge/Mash-out" water into a large pot I have, drain the mash into the keggle, then pour the remaining mash-out water (at 177 degrees, up a six foot ladder, after three beers, eek!) up to the mash tun, pour that in, and mix it.

My question is, do I have to vorlauf manually a few times with my initial mash drain? I've never really done that before. I just adjusted the mash drain until it was slow and recirculated with the hotter mash-out water until it ran clear.

I'm SUPER pissed at this pump. It worked for three previous brews. I can't figure out why it can't pump up six feet to the mash tun.

HALP!

I have 38 minutes left in my mash

 

[JuanMoore]

My question is, do I have to vorlauf manually a few times with my initial mash drain? I've never really done that before. I just adjusted the mash drain until it was slow and recirculated with the hotter mash-out water until it ran clear.

If you can't get the pump to work then yes, I'd manually vorlauf a couple quarts to filter the particulates. Where is your pump located? Is there any way to raise it up so that it's not pushing uphill so far? Or is there a way to lower the MLT?

 

[Special Hops]

Pump performance goes down with hot liquids. A lot easier to cavitate. Which would explain why it worked fine when you tried it with (I assume) cold water.

 

[JetSmooth]

Pump performance goes down with hot liquids. A lot easier to cavitate. Which would explain why it worked fine when you tried it with (I assume) cold water.

That's got to be it! I should be fine if I manually sparge this time. Need to figure something out, though.

JuanMoore, the pump is on the bottom step of the ladder, which is sort of the hightest it can go if I want to gravity prime it from the keggle.

I also JUST ran out of propane, so ran out and grabbed a new tank. I'm back on the right track now!

 

[JetSmooth]

Well, as if this couldn't get any worse!!! It started raining HARD about 30 minutes into my 90 minute boil.

I got my first hop addition into the hop sock, but tossed the second directly into the keggle.

Third and irish moss will go into the keggle diredctly as well.

Luckily, I am fermenting in a 10 gallon corny, so I can drain directly into it without cooling. I'll cool inside maybe until morning, where I can pitch the yeast.

UGH!

 

[JetSmooth]

I threw a round cookie sheet over top the keggle, since I couldn't bring it closer to the house. Should I be concerned about DMS?

 

[lumpher]

I'll cool inside maybe until morning, where I can pitch the yeast.

UGH!

i know a couple of national-class brewers who wait 3-4 days sometimes before pitching. i chill, and immediately pitch at 75 or less, but these guys wait for days sometimes, and blow my beers away, so it won't hurt if you wait, as long as it's sealed from nasties

 

[JuanMoore]

I threw a round cookie sheet over top the keggle, since I couldn't bring it closer to the house. Should I be concerned about DMS?

Maybe. Is the cookie sheet tight over the hole in the keggle, or resting on the skirt above the hole where a lot of the steam can get out through the handles? Also, what's the grain bill?

 

[JetSmooth]

Well, I was easily 40 minutes into a strong boil before I threw the cookie sheet on top. 60 minutes (or so) into a 90 minute boil, I noticed the burner was out, so I dumped the keggle into my fermentter (a 10 gallon corny) and chucked into a bathtub. Followed with 4 - 16lb bags of ice to hopefully be at pitching temps by morning.

I never got my 0.5 oz hop addition at 5 minutes. I guess I'll drop hop with those.

This had better be the best beer EVER!!!

Edit: The cookie sheet wasn't really "tight" on. There was a lot of steam coming off. This is also a SMaSH with 15 lbs of Maris Otter and Fuggle hops.

I'm going back into BrewTarget to figure out what the actual boil and timing additions may result in.