Cold Water Fly Sparging

[pdfmorais]

It's a 32 liter batch... I have a 2 liter jug. That could work. Never thought about it. Lol. But I'm still trying the could fly sparge... I'm on my way to my brew place. I'm going to brew a Belgian Blonde today. I'll post the results later.

 

[pdfmorais]

Tried the cold fly sparge and guess what... I had an efficiency increase by 3%!

I don't know if thats all related to the fly sparge because I had a problem with my mill and had to adjuste it. The thing is that with that mill and batch sparge (hot or cold), I never passed the 70% efficiency (i know... is low) and today I got 73%.

Even if the increase was due to the mill(which I seriously doubt it), I can say that cold fly sparging works.

 

[swampbrewcrew]

Tried the cold fly sparge and guess what... I had an efficiency increase by 3%!

I don't know if thats all related to the fly sparge because I had a problem with my mill and had to adjuste it. The thing is that with that mill and batch sparge (hot or cold), I never passed the 70% efficiency (i know... is low) and today I got 73%.

Even if the increase was due to the mill(which I seriously doubt it), I can say that cold fly sparging works.

I cold fly sparge as well and haven’t had a loss in efficiency either. I’m assuming homebrewers learned to sparge at temperature because that’s what the big boys were doing. What they didn’t say was the sparge temp doesn’t effect efficiency, but it cools the wort. Which means you spend more time and energy heating the wort to boiling. This can be a matter of a few minutes on our scale, but when you’re talking multiple bbls it can be a significant amount of time and energy wasted.

 

[pdfmorais]

Yes. But in my case, I already sparged with cold water (batch sparge) so it didn't add much time to the process. And it is much easier. Just connect the hose from the tap to the sparge arm and open them valves.

 

[RM-MN]

Tried the cold fly sparge and guess what... I had an efficiency increase by 3%!

I don't know if thats all related to the fly sparge because I had a problem with my mill and had to adjuste it. The thing is that with that mill and batch sparge (hot or cold), I never passed the 70% efficiency (i know... is low) and today I got 73%.

Even if the increase was due to the mill(which I seriously doubt it), I can say that cold fly sparging works.

The top three reasons for a difference in efficiency are:
1. The crush
2. The crush
3. The crush

Your cold sparging probably lowered your efficiency a smitch but the change in the crush would easily raise it up more.

 

[pdfmorais]

Yes... That could be it... But if the drop in eff is not that big i can live with that.

 

[swampbrewcrew]

Yes. But in my case, I already sparged with cold water (batch sparge) so it didn't add much time to the process. And it is much easier. Just connect the hose from the tap to the sparge arm and open them valves.

I meant cold sparring increases the amount of time it takes to raise the wort temp to boiling. If you sparge normally your temp will either stay the same or rise a little. With cold sparging we are causing a significant drop in wort temperature that has to be accounted for when raising the wort to boiling. The increased time is negligible on the homebrew scale, but on the pro side it could be significant.

 

[applescrap]

^^this imo is the real issue behind cold sparging.

 

[pdfmorais]

^^this imo is the real issue behind cold sparging.

That's my opinion too...

 

[Nokt]

So can you sparge with hot tap water? It's readily available and wouldn't drop the wort temp as much as cold sparge water.

 

[pdfmorais]

Don't have hot tap water available where I brew. I already thought about that and I'll have it available soon.

 

[kylevester]

Tap water generally won’t be good chemistry wise. Higher than desired pH and alkalinity can promote tannin extraction leading to harshness and astringency.

 

[pdfmorais]

I'm not worried about it. The beer is turning out great!

 

[wilserbrewer]

So can you sparge with hot tap water? It's readily available and wouldn't drop the wort temp as much as cold sparge water.

Absolutely you can if you feel your hot tap water is quality brewing water.

Some argue hot tap water is inferior for many reasons...

Example would be a 100 year old rusty boiler hot water source...

Ymmv

There was a 100 post thread on this topic a few years back.

 

[pdfmorais]

Tap water generally won’t be good chemistry wise. Higher than desired pH and alkalinity can promote tannin extraction leading to harshness and astringency.

I dont know the water's chemistry but the tap water here where I live (azores/portugal) is great. Is better then some bottled brands...

 

[Nokt]

Tap water generally won’t be good chemistry wise. Higher than desired pH and alkalinity can promote tannin extraction leading to harshness and astringency.

That makes a lot of sense. My tap water has a pH of 7.94

 

[kylevester]

I dont know the water's chemistry but the tap water here where I live (azores/portugal) is great. Is better then some bottled brands...

A lot of bottled water is tap water that maybe is filtered through activated carbon to remove chlorine and residual organics. Not surprising your tap water would be on par or even better.

But the issue remains for temperature and pH, regardless of how good it tastes w/o treatment. The pH is the more important factor, so just be aware that you may get harshness and astringency using untreated tap water.

 

[LarMoeCur]

I would not sparge with hot water coming from a tank heater. The chemistry of the water can change quite a bit in the the heater tank. Depending on the age of the heater there can be a lot of sediment (calcium carbonate) and scaling on the inside of the tank. Wilserbrewer said it has been discussed at length here. I just flushed my hot water heater and replaced the heating elements yesterday. I almost don't even want to shower after seeing what came out of it!

 

[ba-brewer]

A lot of bottled water is tap water that maybe is filtered through activated carbon to remove chlorine and residual organics. Not surprising your tap water would be on par or even better.

But the issue remains for temperature and pH, regardless of how good it tastes w/o treatment. The pH is the more important factor, so just be aware that you may get harshness and astringency using untreated tap water.

Or figure out the water make up and just brew styles that work well with the water.

 

[ESBrewer]

Unless the hot water is shown to be useful, I would stick to cold tap water (heated or cold). Hot tap water may contain more minerals and nowadays even plastics from tube walls etc.

 

[AkTom]

I use my well water (hot) to sparge with. No problems.
Cheers

 

[MaryB]

Pass on hot tap water,mine smells like a swimming pool with all the chlorine!

I tried a cold water sparge. Added to much time to the boil and I dropped to 1.050 from my normal 1.054 OG on a recipe I brew a LOT so it is almost an make it while asleep. So same procedure I always use, same grain as the batch before it etc. Went back to hot sparge and back to 1.054 OG a week later...

 

[Soulshine2]

Hi,

I am thinking about changing from batch sparge to fly sparge. The problem is that I have no way of heating the Fly Sparge water. I read two articles about experiments where is claimed that temperature is not an important factor in sparge effciency but the two articles were related to Batch Sparging.

Is temperature an important factor in Fly Sparging? Can anyone help with this?

Thanks.

Im confused as to why you have no way of heating your sparge water...you have a way to heat to boil . Ok, I read the entire thread and now I understand you have limited equipment and I didnt realize youre in Portugal. so now , can you possibly find an insulated cooler with sufficient volume you can use as a holding vessel while you use the burner to heat your sparge water since you'll be boiling the entire volume later anyway. It'd probably extend your brewing day but I would think it could work.

 

[pdfmorais]

Im confused as to why you have no way of heating your sparge water...you have a way to heat to boil .

Yes, I heat to boil with the same burner I mash. While I'm mashing (direct fired mash tun) I can't heat the sparge water cause I only have 1 burner.

 

[Soulshine2]

Yes, I heat to boil with the same burner I mash. While I'm mashing (direct fired mash tun) I can't heat the sparge water cause I only have 1 burner.

I edited my above post .

 

[pdfmorais]

Im confused as to why you have no way of heating your sparge water...you have a way to heat to boil . Ok, I read the entire thread and now I understand you have limited equipment and I didnt realize youre in Portugal. so now , can you possibly find an insulated cooler with sufficient volume you can use as a holding vessel while you use the burner to heat your sparge water since you'll be boiling the entire volume later anyway. It'd probably extend your brewing day but I would think it could work.

I will buy a new burner soon. Until then, I will sparge with cold water cause I've seen It makes little or no diference...