Does anyone line their mash tun with a BIAB?

[Dustin_J]

Me too - 3V electric HERMS. Cleanup is much easier with the bag when brewing inside - as others mentioned, just pull the bag, drop in a bucket, take it outside to dispose of. Easy peasy.

 

[seatazzz]

Gonna add to mine, having clearer wort go into the boil kettle is another bonus; no grain bits like I had with my old tun, no nasty bazooka to clean, and less hot break. I finally learned (after 3 years, geez) to shake the bag out after dumping it, BEFORE rinsing, and almost all of the grain bits go away (albeit all over my shirt, pants, hair, dog, cat, yard, whatever is in the way) but the bag is clean and ready to go for next time. Never looking back.

 

[belgabrewing]

Yep, I do! I bought my bags from Wilserbrew here on the forum, because he custom makes them to fit for a great price.

I have a 3-vessel all electric HERMS and I added a tippy dump for cleaning the MLT, but the bag makes my life so much easier. Since I have bottom draining vessels, even with a false bottom I was getting some clogging in my pump, and this fixed my problem plus made the clean up even easier.

I use 5 gallon paint filter bags from Home Depot. They only cost a few dollars each and I have used each one dozens of times. I use one in the mash tun and one to line my fermenter. It works great to filter out the hops and junk as you pour the wort into the fermenter. The pores as so small it really aerates the wort like crazy as you pour through it. Lift it out and let it drain completely and all you have left is clean wort. I sanitize it in a bowl with a no rinse sanitizer.

 

[PberBob]

I have a really simple mash. set-up. An upright 8 gallon igloo cooler with replacement spigot (twist open/close), a 'vegetable steamer basket in the bottom that opens up to fill the diameter, and then the bag on top of that.

 

[myndflyte]

I've never considered running The Brew Bag through the washer. I rinse it to remove as much residual grain as possible. Then place it in the sanitizer bucket while I get the boil started. Then hang it to dry.

Does anyone else wash their bag? Or do you rinse and sanitize?

I run mine through the washer. I rinse off as much grain as I can then just chuck it in with the next load of laundry. It comes out barely damp so I just hang it up to dry.

 

[verboten]

Does anyone else wash their bag? Or do you rinse and sanitize?

I wash mine with the brewery rags/towles and i only use oxyclean free

 

[UncleD]

After multiple batches mucking around with the sparge getting stuck and having to vorlauf more times than I can count, I finally tried using the BIAB bag in my mash tun. The sparge was easy, so that was great. However, I did notice a drop in my efficiency from a similar prior batch without the BIAB bag. Maybe I didn;t quite mix the grain in as well. Either way, I'll compensate a bit for it next time. Well worth it in my opinion!

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

I mashed in a rectangular cooler with a bazooka filter for quite a few batches, starting in March. By the next winter, I realized how much it sucked to try to clean out a cooler mash tun when you can't just take it out and hose it off. Massive PITA. In addition, I had quite a bit of loss in the mash tun resulting in really poor brewhouse efficiency. At 60%, I figured it would turn into a problem with my next beer, which was a bourbon county brand stout clone. With 25 lbs of grain (large grain bills hurt efficiency), I figured I would run into problems.

I decided I would try using a bag in my cooler (at the time, I didn't know anyone did that). It worked great. Zero loss in the MLT, less grain absorption and my efficiency went way up. Plus it was far easier to clean the MLT...just pull the bag, dump into a compost bag and throw it into our compost recepticle. Then I just rinsed the cooler and bag with my sprayer at our sink. Not ideal, but a lot easier than dealing with an MLT coated in grain bits.

I'm a big fan of using a bag and removing the grain from the wort as opposed to removing the wort from the grain.

In general, we, at the typical homebrew scale (10 or less gallon batches), have some luxuries that are not realistically available at the pro brewery scale. MIAB is one (though there is a 7 barrel basket based BIAB rig available). Another is immersion chillers. They are so much easier to use and clean and have zero risk of clogging or harboring nasties. I understand following the "Big boys" with processes/equipment where it potentially yields better beer, but I'm also for taking advantage of things we can do at our scale that makes things easier with no impact to beer quality.

 

[BIAB-Tim]

5 gallon Cooler false bottom and a Bag ! 5 gallon batches no dead space in the cooler and it holds the heat Better @60min mash ! The bag is more for finer crushes than clean up !

 

[greywolf]

I do it with a 20 gallon kettle as a mash tun. It has a basket which I line with voile. I was amazed at how easily I can runoff and no more stuck sparges.

 

[Home_alone1]

I’ve been doing this since my 3rd batch a couple years ago. My false bottom was crap so I improvised and got a bag from my LHBS . I brew with a lot of wheat and haven’t had a stuck sparge since going this rout.

 

[greywolf]

I line my basket with voile and it works great. I was astonished at the drain rate. I was getting frustrated with stuck sparges in mt igloo with hose braid. This soooo much better.

 

[Jayjay1976]

+1 for @wilserbrewer 's BIAB bags and his ratcheting pulleys; awesome quality and stellar service, his bags are easy to hoist but will never let you down!!

After mashing out with a good squeeze I drop it in a bucket to cool off before dumping into a trash bag. Some days I am too worn out to dump it right away so I let it sit for a day or two, in which case the naturally occurring lactobacillus in the grain has taken over and my garage smells like yogurt. I never "wash" the bag beyond spraying out with hot water and rinsing thoroughly, then hang dry it from the hoisting hook over my kettle.

If I had any doubts about the old bag's durability I would have a backup on hand, but 35 batches in it is as strong and trustworthy as ever.

 

[nebulabrewing]

A friend of mine gave me his BIAB. I used it in my 5 and 10 gallon coolers and it works flawlessly. Some of the clearest beer I've been able to brew to date. I highly recommend it!

 

[4ferraras]

Yes, started with the 10 gal igloo and used it with a bazooka tube. Then upgraded to SS brewtech mash tun and did one mash without the bag. Back to the bag in the mash tun ever since. Wouldn’t mash any other way.

Did you replace the SS Bretech false bottom with the Blichmann one as well as using the bag? I had a rough first brew day with the Infussion mash tun... Seems like the drain port should be larger.

 

[RevA]

I use BIAB as well with my mashtun. Largley because I have a corona style mill that tends to grind fine. The bag makes cleaning easier and the cooler tun is easier to keep on temp that a pot.

 

[Velnerj]

At one point in my brewing experience I used mash in a bag with a 5 gallon igloo round cooler. I ran into an issue which ultimately made me go away from this method.

My issue came to lautering. I didn't pull the bag out but rather just opened up the ball valve and let it drain. I wasn't using a false bottom and if I recall correctly, I also remove my bazooka braid... This caused some problems for me. What was happening is that the ball valve was draining faster than the wort was coming through the bag. This caused a suction effect which abruptly stopped the lauter... Basically a stuck sparge. The suction made it really hard to pull the grain bag out in order to restart the lauter. It was a wrestling match the whole way.

I understand now that the best approach is to pull the bag out (best if you have a pulley system) and let it drain either in the mash tun or the kettle. I don't have a way to set that up properly so I abandon this method. Eventually I got an all in one system and I really like it.

 

[PberBob]

I’ve been using a bag in my round cooler mash tun. I also have a flower petal vegetable steamer as a false bottom. I’ve never (knock on wood) had a stuck spare in about 40 batches.

 

[bwible]

At one point in my brewing experience I used mash in a bag with a 5 gallon igloo round cooler. I ran into an issue which ultimately made me go away from this method.

My issue came to lautering. I didn't pull the bag out but rather just opened up the ball valve and let it drain. I wasn't using a false bottom and if I recall correctly, I also remove my bazooka braid... This caused some problems for me. What was happening is that the ball valve was draining faster than the wort was coming through the bag. This caused a suction effect which abruptly stopped the lauter... Basically a stuck sparge. The suction made it really hard to pull the grain bag out in order to restart the lauter. It was a wrestling match the whole way.

I understand now that the best approach is to pull the bag out (best if you have a pulley system) and let it drain either in the mash tun or the kettle. I don't have a way to set that up properly so I abandon this method. Eventually I got an all in one system and I really like it.

I was using a bag in my 5 gallon orange gott cooler for awhile. I ran into similar issues and I also found beers were not clearing. Even recirculating with a pump I was not able to get clear wort with the added bag. Did not have the problem with just the false bottom. Can’t explain that one but it did happen.

And no, you don’t want to pull the bag to drain. That stirs up all the junk you just spent time recirculating to get rid of.

I’ve since gone to the Anvil Foundry for most of my beers and I don’t use the orange cooler much now. I do not use a bag in the Foundry. I also do not pull the Foundry basket. I drain clear wort to my brew kettle and boil. Foundry serves as my mash tun. I like being able to do controlled step mashes.

 

[seatazzz]

+1 for @wilserbrewer 's BIAB bags and his ratcheting pulleys; awesome quality and stellar service, his bags are easy to hoist but will never let you down!!

After mashing out with a good squeeze I drop it in a bucket to cool off before dumping into a trash bag. Some days I am too worn out to dump it right away so I let it sit for a day or two, in which case the naturally occurring lactobacillus in the grain has taken over and my garage smells like yogurt. I never "wash" the bag beyond spraying out with hot water and rinsing thoroughly, then hang dry it from the hoisting hook over my kettle.

If I had any doubts about the old bag's durability I would have a backup on hand, but 35 batches in it is as strong and trustworthy as ever.

+1 to your 'cleaning' regimen. My old bag, and my new-ish wilser bag, have never seen any kind of soap, even if I sometimes forget and leave it a day or two. A good rinse in hottish water, while scrubbing between my hands, sees it good. Hang it up to dry, and next brewday give it a good shake to get the dried grain bits that always seem to stick just fly away. Unless your bag is covered in mold/mildew (in which case I would pitch it, or at least run it through the washer with a non-scented detergent, then soak it in clean water), nothing left on it is going to transfer to the next brew, since it's pre-boil. And I'll pound this again; nothing beats just pulling the bag out of the tun, dumping the spent grain, and having minimal cleaning to do. I HATE cleaning.