Efficiency or should I say Inefficiency...

[h22lude]

Have you considered that your issue may be too much water?:cross:

I'm suspect of his mash calculator because I ran his recipe through BeerSmith and got way different strike and sparge volumes. I'm not saying that crush isn't a contributing factor, but too much water = low OG.

I definitely agree with you. If you use too much water than your preboil and OG will be low. And if you use too little water your preboil and OG will be higher.

What I was trying to say was if a brewing software was used, I highly doubt the low efficiency was because of too much water. The brewing software will calculate how much water based on grain and equipment (boil off and tun dead space).

As long as the recipe OG and brewing software OG match then the user should get the estimated preboil. Now if the user entered something in wrong and the brewing software OG was lower than the recipe OG, that would cause a problem.

 

[jaylakejr]

Ok guys this all makes sense. Maybe my mash calculator is not configured correctly. I am using Brew 365 Mash calculator. What I put for my last batch is the following.

Batch Size: 5 Gallons
Grain Bill: 12.75 Lbs
Boil Time: 1 hr
Trub Loss (Gal): .5
Equipment Loss (Gal): 1
Mash Thickness (qts/lb.) 1.33
Grain Temperature: 70F
Target Mash Temperature: 152

Constants:
Work Shrinkage: 4%
Grain Absorption: 0.13 Gallons/Pounds
Boiloff Rate: 10% per hour


At those values I get a Mash at 4.24 Gallons 164.33F
and Sparge 4.78 Gallons
Total water needed 9.02 Gallons

Pre Boil Wort Produced 6.37 Gallons


Let me know if I should use a different calculator of if I am putting the wrong information in.

Thanks guys.

 

[ilikeguns]

Let's see what your pre-boil is on your next brew. None of the numbers seem that out of line, but it could be a matter of tightening up those numbers. Did you measure your equipment loss or are you using estimates?

 

[jaylakejr]

I am using estimates

 

[ilikeguns]

thats good, fill up your mash tun with water and let it drain in the same way you would with a mash.. then measure the water that is left. My 10 gallon igloo holds on to about a half gallon.

 

[jaylakejr]

Ok will do, thanks for the pointer.

 

[QuaffableQuips]

"A little bit" indeed. Only a very very small efficiency benefit to mashing-out according to this experiment by Kai:
http://braukaiser.com/blog/blog/2009/05/12/cold-water-sparging/

Thanks for that link. My efficiency improved when I went hotter, but there could certainly have been other variables at play. My notes aren't that good. But Kai could tell me the earth is flat, and I would be inclined to believe him...

+1 to ilikeguns's suggestion of measuring your equipment loss. 1 gal seems a bit high.

OP, are you measuring the volume of wort going into the fermenter? If it truly is a problem of too much water, then you should end up with correspondingly more than 5 gallons.

 

[jaylakejr]

I have a relatively small brew pot and when I collect the wort after the sparge, I cut off what I collect at 6.5 gallons. I know I could get more of whats left in there, so there is definitely a problem with how much water I am using.

 

[GotPushrods]

Ok guys this all makes sense. Maybe my mash calculator is not configured correctly. I am using Brew 365 Mash calculator. What I put for my last batch is the following.

Batch Size: 5 Gallons
Grain Bill: 12.75 Lbs
Boil Time: 1 hr
Trub Loss (Gal): .5
Equipment Loss (Gal): 1
Mash Thickness (qts/lb.) 1.33
Grain Temperature: 70F
Target Mash Temperature: 152

Constants:
Work Shrinkage: 4%
Grain Absorption: 0.13 Gallons/Pounds
Boiloff Rate: 10% per hour


At those values I get a Mash at 4.24 Gallons 164.33F
and Sparge 4.78 Gallons
Total water needed 9.02 Gallons

Pre Boil Wort Produced 6.37 Gallons


Let me know if I should use a different calculator of if I am putting the wrong information in.

Thanks guys.

First of all, I'm not sure how your calculator uses the term "batch size", but to me, that's a 5.5 gallon batch, not 5 gallon.

Pre-boil of 6.37 - 10% over 60 minutes = 5.733 gallons - 4% cooling shrinkage = 5.5 gallons right on the nose.

Yes there will be trub loss left in the kettle, but your gravity and recipe should be calculated on what you have after the boil. That is the volume the sugars will be dissolved into. You might only get 5 gallons of it, but there is sugar left in the trub in the kettle.

I don't know you're starting gravity on that batch, but you have 12.75*36 = 459 points available. In 5.5 gallons:

1.083 = 100%
1.075 = 90%
1.067 = 80%
1.063 = 75%
1.058 = 70%
1.054 = 65%
1.050 = 60%

If you're developing this as a 5 gallons recipe, it's not surprising that it will come up short.

 

[GotPushrods]

Also, your sparge does seem a little large.

I get the same mash number: 1.33 qts * 12.75 lbs = 4.24 gallons.

0.11 gal/lb grain absorption, and say .25 gallons mash-tun loss. First runnings = 2.59 gallons.

The quarter-gallon loss is probably more reasonable, since a LOT of the dead-space is taken up by grain... and that absorption is already taken into account. It might be even less.

To get 6.37 pre-boil, you'll sparge with 3.78 gallons. Any more and you'll have to stop your second runnings with wort left in the mash.

 

[h22lude]

thats good, fill up your mash tun with water and let it drain in the same way you would with a mash.. then measure the water that is left. My 10 gallon igloo holds on to about a half gallon.

I did this too in Beersmith but lately I just tilt my cooler to get it all out. No sense in wasting half a gallon just because it is at the bottom. Now I leave Beersmith at 0 for lauter tun dead space.

 

[Gunfighter04]

Calibrated your thermometer?

 

[brewguyver]

I did a BIAB during the full moon - mashed for 90 minutes and got 1.024. @&$!

I traced it back to the grain being packed too tightly. Net net, make sure you're agitating your wort sufficiently to get the sugars out.

 

[jaylakejr]

Hey Guys, Just wanted to give you an update. I did an IPA last night and took into account all of your recommendations and hit 70% efficiency!
What I did was:
Had my LHBS tighten the mill
Stirred the mash a lot more
Measure the strike and sparge water much more carefully
and sparged with water that was a little hotter than 170

With all of that, I hit 70%! That is a huge jump from the 59-60 I saw just last weekend.

Thanks again everyone!

 

[ilikeguns]

awesome man. Thanks to this thread, I learned that I need to stir my mash more than I have been if I want a bump in efficiency.

 

[QuaffableQuips]

Congratulations! It's a good feeling when you start predictably hitting your numbers. 70% is great, and many (most?) recipes assume that value for brewhouse efficiency.

Brew a few more recipes without changing your equipment or process to make sure you're consistent from batch to batch. Then if you want to observe the effect of any one parameter down the road, you can just change one thing at a time to get a feel for how that affects your system.

Congrats again!

Hey Guys, Just wanted to give you an update. I did an IPA last night and took into account all of your recommendations and hit 70% efficiency!
What I did was:
Had my LHBS tighten the mill
Stirred the mash a lot more
Measure the strike and sparge water much more carefully
and sparged with water that was a little hotter than 170

With all of that, I hit 70%! That is a huge jump from the 59-60 I saw just last weekend.

Thanks again everyone!

 

[Shooter]

Cool! I'd say as long as you're hitting mid sixties or higher consistently, no need to mess with it.

 

[jaylakejr]

awesome man. Thanks to this thread, I learned that I need to stir my mash more than I have been if I want a bump in efficiency.

Hey, not sure if you have a mash paddle but I got mine from this guy on eBay and it is super nice and the price was great. Search for seller predfam he is out of nj.

 

[patthebrewer]

Hey, not sure if you have a mash paddle but I got mine from this guy on eBay and it is super nice and the price was great. Search for seller predfam he is out of nj.

I heard that too

 

[Denny]

I wonder if my sparge water temp is too low... I think Saturday I will be brewing again and I want to get all my ducks in a row to try and up my efficiency. I am having my LHBS double mill my grains.

I really doubt that your sparge temp has anything to do with it unless you're already not getting full conversion in the mash. You should read this and check....http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.ph..._Efficiency#Determining_Conversion_Efficiency . It will help determine if your problem is in the mash or sparge. I can tell that you 90+% of the time that efficiency problems are directly related to poor crush.

 

[Denny]

Have you considered that your issue may be too much water?:cross:

I'm suspect of his mash calculator because I ran his recipe through BeerSmith and got way different strike and sparge volumes. I'm not saying that crush isn't a contributing factor, but too much water = low OG.

Not if his final volume is correct.

 

[ilikeguns]

Not if his final volume is correct.

true

 

[patthebrewer]

I really doubt that your sparge temp has anything to do with it unless you're already not getting full conversion in the mash. You should read this and check....http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.ph..._Efficiency#Determining_Conversion_Efficiency . It will help determine if your problem is in the mash or sparge. I can tell that you 90+% of the time that efficiency problems are directly related to poor crush.

My efficiency never seemed to get out of the sixties when I was having my LHBS crush....since I got a mill I'm usually mid seventies. Although as a side note occasionally I do, no sparge batches, with efficiency in the mid fifties to sixties. However, these beers seem to taste fantastic, with more body and mouthfeel. Just an observation. So maybe sometimes we get too tied up with trying to push our efficiency to the limit....