Efficiency problem

[Baspronick]

So today I brewed my seventh batch ever, second all grain. I brewed the deception stout recipe. I actually brewed this recipe already using extract, but it went so fast that I actually got a request from the wife to make it again. Anyways, my last batch I only a achieved 61 % efficiency. Long story short, I mashed too high, and assumed that was the reason for the poor efficiency. Today everything seemed to go great, so I assumed I would have achieved better efficiency. Not the case. Appears I'm right at sixty percent. What gives? my process went like this. I heated up my mash water to 162, added it to my ten gal cooler mash tun. Let it sit for an hour, stiring a couple of times, then I fly sparged over a period of ninety min. I took all the wort I collected, and boiled for 60 min. Why is my efficiency so low?

 

[pm5k00]

Your crush would be the first thing to look at, do you crush your grain yourself, or does your lhbs, if its lhbs ask them to crush it a second time. Also are you stiring the grain bed well after you add your strike water, and are you taking a temp reading after a minute to make sure the mash is where you want it? ... I've never fly sparged so I can't comment about that, but how much wort is left in the dead space of your tun?

 

[Paul07293]

Strike temp shouldn't affect your efficiency that much. Crush would have a greater impact on efficiency. 162 does seem a bit low but that is all dependent on grain bill, temps of your grain and mash tun, etc. What was the temp of the mash? Not much to go on here. Was your starting gravity what you expected? Did you end up with the volume you anticipated? Did you mash out? If the mash was cool you may not have gotten a good rinsing of the grain. It's going to take quite a few batches before you can reliably predict your efficiency.

FYI, I brewed an oatmeal stout yesterday and only got 68% efficiency. But I ended up with 6 gallons of wort at the correct OG which is all that really matters to me

 

[Rogue14]

Are you hitting your numbers? If not you can try to increase your efficiency but you might also just adjust your recipes for the lower efficiency you are getting. The good news is that your process appears consistent.

 

[Ravenshead]

If you're consistantly hitting 60%, just plan for it in your recipe. Consistancy is more important than efficiency.

 

[Baspronick]

I hit my temps perfect on this one, 151 on the mash, stired a few times through the 60 min, and wound up at 149 at the end. The grain I bought was all crushed at the lhbs. My 2 row was pre crushed by them and packaged, my other grains were all crushed by me on their mill. Might consider running it through twice next time. I did hit the og the recipe calls for in the recipe, but I added 1.25 lbs of grain b/c I wanted to make it a little higher abv, but oh well, it should be right on with the extract version I made preveously. The carmel amber ale I made, I was low on my numberscomimg out of the boil, so I added a pound of dextrose at the end of the boil. We will have to sere how that turns out. My stout was bubbling like crazy this morning though, so thats good.

 

[samc]

Crush is a big factor, but just as important is measuring all your volumes accurately. If you are off in one it really screws up the calculations or like me . . . lazy about the numbers!

Next time take a picture of the crush and post it if you are still getting low efficiency.