Grainfather recipe problem

[UglySister]

Grainfather has been great so far, but today I have a problem.
I all ready to start a trappest quadruple. It has a grain bill of 16.25 lbs. It's a 5 gal recipe. When I do the Mash and spare water calculation, it wants me to use 6.5 gals of water. The problem is if I do than the sparge water comes out at zero.
I'm thinking of reducing the Mash water by a half gallon so I can have a half gallon to sparge with. I'm not sure if a half gallon is sufficient though and I'm afraid if I reduce the Mash water anymore, it won't cover the grains.
Does anyone else use the grainfather that has run into this?
If I convert the recipe to a 6 gal it would work, but I would need more specialty grains and I can't get them on Sunday and I can't wait another week because I started my yeast two days ago. Not to mention, I would need bigger fermenting vessels.

 

[shortyz]

cut your base malt down a bit... to be honest thats a little much for the GF if your only sparging 16 pounds of grain with like 2 gallons of water. You could transfer some of the intial mash wort to another pot on the stove and split up your hop addition.

sounds like a giant pain in the dick, good luck.

 

[UglySister]

Yeah, it sucked. I won't try that again. Getting good efficiency on an average size grain bill is tricky with the Grainfather, no way it can handle one that size. I was supposed to get 1.098 and I ended up with 1.084.

 

[skraeling]

When your friend forgets your Grainfather only has a 19ish lb grain capacity and you do 20.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1490043953.413414.jpg

 

[Minky]

I plugged your grain numbers into Grainfather's on-line calculator and it specifies 6.18 gallons for the mash and for sparge water it calls for 1.43 gallons for a 60 minute boil and 1.70 gal. for a 90 minute boil. I've never done a batch with that much grain, but I have found the calculator to be right on with the 10 lb. and under brews I've been brewing.

https://www.grainfather.com/brewing-calculators?___store=us

 

[UglySister]

I plugged your grain numbers into Grainfather's on-line calculator and it specifies 6.18 gallons for the mash and for sparge water it calls for 1.43 gallons for a 60 minute boil and 1.70 gal. for a 90 minute boil. I've never done a batch with that much grain, but I have found the calculator to be right on with the 10 lb. and under brews I've been brewing.

https://www.grainfather.com/brewing-calculators?___store=us

I checked there website a few times and downloaded there apps looking for a calculator and didn't find it. Thank you for the link!

 

[Minky]

Sparging with less than 2 gallons with grain bills like that may not give you the efficiency you'd like to see, but I always considered there would be limitations with the Grainfather. I don't brew big beers, so it shouldn't become a concern for me, but you may be pushing the envelope. All in all, I am enjoying brewing indoors, the easier brew days, and the minimal equipment concerns that come with the Grainfather.

 

[UglySister]

Yeah, if I new about the online calculator I think I would have been fine. I backed my mash wash down to 5.5 gal and sparged with one gallon. In the end I was a gallon low and had to add water. The online calculator told me to mash with 6 and sparged with 1.75. That would have been perfect.
The instruction book should point you to the website instead of giving a formula that is inaccurate.
I'm enjoying the Grainfather also. I would love to have full setup but I don't have room. (1200 SF farmhouse is tight for a family of 4). If I ever move I'll get a bigger place and build a brewery, but for now the Grainfather father fits my needs.

 

[Chanoc]

Why don't you cheat and use some malt extract and reduce base
Grain?
Not trying to be an @$$..
Chanoc.

 

[joegbeer]

For big beers in the Grainfather, my current direction has been to cut the batch volume down to 3.5 gallons or 4 gallons and try to keep my grain bill total weight around 16-17 lbs. That includes a 1/2 lb of rice hulls to help the sparge.

One of my next big beer brews I'm going to try the reiterated mash process, I just haven't done that yet.

 

[UglySister]

For big beers in the Grainfather, my current direction has been to cut the batch volume down to 3.5 gallons or 4 gallons and try to keep my grain bill total weight around 16-17 lbs. That includes a 1/2 lb of rice hulls to help the sparge.

One of my next big beer brews I'm going to try the reiterated mash process, I just haven't done that yet.

Please explain the rice hulls.

 

[UglySister]

Why don't you cheat and use some malt extract and reduce base
Grain?
Not trying to be an @$$..
Chanoc.

I started out brewing with extract but I can't stand the off flavor. They say some people can taste it and some can't. Maybe if I used DME not LME and only a small amount, it wouldn't effect the flavor, but I don't want to risk it.

 

[Minky]

Please explain the rice hulls.

Rice hulls help maintain a free flow through the grain-bed so you get an efficient mash and avoid an extra-slow or stuck sparge. A couple or three handfuls are usually enough. Especially helpful when using a high percentage of wheat, oats, or other grains that tend to gum things up.

The first time I asked for rice hulls at the brew store, I asked for 5 pounds. It was like a bushel!

 

[UglySister]

Rice hulls help maintain a free flow through the grain-bed so you get an efficient mash and avoid an extra-slow or stuck sparge. A couple or three handfuls are usually enough. Especially helpful when using a high percentage of wheat, oats, or other grains that tend to gum things up.

The first time I asked for rice hulls at the brew store, I asked for 5 pounds. It was like a bushel!

That's awesome. I'm going to try them. We have found that we need to open the Grainfather up and stir the grains at least 2 or 3 times during the Mash to get decent efficiency. I bet the rice hulls would take care of that.

 

[shortyz]

i always chuck a pound of ricehulls in my grainfather on an average brew. just remember to add it to your beersmith bcs it sucks up quite of a bit of water.

i struggle with effiency with my GF to, alot of guys are like "GRIND FINER" then when you do that it takes 2 hours to sparge it. ive started just adding more base malt to make up for the short fall, saving 2$ isnt worth missing my og.

Im going to screw around with thinner mashes and stuff in the coming months.

 

[UglySister]

We have learned to stir during the Mash. For a 90 minute boil, we set alarm for 30 minutes and stir, then another 30 and stir again. Then after the Mash time we let the grains drain for at least 5 minutes before sparging. Other than the large grain bill we recently struggled with, this has succeeded in hitting or exceeding our target OG.
In regards to the large grain bills, I emailed Grainfather about the issue. Here is their response.
Hi Tom,

Thanks for your email and sorry to hear about the issues you faced with your large grain bill. The Grainfather is actually capable of brewing with up to 20 lbs but I have found personally that it requires a slight variation to the usual method of mashing in with the grainfather.

For starters, rather than using the 0.7 Gallons (2.7litres) in the usual calculation you should reduce this to 0.6 Gallons (2.3 litres) per 2.2 lbs (1 kilo) of grain.

Fill your Grainfather with your mash water and heat to your desired temperature, then add half of your grainbill – 8 lbs in your recipe. Stir thoroughly and then attach the recirculation arm and recirculate for 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, add another 2.2 lbs of grain, stir thoroughly and then recirculate for 5 minutes. Continue like this until you have added your full grainbill and you should find that you can fit your grain bill in no problem. If you get to the point where you put the top plate on and find that you can add more water to the mash then feel free to do this and just take the added mash water from your total sparge water.

I hope this makes sense and if you need any other help please don’t hesitate to ask.

Best Regards,
David

Kind Regards

Dave
Technical Advisor