Grant for rims system

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So here is an article from BYOB http://***********/stories/techniqu...66-hot-side-aeration-a-storing-hops-mr-wizard

Good technical brewing literature is very expensive and is not posted for free online. So it's hard to give you good reference to the actual chemistry. But the bottom line is, maintaining water an inch above your mash bed prevents excess oxidation and helps to evenly rinse the mash bed of extract. I will tell you another thing oxygen is the biggest concern of brewers, even more so than bacteria. We use a very expensive sensor to test our beers for oxygen and anything above 20 parts per Billion, yes Billion is unacceptable. High oxygen can ruin a beer in a matter of a few days, before it has ever left the building. Even a bag of potato chips is purged with gas in order to prevent oxidation. I am sure you take good care of your coffee beans, I sure do. I am just trying to help people out, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. I'll draw a diagram of a trombone and post it. Good practices will make good beer, don't stress out, but make sure you take care of your wort and you will make cleaner beer.
 
So this a pretty bad sketch of my homemade trombone. I took the design from a brewery I brewed at for 3 1/2 years. The brewery I am currently working at has a fixed version, I don't feel it functions as well but it is hassle free, so you may prefer to make a fixed one. To make a fixed one just run a pipe to the top of your mash tun and some where in the middle below where your grain bed usually rest put in a tee to run off from. It will greatly reduce compaction, and you can control the flow with the amount of water on top of your mash bed. If the flow is still to fast you can adjust your valve, but it works the best if the valve is wide open. Using the grant you just adjust the exit valve of your pump to match the speed of the runoff going into the grant, unless you setup a float switch. Also be sure to prevent splashing, by keeping the grant fairly full at all times.

Trombone 001.jpg
 
organikbrewer, thanks for posting the sketch. Much easier to understand.

Do you need to use the grant or can it be directly piped to the pump ? I know the grant has its advantages for monitoring and matching flow rates, but as you mentioned, I use a float switch to keep the wort an inch above the grain bed.

i wasn't sure if the grant also helps break a vacuum that could occur by the pipe or tubing being full of wort.

Thanks

Bill
 
Organ,

Thanks for posting in this thread, you have brought up some very good points. I am the one who started this thread because I wanted to find the best way to make a grant. Besides the sketch, do you have any actual pictures? Do you know if there are anymore threads regarding this trombone? I don't know if people call it something besides what you are calling it.
 
Thank you, I am glad it is helpful. You can directly hook a pump up, but you have to throttle it back because it will start to pull air bubbles if it flows faster than it's being feed. I do recommend using a grant. I actually just re-piped my setup. I was tired of the trombone setup, and I made it fixed. I have three valves now, one at the bottom, second at the first dimple of the keg, and the third at the next dimple. It's piped to the grant and I just throttle the pump so it just drizzles out, and I just adjust the valve so the level of the grant stays constant. I plan on getting some float switches so I don't have to watch it closely. So after the valve on the mash I put a union then a tee. The bottom valve is at that tee and then I just ran a pipe up to the top of the mash tun with tee's along the way, with valves. I hope that makes sense. I do have some pics of my Trombone I'll add them to this post.

Home Brew 015.jpg


Home Brew 011.jpg
 
Can we get pictures of it installed and a overall pic of the system. It's just really hard to understand this setup.
 
I just did a search on this forum and on the internet for more information on this trombone and couldn't find anything. I am really interested in it.

A while back, a buddy did something similar to his system and I blew it off because at the time I didn't care and didn't understand it. However, i do remember him saying this trombone fixture is almost used in all breweries in Belgium.

I really can't wait to see more pictures.
 
I thought I had some pictures of my grant, but I guess I was wrong. I do have two videos, if anyone's interested. While I'm not using a RIMS system, the idea should be the same.

The first is how I built the grant. The second is a full brewday, but you can see me describing it around 2:15 and actually using it at 8:30.

Hope they're useful. Both are in 720p HD if you click through.





-Joe
 
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I like being able to see the liquid level. I guess if you were using some sort of electronic level sensors it'd be OK. But then you're increasing the amount of liquid under the false bottom, reducing the amount in contact with the grain and requiring more liquid in the mash to cover the same amount of grain.

-Joe
 
pola0502ds. I have a new setup, i'll post it when I get a chance. That container would make a good grant. The whole idea behind this is very simple. Water weighs about 8 lbs per gallon and a mash tun full of grain and water weighs a lot and that weight presses down on your false bottom, impeding the flow of wort. This can cause a stuck mash if the grain is milled to finely, to large of a mash, or to little surface area on the false bottom. Running the wort back up as it comes out of the mash to a level just under the water level in the mash relives the push of gravity on the false bottom reducing the pressure upon the false bottom. This is the main reason why modern lauter tuns are very wide. The shallower the mash bed the better you can extract the wort from the malt, because of less compaction upon the false bottom.
 
pola0502ds said:
I just did a search on this forum and on the internet for more information on this trombone and couldn't find anything. I am really interested in it.I really can't wait to see more pictures.
Click to expand...

The trombone thng is basically an adjustable weir. The vent at the top prevents the down tube from becoming a siphon. The wort level inside the kettle cannot rise above the top of the weir (horizontal pipe w/vent at the top) so long as the false bottom is free flowing and there are no other major restrictions. So, the idea is to limit it to gravity flow while at the same time maintaining the liquid level inside the kettle. You could still overflow the kettle when fly sparging, but the grain bed won't run dry. A float switch could be used to avoid the overflow situation.
 
Nosta - i will check out your videos later today if i have time, thank you.

Catt22 & Organ - thanks for your responses.
 
I see how you get that it is similar to a weir, but it does pull from the bottom. Any pressure you reduce on your false bottom is going to give you better flow and less compaction which will lead to better extract. You can decrease the mash bed depth and increase the false bottom surface area also to reduce pressure. But if you can't do that, than a trombone is your best bet, or a fixed version.
 
organikbrewer said:
Any pressure you reduce on your false bottom is going to give you better flow and less compaction which will lead to better extract.
Click to expand...

I'm still trying to verify your claim that slower flow is better flow and leads to better extract. I read your BYO Mr Wizard link, but that is about HSA. A faster lauter does not by itself imply HSA, it is only a consideration if you stir the mash.

I also looked into turbidity. This paper claims that turbidity is a funciton of stirring, not of lautering rate. And any extracted turbidity is dramatically reduced by a RIMS system, which continuously filters the wort.

Finally I looked into tannins. Tannins have a good aspect and a bad aspect. A small amount of tannins are needed to help precipitate proteins in the hot break. But sparge temps above 180F or pH above 8 can cause tannins to leach out at a high rate. Mr Wizard says "It is generally accepted that when the readings get down to a specific gravity of 1.008, there are more tannins and other unwanted material flowing from the lauter vessel." I am having trouble verifying Mr Wizard's statement (experiments with very thin mashes seem to contradict him, also consider that strike water always has SG lower than 1.008), but in any case high temps, high pH, and low gravity have nothing to do with the rate of the lauter.

So HSA, turbidity, and tannins all appear to have nothing to do with lauter rates. I have also found no mention of pressure or compaction being involved. Is there some other defect or consideration that I missed here? Do you have any other links you can share about the relationship between lauter rate and extract quality?
 
How long does it usually take you to run off? I always recommend 1 hour to 1 1/2 hours to fill your kettle and at least a 15 minute vorlof, and 30-60 minute mash. If your using a mash filter, you can lauter very quickly, but with traditional sparging slow, gentle and hot is always best. It allows you to rinse the grain with the most efficiency of extract. The main reason I know this is because I brew three batches of beer a day 5 days a week for the last 7 years. You can tell when your going to get a bad extract by the way the mash is lautering. You should always go slow at first and when the gravity drops the viscosity also drops and you can speed up the runoff. It is a rule of thumb to always stop a runoff before your ph rises above 5.7 and lower than 1 degree Plato. Also when looking for info, if you look for answers from home brew knowledge, your not going to get very advanced information. If you really want solid answers you need to start buying real technical brewing textbooks or go to a real brewing school and get an education.
 
Wowsers. I thought any old dope like me could brew tasty beer. :(

Guess i'm gonna have to take up another hobby. :drunk:
 
organikbrewer said:
Also when looking for info, if you look for answers from home brew knowledge, your not going to get very advanced information. If you really want solid answers you need to start buying real technical brewing textbooks or go to a real brewing school and get an education.
Click to expand...

That should liven things up a bit.
 
I guess home brewing for me has a different meaning. I like to brew the best beers possible, I am always trying to brew beer better than I make at work. Because honestly I think a lot of micro brews are pretty poor in quality. Home brewing is away for me to put my experience to practice without the limitations of my employer. So I take my home brewing seriously, I enjoy brewing a lot and like to share my knowledge with others, because I once was just a home brewer. I have noticed with my local club and online that most home brewers are not concerned with quality and just enjoy drinking beer and making some beer and that is fine. I am sorry to be short, it gets frustrating some times. I understand people's hesitance, you don't know me, your not just going to believe what ever I say. And I am not an industry expert. But I do have education and experience. I would like to help, if you don't want help, cool! Good Luck. But really how often does a professional actually take the time to answer your questions?
 
organikbrewer said:
how often does a professional actually take the time to answer your questions?
Click to expand...

Not very often. If you don't answer my question, I certainly don't have a right to gripe about it. Of course, if you did answer my question it would be of great value to me, even if you were short. Saying that I should go to school to find the answer, or read every pro brewer book currently being published, is being short without providing an answer.

So, what is the relationship between fast lautering and poor extract? Please feel free to refer me to a specific reference.

My question is only about lautering rate. Assume that my sparge temperature and pH are in the proper range, and that the grains are not exposed to air. How does the lautering rate affect extract quality?
 
organikbrewer said:
I guess home brewing for me...
Click to expand...
I hear where you're coming from, OB. I'd have to say this post has a bit different tone than the prior 2 and it is nice to have suggestions from some with a lot of experience.

I see you haven't posted here all that often, so you may not be aware that a lot of the folks on here are very interested in quality and do a lot to improve and make good beer. Of course some just want to "make some burr" too.

That's great you get to brew for a living; keep up the good work.
 
Sorry, I think I was having a bad day yesterday. I am pretty sure I went over why you get better extract in earlier post. A fast flow causes wort to take the path of least resistance, and that causes channeling. When you create channels, your are not rinsing the grain, you are pulling sparge water from the top. Also fast flow causes compaction which will also cause channeling. The point of sparging is even rinsing of the grain bed. At first the wort in the malt is very viscous so you need to go slow and keep it hot, around 168. Once the viscosity drops you can speed up, but you want to avoid compacting the mash and creating channeling. I have been home brewing for over 10 years and I always noticed that my gravities were lower if I ran off faster than 1 hr. Use Plato it is more accurate and always precisely measure your grain and volumes in order to calculate your extract. Try brewing a very simple beer like a Pilsner with 100% Pilsner malt a few times and try running off a different speeds, as long as you have accurate measurements you can monitor the amount of extract your extracting. Brewing in Metric is far easier than standard, but here is a simple way to figure out your extract. 1 litre of distilled water at 60 degrees weighs 1 kg. A Specific gravity of 1.000 is water so if your wort is 1.048 that means each liter weighs 1.048 kg or 1048 grams. So take your volume times you gravity and divide it by your weight of malt used. In metric, and you have the weight of your wort. Multiply that by you gravity in plato divided by 100, so 11.5 would be .115 and then divide that by the weight of your malt and you have the percent of the weight of your malt that was extracted. On average the maximum of extract in malt is 80% of the weight, the rest is husk, endosperm, gums, etc. But please trust me when I tell you that you should runoff, very slowly and keep you mash bed very even. I was not trying to tell you, you need to spend a lot of money on education, I was trying to tell you if you want good info you need to get it from good sources. Sorry but a lot of home brew sources are wrong or poor. There are some good books, but they can't possibly cover everything in detail, so if you want that sort of info you need to buy books written by industry leaders, but they way be unrealistic for you.
 
organikbrewer said:
A fast flow causes wort to take the path of least resistance, and that causes channeling. When you create channels, your are not rinsing the grain, you are pulling sparge water from the top. Also fast flow causes compaction which will also cause channeling. The point of sparging is even rinsing of the grain bed.
Click to expand...

Thanks, that clears it up for me a lot. It sounds like the problem is one of efficiency, not of defective wort. Is that right?

My goal is to reduce the time it takes me to brew without hurting the quality of the beer. I have the hours between 9pm and midnight to myself: weekdays belong to the mortgage and weekends to the family. So I spend a lot of time brainstorming how I could brew in three hours, including all cleaning, using a minimum of energy (since there isn't much left in my tank at the end of the day). I'm willing to risk lower extract efficiencies but not defective wort.

My current idea is to use my BK as a huge grant, continuously recirculating between the MT and the BK. This implies a very thin mash (like BIAB). I don't know why nobody does this, because I see several advantages: there is no sparge, so I can hit a gravity easily. I don't need an HLT. When I hit my gravity, half my wort is already in the BK so I can start my burner and get a head start on the boil. I can use the burner in the BK to help with temp increases for step mashes or mashout.

I don't need to recirculate quickly during the mash, but once I hit my gravity I want to extract the remaining wort from the MT as quickly as possible. I am building a system to monitor vaccuum and adjust the pumping rate to avoid stuck mashes. I plan to use rice hulls to push the envelope even further.
 
I am sorry you don't have time, that is to bad, because beer takes time and I feel it should never be rushed. But if you don't have the time, you can cut corners. You can get good conversion in 20 minutes, just use good two-row with very little specialty malts. Less than 10% of grist. Also Higher mash temp hasten conversion time, but make a less fermentable wort. You can run off faster, if you make a shallower mash bed with a false bottom with lots of surface area. As far as recirculating wort into your kettle and heating it up, that's not a good idea. That is where all the enzymes are and if you heat them up you will denature the enzymes and stop conversion. Just stick with a single infusion mash. Maybe you should build a bigger system, so you don't need to brew as often, so you can spend more time when you do. It really should take at least 6 hrs. to brew a beer. As far as wort is concerned you want it very clear, the cloudy particles cause off flavors in your beer, you maybe you should use a coarse water filter as you run off. Good Luck!
 
wuertele said:
Thanks, that clears it up for me a lot. It sounds like the problem is one of efficiency, not of defective wort. Is that right?

My goal is to reduce the time it takes me to brew without hurting the quality of the beer. I have the hours between 9pm and midnight to myself: weekdays belong to the mortgage and weekends to the family. So I spend a lot of time brainstorming how I could brew in three hours, including all cleaning, using a minimum of energy (since there isn't much left in my tank at the end of the day). I'm willing to risk lower extract efficiencies but not defective wort.

My current idea is to use my BK as a huge grant, continuously recirculating between the MT and the BK. This implies a very thin mash (like BIAB). I don't know why nobody does this, because I see several advantages: there is no sparge, so I can hit a gravity easily. I don't need an HLT. When I hit my gravity, half my wort is already in the BK so I can start my burner and get a head start on the boil. I can use the burner in the BK to help with temp increases for step mashes or mashout.

I don't need to recirculate quickly during the mash, but once I hit my gravity I want to extract the remaining wort from the MT as quickly as possible. I am building a system to monitor vaccuum and adjust the pumping rate to avoid stuck mashes. I plan to use rice hulls to push the envelope even further.
Click to expand...

That is exactly what I do. There's a few who do the same. Check out the "I love no-sparge brewing" thread. However, I only use the burner on the BK to heat strike water and occasionally as a boost to mash-out temperature. I have a RIMS between the BK and the MLT to maintain mash temperature. Before the RIMS, it was way too easy to overshoot temperatures through direct-firing the BK. One thing I've noticed with a false bottom on a bottom drain sanke MLT is the amount of particles that make it into the BK. I drain the MLT through a hop spider now. I get crystal clear wort now. My efficiency is running between 62%-65% with no-sparge. Good luck hitting that 3-hour brew though. It takes me around 4-5 hours on a good day.
 
Yeah, it's worth noting that most of the discussion here about lauter speeds largely impact extract efficiency. For homebrewers that's typically not the biggest deal- if you're only hitting 65%, throw in a few more dollars worth of grain. As scale increases, so does the importance of efficiency, which explains why organikbrewer is so hung up on efficiency stuff.

Personally, I brew without a grant or trombone using a blichmann false bottom. I restrict flow from the MLT during the lauter (and during recirculation whilst mashing) with the simple expedient of a valve on the pump outflow. I admit that a grant would be nice in particular as a way to keep a better handle on flow rates.

I'm not really sure how the trombone functions to reduce pressure on the grain bed. As far as I can see, the only real factor that influences grain bed compaction is flow rate out of the false bottom. Reducing the flow rate should reduce the compaction amount. You could moderate that flow rate in a number of ways, and I suppose the trombone is one of them (by radically reducing the effect of gravity on an open-valve flow).

Alternatively, once wort is flowing into the grant (thus causing a siphon at your MLT outlet) you could raise the grant itself so it is somewhat higher in the air- same net effect- slowing the rate of flow via gravity due to a reduced height difference between the outlet and the top of the water column. Keep the outlet below the top of the water level in the MLT is all.
 
I brewed a Kolsch yesterday in 5 hrs. It took me 120 minutes to runoff and I had a efficiency over 90%. Getting a good consistent efficiency, means I can calculate out my grain bill and OG with consistent results. If my OG if off than so are my hops. I know you guys, don't have the time, experience and knowledge. So your just trying to make so beer and have fun, great. I like to try to help others by teaching them things, but it's not what everybody wants to hear. I was merely looking for plans on wiring up a grant controlled by float switches. I was reading that someone was having compaction problems, so I suggested a trombone, which work beautifully and give better extract (saves you money). Take what you want from what I have said, I can tell people are happy with their setups. Great! I will not be adding anymore to this post, I feel like it is going no where.
 
For the record, and I don't know if you're even watching this thread anymore, your saying stuff like "I know you guys don't have the time, experience, and knowledge" better explains the slight debate you're getting in this thread rather than any homebrewer predisposition away from Learning New Things. If you can put the 'tude in a bucket, life will be easier.

Getting a consistent efficiency is very important, I agree. I'd say being consistent is far more important than any given efficiency level. I'd rather always hit 65% than range from 75% to 90%. In an ideal world, however, I'd have both- I'd always hit 90%.

I apologize if you think I was dinging your trombone- I'm sure it is a good solution for you (clearly, if you're getting good efficiency levels). For someone brewing on the 5-20 gallon scale, however, it seems to be an over-engineered solution to the problem. If you just raise the actual position of the grant so it's not on the ground but instead situated somewhere below the top of the water column in your MLT, you'll get the same results. On a commercial scale I'm sure that's not feasible, given the weight of water and hard plumbing.

Of course, some people love using over-engineered solutions to their problems. I'm currently working on a design for a sparge manifold that's a lot neater-looking than most, but probably only marginally more efficient than a plain old silicone tube laying on top of the grain bed.
 
I honestly never saw the attitude come across from "organikbrewer" who posted here. I appreciated his honest input and him taking the time to provide thoughtful detailed suggestions.
School and reading the proper books are logical suggestions coming from someone who lives and breathes what we do for kicks in our free time.
Just my two cents.
 
back to a couple posts on the previous page, some questions. If you are sparging very slow, then whats the best way to maintain your sparge water temp? Does anyone heat it up to the correct temp and then once it starts to drop, heat it up again?
 
As I promised pictures of my trombone, for those brewers who don't treat their beer like a microwave dinner.

DSC_0033.jpg


DSC_0036.jpg


DSC_0038.jpg
 
I for one would like to thank you Organikbrewer for the information and the pics of the trombone. I am fairly new and have not started AG yet, but i plan to this summer. I too wanna make the best, most consistant beer possible and i now understand that it cannot be rushed. I dont mind taking an extra 2 hours to brew a "perfect' batch as i take pride in what i am doing. thank you again. :)
 
Here are a few more pics. For the guys who want to run off fast, you can still do that with a trombone. Maybe not as fast as you want, I am still wondering what your target time is? You should really shoot for an hour, and don't worry about over extracting, you need to breach 98% efficiency to do that. The most important thing you can do to get quality wort is hit you target ph, Mash 5.2-5.4 and sparge water should be treated to 5.7 any higher and you develop darker wort and leach tannins. Also remember recirculating is very important, as any cloudiness or chunks in your kettle will lead to off flavors and staling compounds. Time should be the last thing your worried about when your making beer, you should treat it like your slow cooking some ribs. Have a beer and have fun.

DSC_0039.jpg


DSC_0044.jpg


DSC_0050.jpg
 
Wow, thanks buddy. Now i'm starting to understand it. Just so I understand this, do you still use a grant with this system? Or is it not needed with a setup. The reason I started this thread was because I was concerned of compacting my grain bed on a single tier system using all pumps, no gravity. There is not a overall pic of your system so I cannot tell.

What do you think of 5 star chemical ph 5.2 chemical? I just ask, because I would like to know what you do to treat you water to maintain the mash ph you described.
 

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