Half load brew

[AberPsych]

Sorry for what may be a daft question everyone. I typically brew 25 litre recipe batches with a Karlstein kettle but Id like to do a little experimentation with much smaller brews, perhaps producing 8 litres or so at a time. The boil off can be calculated of course, the sparge volume lowered, but can you offer any advice on what this will do tothe mash? will a smaller volume boil require less mash time for some reason?

 

[RM-MN]

The time required for full conversion in the mash is determined by the quality of the crush, not the size of the batch. With that said, most people mash for longer than is required for conversion simply because they don't know how long it takes for full conversion and it is easy to set a timer for 60 minutes.

 

[AberPsych]

Super. Ill keep an eye on the Brix in the boil which is how I usually have a clue where the sugar levels are, but thats great, thanks.

 

[AberPsych]

Will the boil time need to be edited for a smaller mash do you think?

 

[RM-MN]

Your boil off is a constant, not a percentage of the amount of wort. If you keep the same kind of boil it shouldn't change to a different time. Another thought for you. Some of us do not do a 60 minute boil. We have found that for our beers a 30 minute boil is sufficient since we do not use lots of Pilsner malt (needs longer boil to boil off DMS) and have found that 90% of the bittering from hops happens in the first 30 minutes. Others want to use a 90 minute boil to darken the wort through the Maillard reaction or to boil off excess liquid from sparging.

 

[Miraculix]

Your boil off is a constant, not a percentage of the amount of wort. If you keep the same kind of boil it shouldn't change to a different time. Another thought for you. Some of us do not do a 60 minute boil. We have found that for our beers a 30 minute boil is sufficient since we do not use lots of Pilsner malt (needs longer boil to boil off DMS) and have found that 90% of the bittering from hops happens in the first 30 minutes. Others want to use a 90 minute boil to darken the wort through the Maillard reaction or to boil off excess liquid from sparging.

I'm doing 30 minutes even with pilsner malt... Without any ill effect.

 

[AberPsych]

Thanks so much for that, Yes, Ive read threads on here about shortened boil times and that was part of the motivation for this little series of experiments actually. I imagine its all been done by you guys, but I want to do it myself with my kit to make sure Im tailoring the guidance for my skill level and kettle/mash tun. Thanks so much for this.

 

[Miraculix]

Thanks so much for that, Yes, Ive read threads on here about shortened boil times and that was part of the motivation for this little series of experiments actually. I imagine its all been done by you guys, but I want to do it myself with my kit to make sure Im tailoring the guidance for my skill level and kettle/mash tun. Thanks so much for this.

If you end up with more boil off and a higher fg as anticipated, there's nothing wrong to add back some water to get down to the desired fg. I do this all the time due to my boil pot being too small for my fermenter.

 

[madscientist451]

I've experimented with 30, 15 minute and no boil brews, and although the beer was ok, I've gone back to 60 minute boils. I figured that with all the other work that goes into getting a brew together, saving time on the boil wasn't really doing anything for me. However. short boil beers might work great for you.

 

[hottpeper13]

I found that doing smaller mashes in the same tun resulted in a very shallow filter bed,so I switched to a BIAB and never looked back. Ok, maybe looked back a little,and now have 4- 15 gal vessels and and can do 5 gal to ....well we just did an 18 gal into the fermenters Lambic base for the solera barrel.