Hefe AG questions

[Huds]

Long time thread stalker, first time poster.

I have a 6 gallon recipe kit for MoreBeer!'s Hefe recipe:

7.2 White Wheat
4.8 2-Row

0.5 Oz N. Brewer @ 60 min

I've been wanting to brew something my wife can enjoy in hopes for more support of the homebrewing addiction I have developed over the years. This hefe i hope is that solution

Okay, I have a 10 gallon Rubbermaid water Jug with a false bottom for my mash tun. I have a ten gallon boil kettle that i use for 5-8 gallon batch sizes. I have done about 8 all grain batches and all of them I have used the batch sparge method. Mash @ ~151, sparge then sparge with remaining batch water and try to hit ~168 (which i'm always low ~160-165.) Also, i am always short on my post boil amount. I usally end up with 3.5-4 gallons of wort. Pisses me off because i usually have about 7.5galls in the kettle pre boil. how can 60 minute boils lose that much? WTF?

Anyway, my real question is can I yield a good hefe using the batch sparge technique? I have heard of lots of stuck sparges because of the gum that can form using wheat.

Can anyone give me some advice on how i can make a solid hefe with my setup.

I don't have a pump or sparge arm.

Thanks

-Huds-

 

[erikpete18]

Batch sparging itself won't prevent you from doing a hefe, but you may want to make your life a little easier and pick up some rice hulls to make sure your sparge doesn't get stuck. Toss a few handfuls in with the mash and they'll help to set a nice filter bed and prevent the wheat from getting too gummy. Remember that the rice hulls will soak up some water though, so factor that into your calculations so you aren't even shorter in the final product. The mashout you're doing should also help to allow things to flow a little better.

As far as being shorter on your final volume, its likely because either you're boiling off more than you are calculating for (like you mention) or there is deadspace that you aren't able to access that you aren't taking into account. Measuring deadspace is pretty easy if you've got a little time. Measure out 3 gal of water and pour that into your mash tun, transfer that water to the BK, then transfer again to a bucket and measure how much water you've got after transferring. If you've gone down to 2.5gal, then you need to plan to add an extra half gallon of water, and so on. Boil off is a little trickier, but since you've got a few batches that are consistently low, I'd plan on increasing your sparge water. If you're always 1-1.5gal short, add an extra gallon of water to the sparge this time around and see how close that gets you to 5gal in the end, then adjust again for next time if necessary.

 

[Huds]

Thanks for the suggestions. Do you think a rolling boil would make a different wort than say a simmering boil would? Maybe I am boiling off at a higher rate than i need to.

 

[TyTanium]

Batch sparging is great for a hefe since you mix it up and drain it fast. If it gets stuck, just mix it up again and drain again. Rice hulls can help too, but I've never needed them.

7.5 gallons down to 3.5-4 gallons? With an hour long boil? That's a crazy amount of boil off. You sure your volume measurements are correct? Also, are you taking pre and post-boil gravity readings, and are those consistent with the volumes you have (i.e., volume difference is boiloff, not losses like splashing or siphon error). A rolling boil is important, you want more than a simmer, but if you're boiling off 50% you could probably tone it down...

Lastly, a hefe is all about the yeast. What yeast are you using and what do you have for temp control?

 

[erikpete18]

Yeah, boil strength is something I'm not quite clear on. Overly strong boils can be bad (high boiloff rate, kettle caramelization, more propane used) and so can light boils (lower amounts of protein agglutination, lower levels of alpha acid isomerization). I've always heard somewhere between 10%-20% is ideal, and I think with my setup I've currently got it set in Beersmith at 12% (0.75gal) with slight variances for the weather. If you're boiling off to half the volume, you could definitely look at toning down the flame during the boil, which should help some. But other factors (humidity, wind, weather, etc) are going to be out of your control.

 

[Huds]

Okay, so i made the all grain Hefe yesterday. 4.5 gal strike water dough in @175 and temp was at 156 so i stirred to i hit 152 and tightened the lid. I sparged and collected about 3.25 gallons. I batch sparged with 185* water but it only hot me to 162~ oh well. total pre boil wort collected was ~7.25 gallons. I used my keggle this time and did a 60 minute boil. I ended up with about 6 gallons in my carboy which is good. little tough to cool down 6.5 gallons of wort with a 25' IC and the dip tube blocking the bottom. so i used about 9 gallons of water and yielded 6 gallons. 6/9 67% is that okay? I measured the efficiency on brewersfriend.com and got 64.43% I see a lot of recipes call for 75% efficiency standards. Is my low efficiency standard with batch sparging and/or my processing equipment?

 

[TyTanium]

I batch sparged with 185* water but it only hot me to 162~ oh well.

Not something to worry about. Just use warm/hot water. Temp isn't critical here.

so i used about 9 gallons of water and yielded 6 gallons. 6/9 67% is that okay? I measured the efficiency on brewersfriend.com and got 64.43% I see a lot of recipes call for 75% efficiency standards. Is my low efficiency standard with batch sparging and/or my processing equipment?

Nice. I like your thought process. But usually we're not interested in water efficiency, we're interested in grain efficiency...namely, of the 100% of sugars available in the grain, how much of them did I extract? That's were the 75% "standard" comes from.

Did you take a gravity reading? That's how you'd determine your efficiency.

 

[erikpete18]

Yeah, I don't even tend to measure how much water I use to cool, I just collect the warmest stuff for cleaning, then run the rest out to the give the yard a good watering. As for your 64% efficiency, that's not terrible. There are a ton of things that could influence your particular efficiency (grain crush, grain bill, your setup, your protocol, etc.), but I tend to be of the school of not worrying about getting a high efficiency, but worrying about getting a consistent efficiency. I'd much rather have a consistent 65% efficiency, spend an extra dollar or two on base grains, and be able to predict the final product better, rather than spend my time tweaking things batch to batch to try to increase the efficiency. You could argue that a consistent 85% efficiency is more cost-effective than consistent 65%, but for a few bucks one way or another per batch, I'm not inclined to worry. I'd also read/heard somewhere of a study that tested the taste of different efficiency beers (I believe same OG/FG, just different amounts to grain to get to that point) and the lower efficiency batches actually tasted better in the end than the higher efficiency batches.