I NEED help with my efficiency

[GilSwillBasementBrews]

I guess I have been lucky using LHBS crushed grains, tap water, and batch sparging I usually pull around 85% efficiency. The only thing I could offer is make sure your volumes and temps are correct, remember to adjust your hydrometer reading for temps. I started brewing The beginning of the year, extract/PM and AG the past few months batch sparging same water and the only time I got bad efficiency 50-60 was when I was off on my mashing volumes.
Again newly brewing myself so take it with a grain. Hope you get it worked out.

 

[Ztp]

Well a corona mill is on its way. I always put my recipes through beer smith so I think the volumes should be good. But we will find out this weekend.

 

[Fly_Rodder]

I'll second the crush. I completed a half dozen batches on my set-up and was getting 60-68% from the store's crush. Received my new mill last weekend and made a batch last night - 76%!

 

[Glynn]

on my first batch i got a 65%. when i was crushing my grains i made a note of the roller spacing because it seemed big to me. last week i went in and asked if i could change the setting a little finer because my eff was low. i was told that there setting should be fine. the onsite brewer who was making a batch at the time laughed and said ppl mess with the settings all the time and told me to use one he has it set at now. yesterday i hit a 78% eff on just my second attempt. i also mash high and stir/add cool water till i hit my desired temp.

 

[Denny]

The past few beers have finished rather dry,

This is indicative of a mash temp problem.

 

[jstofer]

I've read through all of this and I was having the same issues. I had recently switched away from using a cooler to a direct fire setup. I just utilized the "stainless kegs" in beersmith for my setup b/c it is very similiar. I made four or five batches on it and nothing was turning out good. I was measuring my efficiency and it was low. I had been treating my water, I crush my own grains, had been hitting good ph, etc and I couldn't necessarily dial it in. So on this last one, I paid a great deal of attention to my boil off, trub loss, chill loss, etc. I took pre boil measurements and found that I was hitting in the mid 90's with my mash efficiency; however, I was losing a lot more to trub, cooling, etc. Also, I wanted to start shooting for 10 gallons bottled, which affected my "batch size." I took what I learned from this last brew and backed into everything on beersmith and compared it to what I actually got. If I would have had the correct numbers in for equipment and batch size, I would have hit an efficiency in the 80's. Essentially, because I have now reconfigured my equipment profile and what I am targeting, I had to readjust my recipes by adding a little more grain to increase OG. Once I really started playing with the software, I found it quite interesting and it was a good learning experience. It taught me a lot about my process. Hopefully, this will solve the problem of things tasting "watered down" and a lack of malt profile from beers that I know were spot on with temp, ph, etc.
This was just my experience and I thought I would share it with you. Maybe it will help, maybe it won't.....good luck!

 

[sketerbuck]

Sure, it will. Many people routinely get 80-85% with batch sparging. Continuous sparging maybe be marginally more efficient, but normally only 1-2% and not worth changing equipment for. Two of my homebrewing idols, Kai Troester (braukaiser.com) and Denny Conn (dennybrew.com) batch sparge with awesome results.

I'd still look at the crush- I've had some poor crushes from more than one online homebrew store.

One thing that may be a factor is your water chemistry. Do you know your water chemistry, or have you ever taken any pH readings of the mash? What about conversion- have you ever done an iodine test for conversion?

I know when I batch sparge instead of fly sparge on my system I go from 85% to 65%. That being said its all about consistency so whatever works well on you system is what's best for you.

 

[Ztp]

Well the corona mill came in, I got her dialed in to where it is making a pretty good crush. Gonna start brewing up an Oktoberfest here in just a little while so we will see if crush was my problem.

 

[jstofer]

Good luck. I conditioned my grains the last batch I did. The crush turned out excellent

 

[Stauffbier]

Well the corona mill came in, I got her dialed in to where it is making a pretty good crush. Gonna start brewing up an Oktoberfest here in just a little while so we will see if crush was my problem.

Keep us informed!

 

[Ztp]

I know this would probably fit more under my old junk corona thread, but mine was so ugly I figured I would post it up here as well. I was pretty impressed with the crush this thing will produce after some tinkering and adjusting though. Haha

 

[Denny]

I know when I batch sparge instead of fly sparge on my system I go from 85% to 65%. That being said its all about consistency so whatever works well on you system is what's best for you.

Boy, that's strange. I've never known it to make that much difference. I wonder what's up......

 

[Ztp]

Well I have about 5 mins left in boil and just by tasting the rubbings I can tell there is so much more sugar. So far it looks like crush was the culprit but I will report when I get some readings other than my tongue.

 

[Ztp]

Well it was much better this time. I came out with a 1.058 for OG which will be about perfect for an Oktoberfest. My efficiency still was not fantastic, but I missed my temperature a little, and my volume came out a little high, but I bet it will turn out pretty dang good.

 

[Yooper]

Well it was much better this time. I came out with a 1.058 for OG which will be about perfect for an Oktoberfest. My efficiency still was not fantastic, but I missed my temperature a little, and my volume came out a little high, but I bet it will turn out pretty dang good.

If your volume was a little high, that would explain a lower reading. Did you figure your efficiency?

 

[Ztp]

It was around 63 percent. It was actually your Oktoberfest recipe, I adjusted it a little for my low efficiency, and had to sub a few things.

 

[bottlebomber]

I'm betting that getting a real mash paddle, and stirring the mash more would get you at least a 5% increase. Get a mill and do a finer crush to get the other 10% and you're golden.

 

[Stauffbier]

I'm betting that getting a real mash paddle, and stirring the mash more would get you at least a 5% increase. Get a mill and do a finer crush to get the other 10% and you're golden.

He actually got a Corona, and this was his first batch with it.

Ztp, it sounds to me like you need to dial in your water volume better, maybe tighten up that Corona a 1/4 to 1/2 turn (don't be scared to do this), and I bet your efficiency will go up even more. Maybe start calculating your water volume yourself instead of using software (unless you already do). And like Bottlebomber said, stirring is good. Don't worry if you lose a few degrees on the mash...

 

[Ztp]

Ya I will tweak the corona a little tighter next go around and see if I can squeeze a few more points out. And I will also calculate my own water next time and see if that helps as well.

 

[JayMac]

Do you do a single batch sparge? I've heard of a few people greatly increasing their efficiency by splitting up the sparge volumes into 2 or 3 infusions. No hard in trying

 

[Ztp]

Well I actually do a double batch sparge at whatever volumes I get of Beersmith

 

[Denny]

Do you do a single batch sparge? I've heard of a few people greatly increasing their efficiency by splitting up the sparge volumes into 2 or 3 infusions. No hard in trying

I've never had an efficiency increase of more than 1-2 points by doing multiple sparges. Not worth my time.

 

[ahacreative]

my experience has been just the opposite: double sparge, hard stirs both times, and my efficiency goes up. i check the gravity in my first runnings, first and second sparge, and i can measure the difference the effort makes.

 

[Denny]

my experience has been just the opposite: double sparge, hard stirs both times, and my efficiency goes up. i check the gravity in my first runnings, first and second sparge, and i can measure the difference the effort makes.

Well, if it works for you....I average 80-85% with a single sparge so I don't feel the need to expend any more effort.

 

[ahacreative]

good point. of i got 85% from a single sparge i'd be there too.

 

[doctorRobert]

Use more sparge water, stir the crap out of it, and boil harder to make up for the extra spare water.

You can even batch sparge twice, just cut the volume in half, that should help your efficiency.

Also, try extending your mash time.

 

[Ztp]

Well I will try over the next several brews to see if I can find different things to increase the efficiency. I'm not sure exactly what answer I was looking for, I'm sure it would help a lot if I had someone here with me haha. I'm sure it will take some fine tuning and all. It's not that the beer I am making is bad, but it is just not as good as I wish it would be. Especially since I now have the setup for lagering, I would hate to waste three months for a mediocre beer.

 

[fpweeks]

So sorry to thread hijack, but i wanted to report back regarding speed of runoff. I have read on here various opinions regarding rate of runoff vs efficiency. My first couple batches of all grain, i ran off fast (batch sparging) and had poor efficiency, like in the 50's. I tried regulating runoff rate and noted a significant rise in efficiency into the low 70's pretty consistently. So i chimed in my opinion on this thread and was told runoff rate makes no difference........so i figured id give it a shot today.....fall other things being equal as far as my typical brew day goes, except i made a point to stir my mash much more often, and i ran it off quickly, both the first runnings and the batch sparge. My efficiency today is back into the 50% range.

So with all due respect to those of you that disagree that runoff rate when batch sparging doesnt matter, i am going back to my slow regualted runoff, so i can get my efficiency back into the 70's.

 

[Denny]

If it works for you, that's what you should do. But I can tell you I've tested it dozens of times and it makes no difference for me or many others. It makes me wonder if there's something else in your system or procedure that's a factor.

 

[Stauffbier]

So sorry to thread hijack, but i wanted to report back regarding speed of runoff. I have read on here various opinions regarding rate of runoff vs efficiency. My first couple batches of all grain, i ran off fast (batch sparging) and had poor efficiency, like in the 50's. I tried regulating runoff rate and noted a significant rise in efficiency into the low 70's pretty consistently. So i chimed in my opinion on this thread and was told runoff rate makes no difference........so i figured id give it a shot today.....fall other things being equal as far as my typical brew day goes, except i made a point to stir my mash much more often, and i ran it off quickly, both the first runnings and the batch sparge. My efficiency today is back into the 50% range.

So with all due respect to those of you that disagree that runoff rate when batch sparging doesnt matter, i am going back to my slow regualted runoff, so i can get my efficiency back into the 70's.

I used to be in the same boat, but now I'm back to running off fast, without any rest time. I did this yesterday and got 81% efficiency. At this point I'm pretty sure my early problems were more of a conversion problem than a lautering issue. Now that I treat my water and crush a lot finer, I can run off really fast on the sparge...