Joining the many as of late: first all grain

[PSUSkier]

So it appears now is the time to take the plunge into all grain brewing judging by the forums. Count me in as one of the many. Like most my first one didn't go exactly perfect by any means, but at the end I hit my SG and was only slightly over my volume without adding any light DME. So that was the good part, but here were the bumps.

• I forgot to add my 5.2 buffer into the mash and sparge water. Ultimately though that didn't seem to matter this time.
• I missed my mash temperature by about 5 degrees. I was able to raise it quickly by adding some more hot water. By the end, I was probably at about 1.7 qts per pound of grain (only an 8.25 lb grain bill).
• I for the life of me couldn't hit my sparge temp. I tried using 186 degree water but that just didn't seem to cut it. By the time I stirred it in I was only up to 159 degrees. I'm still not sure what the deal is which leads me to...
• Sparge batch #2. I tried using 180 degree water and still only went to about 164. I guess I need to work on my calculations on this part or something.
• I never got my runnings perfectly clear either. I think this was mostly due to me shutting the valve in between dumps which may have slightly shifted the screen inside. Next time I'm just going to try to lift the hose to stop the flow and see if that helps. I tried some of the wort after the boil and I didn't taste any bitterness other than from the hops (I think) so I think I'm going to be OK. Maybe a bit cloudy though.

So all in all next time I'm going to make a list of everything that needs to be done because doing it off-the-cuff isn't nearly as easy as I was thinking. And I'm going to overheat the water and let it cool down to strike temp in the tun to see if that helps me dial in my temps. In any event, we're about two hours after I pitched my starter and I already have activity in the airlock so we'll see where things go from here. Any other tips on the above would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

 

[tangofoxtrot308]

Maybe it's just me but I thought sparge water was not to exceed 170? I know you were trying to raise the grain bed temp but when you first pour in all the grains are getting nailed with boiling water. I've just heated to 170 pour in stir 10 min rest then sparge away. Always seem to hit in the 80's without the clear wort you're talking about. Just take a deep breath and break everything down in steps it's not about making mistakes it's about recovering from them!

 

[PSUSkier]

I thought the idea was to push the temperature of the grain bed up to ~170... Is that not correct?

 

[passedpawn]

I sparge with 180 water. I think you could use boiling water if you don't sparge too many times (i.e, each time you sparge, the pH of your mash rises, and that is what you need to be worried about).