Mash Thickness Confusion

[DNW]

The double crush upped my efficiency from the mid 60's into the mid 70's.

This may be an indication that their mill is not adjusted correctly...

 

[mookie1010]

This may be an indication that their mill is not adjusted correctly...

Oh, surely. As noted by others, if I increase my efficiency, I buy less of their grain. Over time, that can add up (or what I call "The Office Space Principle.")

 

[Kaiser]

Oh, surely. As noted by others, if I increase my efficiency, I buy less of their grain. Over time, that can add up (or what I call "The Office Space Principle.")

I don't think that this is necissarily the case. Home brew shops don't make thei r money selling grain. A bad reputation from a bad crush would be more damaging than the upside of selling more gain. I do however believe that home brew shops err on the side of a coarser crush b/c they don't want to field the calls fom all the brewers with stuck mashes if the mill the grain too tight.

Kai

 

[mookie1010]

I don't think that this is necissarily the case. Home brew shops don't make thei r money selling grain. A bad reputation from a bad crush would be more damaging than the upside of selling more gain. I do however believe that home brew shops err on the side of a coarser crush b/c they don't want to field the calls fom all the brewers with stuck mashes if the mill the grain too tight.

Kai

Potato, Po-tah-to.

Whatever the motivation, the result is the same in the end.

 

[Denny]

I would pay good money to listen to Kai, Jamil, and Denny sit around a bar and discuss beer brewing principles, theories, and applications.

Ya know, me, too!

 

[Denny]

When it fits, go for the single sparge. It's less work and only sligtly less efficient.

Kai

I second that. I get so little gain from a 2nd sparge that it isn't worth the time and effort to me.

 

[Denny]

What's the efficiency loss? I've been doing 2 and I have room for one.

I gain maybe 1-2% from a seconds sparge...not worth it for me.

 

[Dog House Brew]

+1 Not worth it to me, too much work for little gain.

 

[mookie1010]

+1 Not worth it to me, too much work for little gain.

I'm gonna do one batch on this weekend's batch. (heh) Thanks for the input.

 

[GrizlyGarou]

I'm pretty sure I have the gist of the ideas going on in this thread. I've read it a few times now, so I at least hope I do.

That being said, I have some questions. Is the thinner or thicker mash considered to be the volume of water when you start the verlauf, or the first addition of water to grains?

I did my first all grain this past week, and I had 50% efficiency on my first runnings, then I put about 1 1/2 gallons of water at about 180 degrees or so (I have the equations from somewhere, as well as the temperature I put in, written down, but not near me right now) and that ended up getting another 25% out. My temperatures were on when I did the infusions, and I lost about 2 degrees over the 45 minutes I let it sit, starting at 155.

So, I want to know if I'm correct in assuming that the final volume of water is what you guys are referring to for the ratio of water to grain or the strike water. I only have a 4 gallon brewpot, but I have a 2 gallon as well. Should I split use more strike water, ending up with more in the infusions and the verlauf, then split the first runnings into the two pots and let one boil down a bit while I sparge with with the other, then sparge with more clear water for the second runnings?

I know I should have a larger brewpot to do a five gallon all grain batch, but you guys can try to convince my wife of that. I already failed. I'd prefer to not spend the same time to get less beer, so if there's any way you know of to keep with the five gallons without a new brewpot let me know!

 

[spittybug]

Old thread, but helpful. I take the approach of the chemical industry; constant flux for best reaction. I put 8 gallons of 155* ish temp water in my mash tun, add all my grains and switch on the pump. I recirculate through my HERMS coil in the HLT and keep the temp ~150* +/- depending on style. I just keep that water going around and around...... Every now and then I'll get a stuck mash, but a good stir or a shot of air clears it. With the chugger style pump being magnetically driven, I'm not worried about jamming it up. So far so good; efficiencies in the 80% to 90% range. I mash for about 90 minutes to take into account the more dilute concentration of enzymes. Conversely, I think the constant movement of the water through all the grain more evenly exposes the starch to the enzymes and provides constant "washing" of the good sugars out of the grist. I find the degree of milling to be the much larger variable in my efficiency - I have my guy Henry double grind for me...

I then slowly pump out of the mash tun and into the boil kettle. I get about 5-6 gallons on this pass. I then compress the grain bed and get another gallon or so. I then manually sparge a quart at a time, stirring up the grain bed and then compressing again, until I reach ~7.5 gallons of boilable wort. While I take gravities all along the way and do the math, at the end of the day I drink VOLUME not numbers I boil to a volume of 5+ gallons and ferment in a corny. I have done checks and the drop off of the gravity reading for the sparge volumes is immense, confirming that the bulk of the sugars went in the main volume of wort.

 

[spittybug]

Having just completed a Kolsch brew day.... there is a problem with my system (and any other I would presume) when the grind is too fine. Usually Henry's grind is too coarse so I have him run it twice. This time he must have tightened it up because I got VERY fine. This plugs up the false bottom in a heartbeat. I was blowing compressed air, stirring like a bandit, I even dumped out of the mash tun to make sure everything was still all plumbed! Luckily I'm making a "low and slow" on the mash and fermenter. Efficiency ended up being about 83%, so I can't complain about that. Even if I mashed much dryer, the mash out process would be a bear with it this fine. I need to give some thought to a mash tun redesign to accommodate this since I like the ease of the very wet mashing and the quickness of changing the temperature. What I really need is a hot water jacketed mash tun..... hummmm. Need to figure it out quick; next one has nearly a 20lb grain bill!!!!!!!!!

 

[Denny]

If you batch sparge, try using a braid rather than a false bottom. 497 batches without a stuck runoff.

 

[spittybug]

If you batch sparge, try using a braid rather than a false bottom. 497 batches without a stuck runoff.

I've been seriously considering this and may indeed just give it a try.