Mash tun workaround

[elgee]

I am itching to brew as its been a few months and my mash tun is I. Storage while I move. I want to still make an all grain batch and am wondering if an 8 gallon kettle is large enough to attempt a BIAB brew of 11 lbs if grain? That or I could maybe use my bottling bucket with a large grain bag?

 

[iijakii]

Definitely big enough, but you might have to do a psuedo dunk sparge. You can input info on just about any of the calculators (like http://pricelessbrewing.github.io/BiabCalc/ ) and it'll tell you volume needed. Or if you wait long enough someone more helpful than I might do it for you.

 

[elgee]

I read I needed a 15 gallon pot to do this, which is my concern. I definitely will need to read about sparring techniques though as I have no clue what the most efficient sparse technique is for BIAB.

 

[jwalk4]

11 lb of grain and a 2.6 qt/lb ratio of strike water will give you 8 gallons for the total mash volume.

That's dicey. But with a sparge (pour over or dunk) of a gallon or so, you could make a 5 gallon batch.

 

[HomebrewSupply]

Yeah, seems like it's going to be pretty tight for a full volume BIAB, but there's no reason you couldn't do a pour over or dunk. Or, if you wanted, just do a 2.5/3 gallon batch, full volume.

 

[Arttu]

I have an 8 gallon electric biab system, but use it kind of like a traditional system. I do 5 gallon batches.

I mash in the kettle (with recirculation) and run the wort in to a plastic bucket. I then add sparge water, give it a stir, recirculate for 5 minutes and run the sparge into the same bucket as earlier. Then I take out the grain bag and false bottom, run the wort back to the kettle and countinue as usual.

If I had the room, I would definitely have a traditional 3 vessel system, but I live in a small apartment and have to fit my gear into a closet.

 

[elgee]

I just hope I can make the entire 5 gallons with the 8 gallon pot. I usually mash with 1.5 lbs/qt not sure if that will work for BIAB?

 

[jwalk4]

I usually mash with 1.5 lbs/qt not sure if that will work for BIAB?

Yeah it'll work. You'll have more dead space which might make it hard to hold a temp, and you'll need a second pot for heating up sparge water. But yeah, it'll work.

Traditional BIAB means full volume mash, no sparge. All the water, and all the grain, together in one pot at the same time.

1.5 qt/lb takes up 5 gallons of space.

 

[elgee]

So if I only did 1.5 qt/lb, I don't know that would be enough given grain absorption?

 

[jwalk4]

If you did BIAB, you could squeeze the bag and get much of the wort lost to grain absorption back.

If you only mashed at 1.5 qt/lb and used 11lb of grain, you'd only get 4.125 gallons of wort - preboil. You'll have to lose some wort to grain absorption. Therefore, you'll have to sparge to hit your preboil volume.

Again, that's if you mash at 1.5qt/lb with 11 lb of grain and want to have 5 gallons of wort post boil.