Parti-Gyle questions

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Supergrump

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this weekend or the next I'll be brewing a Wee Heavy / Strong Scotch ale (using no-sparge) and following it with a parti-gyle (which makes for a long brew day). I only have one burner, so I'll have to queue up the 2 boils. I'm trying to plan out the logistics for this...

During the Wee Heavy mash I'll heat the sparge water for the parti-gyle. Then drain the first mash and boil for 90 min, with kettle caramelization. After the first runnings are boiling, I'll add the sparge water for my parti-gyle.
First question is should I lauter the parti-gyle immediately or keep it in the mash tun for the next 2(ish) hours? If it stays in the mash tun it will likely keep its temp, give or take a few degrees. If I lauter it out it will cool but it won't be sitting on somewhat spent grains. I'm guessing lautering immediately is the best option...

Next question: when I'm ready to boil the parti-gyle, would there be any harm / benefit if I poured the 2nd batch of wort over top of the trub and spent hops from the 1st boil? I'm mostly trying to save the trouble of washing 2 different boil kettles, or washing the same one twice, but maybe it might pick up some of the kettle caramelization and additional hop utilization from the first boil. Would there be any harm? Is it stupid to pour my 2nd batch of wort over top of all the crap that I'm supposed to remove during the cold-break?

The only stupid question is the one not asked, hey?
 
Supergrump
Great question!!
I'm going to be doing the same thing (as soon as my supplies are in). I'm really interested if anyone has done this, and what their results were. Will leaving the mash for 2 hours extract some extra tannins??

If you have an extra bucket to store your second sparge why not do that, instead of risking keeping the wort on the grain for 2 hours, I know that you will lose heat, and it will take a little longer to get it up to boiling again. Be careful not to aeriate it though.

I'm pretty sure though you should at least rinse that trub out, not sure that you would really want any extra trub for the next boil.
I'm no expert, just what I think might help, but I would like to know what the more experienced brewers think too.
 
I have also seen that there are some who do a 90 minute mash, so maybe as long as your temp isn't too hot your 2 hours of sitting on the grain could be ok. I am not positive though
 
What if after you drain your first running you add some boiling water to get the grain bed up to like 170 and leave it till your ready to drain the tun. Then add your sparge water and get your second runnings that way there won't be any more enzymatic activity while the first batch is boiling.
 
If you have something to drain the second runnings into, then I would go that route. Just treat it like a normal sparge.

I probably wouldn't fully clean out the first boil kettle. I would just spoon out the trub at the bottom. Maybe quickly rinse it out, but I definitely wouldn't scrub it. Not worth the extra work on an already long brew day.

Besides, you might get some complex flavors in the small beer from the caramelization you achieved on the first batch.
 
I just did a parti-gyle and a brew day turned into brew two days

total was a 7½ gallon batch split 2½ gallon BW & a 5 gallon Irish red with some capping

I mashed out, waited 10 minutes then first runnings, sparge, 10 minutes and 2nd runnings right away. with the batches of different sizes, I was able to use a smaller BK for the first batch.

2nd batch in the bigger BK was set onto a hot plate that would have got up to boil by the time the 1st batch was done with its 2-hour boil. but it was nearing 10 pm by the end of the boil and I couldn't use my wort chiller (frozen garden hose), so I left it covered overnight and finished it the next day. took ½hour to chill first batch, pitched at 10:30 and Robbie go ni-night.

I would suggest lautering right away into another kettle or even a fermenter bucket

Next question: when I'm ready to boil the parti-gyle, would there be any harm / benefit if I poured the 2nd batch of wort over top of the trub and spent hops from the 1st boil? I'm mostly trying to save the trouble of washing 2 different boil kettles, or washing the same one twice, but maybe it might pick up some of the kettle caramelization and additional hop utilization from the first boil. Would there be any harm? Is it stupid to pour my 2nd batch of wort over top of all the crap that I'm supposed to remove during the cold-break?

The only stupid question is the one not asked, hey?

this, I'm not too sure about, I probably wouldn't do it. that doesn't mean you shouldn't or can't, I say unless someone less n00b than me says don't, maybe you should!
 
Thanks for the replies. I think I'll take chri5's advice and sparge the small beer right away and after the big beer is done I'll quickly scoop out the spent hops and toss the small beer into the boil kettle for the next boil.

I use an aluminum pot as my HLT (15 gal blichmann for my kettle...thank you Santa!) so I could boil right away if I had a second burner. The big beer and small beer will both be 5 gal batches so stove top isn't too efficient for the 2nd boil.

I'm thinking about doing a FWH in the small beer while it waits for its turn to boil. A 2 hour FWH will be interesting.
 
Now I'm starting to flip-flop on this... I'll definitely sparge the parti-gyle small beer right away and let the FWH hops steep a couple hours before boiling. But, I'm thinking there's probably no harm with boiling it overtop of the big beer's spent hops. I've been searching threads where people discuss over-boiling their hops and there doesn't seem to be any harm. Maybe I'll even get a little extra hop utilization from them.

My next question is what's the minimum amount of time I need to boil my smaller beer? Again, in the interest of saving time. I figure I have enough hops to provide enough bitterness with the FWH and a half hour boil, but I'm not sure if short boils only apply to extract? I recall that there's some off-flavors that get boiled off over a 60 Minute boil.
 
The only thing to worry about with a short boil like that is possible DMS. Since you'll have that wort sitting for a while, it might need a full 60 minute boil just to be safe that you don't get much DMS flavors. I know you won't be using pilsner malt, but it is something to keep in mind.

You might also want to shoot for the lower side of the IBU spectrum with the FWH that you add, since the hop debris will still add some level of bitterness to your small beer.
 
I've done three partigyles, and have just one burner as well. Mash in my keggle with false bottom. I've done three seperate beers my first time, and was sooooo tored and sore next day. From here on out it will be just two beers. But anyway, personally I just couldn't bring myself to boil over the previous hot/cold break and hop debri....it wont be that much work to clean, and peace of mind is well worth it…
 
Supergrump, How well did it work out? I have my small beer (OG 1.053 FG 1.020 coffee stout) in the keggerator carbing up, and the wee heavy (OG 1.093) is still bubbling away after 16 days in the primary. It took me all day, started at 10 am and ended at 11pm. my sparge went extremely slow for both beers. (maybe need to change from bazooka tube to manifold)
next time I'll try a 1/3 2/3 parti-gyle. doing a total of 7.5 gal instead of the 1/2 1/2 ten gal.
was exausting, but it is always worth the effort. I hope that all went well.
 
The brew day went well with one hiccup due to stupidity. Brewsmith suggested a small sparge to achieve a 7 gal preboil volume for the big beer so I planned to do a batch sparge and only drain a small amount to the kettle for the big beer and the rest into a bucket for the small beer. After about 7 gal was in the kettle I eyeballed it and thought the volume was still way too low so I drained most of the small beer into the kettle to top it off. The problem is that I recently upgraded to a 15 gal kettle and I'm used to 7 gal filling the kettle to capacity. After the kettle had about 9 gal in it I realized my stupidity and drained some out of the kettle into my bucket and carried on.

The brew day was pretty long. I tried to do a 90 min boil for the big beer and kettle caramelized the first runnings in a stock pot during the big boil to save time. I'm afraid the kettle caramelization didn't work out as well because my stock pot doesn't have the surface area of the brew kettle.

I did end up rinsing the kettle after the big beer was boiled. I also did a FWH (sort of) for the small beer while it sat in the bucket during the big beers boil. The small beer only got a 45 min boil because I had somewhere to be in the late afternoon and after 6 hours I had to wrap it up quickly. The big beer OG was 1.085 and the small beer was 1.038.

After primary fermentation of 10 days at 59F the big (scotch ale) Beer tastes malty, sweet, slightly caramelly with some alcoholic warmth and a small amount of buttery-ness. Im not sure if the mild buttery flavour is caramel or diacetyl or strong alcohol taste. It's currently conditioning in my cool garage and ill leave it for a couple months. It is intended to age till December and be given out as part of a Christmas care package.

The small beer tastes mild, slightly bitter, with a bit of caramel sweetness. It's definitely not memorable but I'm not going for any awards. Let just wanted to make use of the extra sugars left behind in the mash tun.
 
The brew day went well with one hiccup due to stupidity. Brewsmith suggested a small sparge to achieve a 7 gal preboil volume for the big beer so I planned to do a batch sparge and only drain a small amount to the kettle for the big beer and the rest into a bucket for the small beer. After about 7 gal was in the kettle I eyeballed it and thought the volume was still way too low so I drained most of the small beer into the kettle to top it off. The problem is that I recently upgraded to a 15 gal kettle and I'm used to 7 gal filling the kettle to capacity. After the kettle had about 9 gal in it I realized my stupidity and drained some out of the kettle into my bucket and carried on.

The brew day was pretty long. I tried to do a 90 min boil for the big beer and kettle caramelized the first runnings in a stock pot during the big boil to save time. I'm afraid the kettle caramelization didn't work out as well because my stock pot doesn't have the surface area of the brew kettle.

I did end up rinsing the kettle after the big beer was boiled. I also did a FWH (sort of) for the small beer while it sat in the bucket during the big beers boil. The small beer only got a 45 min boil because I had somewhere to be in the late afternoon and after 6 hours I had to wrap it up quickly. The big beer OG was 1.085 and the small beer was 1.038.

After primary fermentation of 10 days at 59F the big (scotch ale) Beer tastes malty, sweet, slightly caramelly with some alcoholic warmth and a small amount of buttery-ness. Im not sure if the mild buttery flavour is caramel or diacetyl or strong alcohol taste. It's currently conditioning in my cool garage and ill leave it for a couple months. It is intended to age till December and be given out as part of a Christmas care package.

The small beer tastes mild, slightly bitter, with a bit of caramel sweetness. It's definitely not memorable but I'm not going for any awards. Let just wanted to make use of the extra sugars left behind in the mash tun.

parti-gyle does make for a long brew day, that's why I just let the small beer sit overnight and boiled that the next morning. I had a few things go wrong, like taking the first runnings into my bottling bucket and left the dang spigot open.

wasn't a big fan of barley wines before, but after tasting it as it went into secondary, I might have to make it an annual thing. if it ages well

same as yours, not to be opened until Christmas and it's entered into brew club competition

glad yours are turning out well!
 
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