Process Review/Efficiency Questions

[axeman9182]

I'll be attempting my first all grain brew with my new converted cooler mash tun (stainless steel braid). I set out to make a detailed list of instructions for myself for tomorrow, as I've had a habit of just missing something minor the last few times, and I'd like to really nail a brew day, and I figured it couldn't hurt to post my planned procedure here for comments.

I'm brewing a five gallon AG hefe with a 10.5lb grain bill and had planned on the following:

- Heat 4 gallons of water (1.5qt/lb mash thickness) to 166 degrees to reach single infusion mash temperature of 152 degrees. Simultaneously heat a small amount of water to near boiling to preheat the mash tun.

-Mash in with most of the 4 gallons, stirring well, and making any adjustments for the temperature.

-Hold mash at 152 for 60 minutes. Heat up two pots of water with 2 and 1.75 gallons respectively to about 180 for a two step sparge.

-Vorlauf and drain first runnings (dispersing water over a sheet of tin foil).

-Add first sparge water infusion, stir well, allow to rest for 5-10 minutes, vorlauf and drain. Repeat with second sparge batch until target preboil volume of 6.75 gallons is reached.

-Bring wort to a boil, add bittering charge of Hallertau (4AAU) and boil for roughly 90 minutes, until postboil volume of 5.5 gallons is reached.

-Near the end of the boil add yeast nutrient and submerse immersion chiller in boil kettle for sterilization.

-Remove kettle from heat and begin chilling. When wort has chilled to 65 degrees, pour through a strainer (to catch any hops or other matter, and assist in aeration) into fermentation bucket.

-Pitch decanted starter of Wyeast 3068, set fermenter aside in basement to allow for primary fermentation (uncovered, with a sanitized mesh bag fastened in place to keep debris out.

A bit OCD, I know, but I'd like to make sure I didn't miss anything as I haven't been thrilled with my last few batches.

I'd also like to calculate my different efficiencies for this brew, and while I think I understand the differences in theory, I'm not totally sure how I'd go about calculating them. I think conversion efficiency measures how much of the starch was successfully converted to sugar (and we'd like this to be close to 100%), lauter efficiency measures how much of the converted sugar was collected into the wort, and brewhouse efficiency is the traditional efficiency number quoted, and would basically be conversion*lauter if not for other losses (such as hop absorption). Aside from brewhouse efficiency (from postboil gravity), I'm not sure how to go about calculating the other two, and any insight would be appreciated.

Sorry for the long post guys, cheers!

 

[djsethall]

If you are as OCD as I am, You will NEVER have a perfect brew day. There will always be something I should have tried, should have not tried. Pump not pumping fast enough or pump pumping too fast and compacting my grain bed. As for the process, I am seeing a few things that I would never do. First off, hallertau is an aroma hop, not a bittering hop. Are you doing your own infusion temp calculations or using software? I would also invest in some sort of stainless plate/bowl/anything besides a piece of aluminum foil to diffuse the stream of water. I am absolutely anal about aluminum never coming near my brew. Some people boil in aluminum and say there is no off flavor. One memory as a child that I have retained somehow was a tour of the olympia brewery. The head brewer stated when asked about beer having an aluminum flavor when in cans pointed out that your nose is actually smelling the pop tab that opens the can and stressed that the beer absolutely never comes in contact with anything aluminum. Others have their own opinion about that subject, as do I. You don't want 100% efficiency. You will extract more than just sugars from the grain (tannins). Try downloading beersmith, its free for 21 days and only costs $20 for the full version (less than a round of beers with my buddies, unless we are drinking my beer). Sorry for the long post dude, cheers

 

[axeman9182]

Thanks for the feedback.

As far as the hops go, I had read that a hop like Hallertau is more traditional for a hefeweizen, and since I'd have to order an ounce of hops for bittering no matter what, I figured I might as well get soemthing where I'll use the whole ounce.

Mash temperature came from http://www.kotmf.com/tools/mash.php?PHPSESSID=6de28b977d933a74f9cc31c56cab607c Though it does seem a bit high compared to what I've seen other people cite as their mash water temperature, which is why I plan on heating enough water for a 1.5qt/lb mash, and then adding a bit less and adjusting as need be.

Beersmith is something I plan on purchasing before my next brew, looking forward to using it.

 

[Bobby_M]

You said:

"Heat 4 gallons of water (1.5qt/lb mash thickness) to 166 degrees to reach single infusion mash temperature of 152 degrees. Simultaneously heat a small amount of water to near boiling to preheat the mash tun.
...
Bring wort to a boil, add bittering charge of Hallertau (4AAU) and boil for roughly 90 minutes, until postboil volume of 5.5 gallons is reached."



1. Don't put near boiling water in your tun, it will just warp the walls more. If your target strike temp is 166F, heat it to 175F put it in the cooler, close the lid for 5 minutes, then open and stir it until it reaches 166. Then dough in. No wasted water.

2. We generally don't boil until we reach a certain volume. You can't reasonably predict IBUs in a flexible boil time. Since you only have a single bittering addition, it's not a big deal but you should carefully measure your boil off rate so you know how much preboil volume you need in the future.

To calculate your efficiencies you have to collect two data points; volume and gravity. For mash/lauter efficiency, accurately measure the volume of the wort in your brew kettle right after your finish your runoff. Stir well and take a gravity reading.

To calculate your brewhouse, you'll measure how much volume you have in your fermenter and the gravity of that wort.

Once you record that data, you can calculate it out based on the grain bill used.

 

[axeman9182]

Thanks for the tips. I just mashed in and ended up with a mash thickness of closer to 1.9qt/lb because I think I underestimated how cold my cooler was before water was added, and ended up undershooting my mash temp by quite a bit (ended up having to settle at 150 instead of 152).

 

[djsethall]

You said
"Beersmith is something I plan on purchasing before my next brew, looking forward to using it."

Try the free trial and see what you think about it. It took me very little time to figure it out and I feel it is the best software out there. It allows you to tweak a recipe, tweak the settings for your system exactly etc. Lots of tweaking. I have been told that I am a tweaker without meth. Lol

 

[rockytoptim]

-Pitch decanted starter of Wyeast 3068, set fermenter aside in basement to allow for primary fermentation (uncovered, with a sanitized mesh bag fastened in place to keep debris out.

Are you really going to ferment in uncovered bucket with only a mesh bag to keep debris out. Sounds like a good way to get a infection. At minimum put some shrink wrap over the top of the bucket.

 

[djsethall]

Are you really going to ferment in uncovered bucket with only a mesh bag to keep debris out. Sounds like a good way to get a infection. At minimum put some shrink wrap over the top of the bucket.

+1
It'll go from hefe to lambic in no time

 

[axeman9182]

+1
It'll go from hefe to lambic in no time

My idea for this came from this discussion on the beer advocate homebrewing forum

http://beeradvocate.com/forum/read/3752878

 

[rockytoptim]

My idea for this came from this discussion on the beer advocate homebrewing forum

http://beeradvocate.com/forum/read/3752878

Interesting Idea. Let us know how it turns out.

 

[axeman9182]

For the record, after 1.5 to 2 days, I will probably put a lid/airlock on it, just going to leave it uncovered for the start of fermentation.

Brew day is going well so far, I've got about 25 minutes left in my boil. My first runnings had a gravity of 1.065, second of 1.036, and third of 1.030. My preboil gravity was 6.5 gallons of 1.051 wort, which I think should have me on track for an 80%+ efficiency brew.

 

[axeman9182]

The rest of brewday went pretty well, with the exception of my post boil gravity reading. My preboil readings were as follows

first runnings: 3.5 gallons @ 1.065
second runnings: 2 gallons @ 1.036
third runnings: 1 gallon @ 1.028
total preboil : 6.5 gallons at 1.051

Everything seemed to be fine, combining the the runnings OGs about equaled out to the total preboil OG. I boiled and chilled my wort, and despite having boiled down from 6.5 gallons to just over 5, my "into the fermenter" specific gravity measured in at 1.052. At this point I'm going on the assumption that that reading was somehow messed up/wrong, since the alternative is three to four prior readings were all wrong.

 

[rockytoptim]

The rest of brewday went pretty well, with the exception of my post boil gravity reading. My preboil readings were as follows

first runnings: 3.5 gallons @ 1.065
second runnings: 2 gallons @ 1.036
third runnings: 1 gallon @ 1.028
total preboil : 6.5 gallons at 1.051

Everything seemed to be fine, combining the the runnings OGs about equaled out to the total preboil OG. I bliked and chilled my wort, and despite having boiled down from 6.5 gallons to just over 5, my "into the fermenter" specific gravity measured in at 1.052. At this point I'm going on the assumption that that reading was somehow messed up/wrong, since the alternative is three to four prior readings were all wrong.

Did you make sure all your runnings were well mixed before taking the sample for preboil gravity. I have had that happen where I didn't mix well and get incorrect reading. Also what temperatures was the pre and post boil readings taken?

 

[axeman9182]

All readings were taken between 60 and 66 degrees or so, not enough to throw anything off too much. I thought I mixed the runnings well before taking my preboil OG, and the fact that it lines up with the runnings OGs makes me think it's correct (unless, are you supposed to mix up the individual runnings before taking a gravity reading?).