Promash question

[crxyem]

So I was doing some reading last night "Designing Great Beers" by Ray Daniels. I was overlook the section on hitting your target gravity and I noticed that he states that all extracts are 100% efficient, which makes sense as it's already been mashed by someone else that realized the efficiency loss. So onto my question.

If I'm designing a recipe it defaults to all grain with some efficiency value say 72% for example. I switch to extract, the efficiency selection gets grayed out. but the calculations for OG are based off the all-grain efficiency of 72%, would it be correct to change the efficiency to 100% when working with extract only ??

 

[Funkenjaeger]

I'm not sure I really understand what you're asking. In an AG recipe, you are stuck with a given efficiency so you adjust grain amounts to achieve a particular OG. When converting from AG to extract, you need to use the right amount of extract to achieve the same OG as the original recipe.

You just said the efficiency selection is grayed out in extract mode, but then you ask about changing the efficiency when working with extract only? I'm not sure I follow what you're asking.

 

[TheJadedDog]

No, once you click the Extract radio button you should be all set for calculating OG in ProMash. No need to adjust the efficiency number since it doesn't play a factor in extract batches.

 

[crxyem]

What I noticed last night while using Promash, was that in all grain mode, if I set the efficiency to 72% and added LME to the recipe I got an estimated OG of 1.080 if I then choose extract, the efficiency setting gets grayed out and the OG reading stays the same. Now if I switch back to all grain and choose 100% efficiency the OG value increases as expected to about 1.084 and then switch back to extract mode the OG estimate is now 1.084. So if I change efficiency in all grain mode it seems to change the estimate for extract mode as well, does that clear up my question ??

 

[Joker]

So you are saying that what ever you set the AG effeciency to, that is what the program is using for the extract recipe. Sounds like you just need to set it to 100%.

 

[crxyem]

^ yeah that's what seems to happen, which is why I thought I should set it to 100%, but others say promash ignores the efficiency settings. Either way I think I will try setting it to 100% and see how close my OG readings are to the predicted values.