Random drop in efficiency?

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Bisco_Ben

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So I just brewed up the Maharaja clone after finding the page where they list a bunch of their recipes. I average about 75% efficiency while sometimes hitting as high as 80%. I have not been under 70% since I have started religiously taking my gravity readings. I took their grain bill ratios and built my recipe in beersmith based on 77% which was 18 lb's 2-row and 9.7 oz's of victory and crystal 120 malts. The recipe called for an OG of 1.090 and I wound up hitting 1.072. This is a bit bigger than my usual grain bill for a 6 gallon batch but how could my efficiency have dropped so much? The only thing that was different than my usual routine was that this recipe called for a low mash temp at 148 and I hit that on the head, however upon taking a temp reading after the mash, I saw that I had lost 3-4 degrees. So honestly what could have caused such a drop in efficiency, and now how can i boost the OG so that my IBU's are not so out of line? I love Maharaja and I was really hoping to nail this one :confused: Any help will be GREATLY appreciated!
 
The drop is probably due mostly to the size of the grain bill, using the same amount of water to rinse twice the grain doesn't work too well. Unless you want to sparge 5 times and boil for 3 hours, lower efficiency is pretty much a rule. The only recipe I've seen for Maharaja includes an extract addition for this reason; you're sure you weren't supposed to have one? You can make up the gravity by adding a little over 2 lbs boiled DME. Because you're going for such a fermentable wort, you could go for 1 lb each of DME and table sugar.
 
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