Sparge question

[Moody_Copperpot]

I'm sure you guys who have been on the boards a long time have answered this question time and time again, but I need some info on sparging.
I did my first all grain batch last week. I mashed for 60 min at about 154 (that was after the addition of grain), then I drained my Cooler MLT and added 170 degree sparge water, which I immediately drained into my brew pot. I was told by an all grain brewer that I should immediately drain my sparge water, but now I'm reading about letting it sit for 10 min, and other methods where you drain two gallons of your mash, add it back to the tun, then drain the first runnings and THEN add the sparge for 10 min. Help!

 

[Suthrncomfrt1884]

It really doesn't matter. All of those ways will work. Try them out, see which ones you like, and which ones get your the best efficiency. Decide from there.

Personally, I've always liked the double batch sparge method. I usually let each addition sit in the mash for about 5 minutes, then let it drain as fast as possible.

 

[Moody_Copperpot]

Is it possible to get a step by step? For example:
Mash 4.6 gallons of water for 60 min
Drain 1-2 gallons and add back to tun
Mash out 2 (I'm guessing) gallons at 165 for 10 min
Drain first runnings
Add 3 (I'm arbitraritly picking this number) gallons of 170 water to sparge.
Do you let the sparge sit at all, or just run it right off?

I've watched a few youtube videos, and all of them are different and now I'm even more confused, haha.

 

[ibbones]

Moody, I do just that. I have been doing that for about six months now and it is working better for me. I also let the sparge set for five or so minutes before draining.

 

[Moody_Copperpot]

Moody, I do just that. I have been doing that for about six months now and it is working better for me. I also let the sparge set for five or so minutes before draining.

Do which thing? The steps with the mash out, or the first one I posted with no mash out? I think you mean the one with the mash out, but just checking.

 

[92greenyj]

I mash at 155 for 60 minutes (up to 90 if its a big beer like a barley wine or IPA that I want to get every last bit of sugar from the grains). Recirculate it for 1 minute. Pump that into my BK. then pump in my sparge water at 170 degrees, stir the sparge water and grains up. Cover and let that sit for 20 minutes. Recirculate again for 1 minute. Then pump the sparge into my BK and stir the BK contents up before taking my pre boil gravity reading. Then I boil.

 

[Moody_Copperpot]

I'm brewing as we speak, my grains are mashing at 154 right now, so in 60 minutes I'm going to try one of these techniques, all seem totally valid and I'm sure have yielded good results.

 

[ajf]

1. Mash for 60 minutes at your chosen mash temperature.
2. Vorlauf. (Drain a small amount into a container, and gently add that back to the mash, until what you are draining is free of grain particles).
3. Drain the entire mash into the kettle.
4. Measure the amount of wort in the kettle, and subtract that volume from your required pre-boil volume to get the amount of sparge water required.
5. Add the required amount of sparge water at whatever temperature it takes to raise the grain temps up to 165 - 170F. (I don't know what temperature this would be, but it is probably about 180F to 190F.)
6. Stir really well to dissolve the sugars. This is very important.
7. Vorlauf. Same as step 2
8. Drain remaining runnings into kettle.

-a.

 

[Moody_Copperpot]

Thank you so much for the run down! I unfortunately already sparged and did it a bit differntly.
I mashed for 60 min
Did the vorlauf
added about 2.5 gallons of 168 degree water for mash out
Drained the tun completely.
Took my meaurment of wort and added 170 water for sparging so I would end up with 6 gallons.
I emptied all that sparge water into the kettle.
I then took the entire kettle of wort and poured it back into the tun.
I immediatelty drained it into the kettle...was this a bad move?
I'll definitely be doing what your instructions said next time, AJF.
One more question. How come some people say your sparge water should be at 170 to avoid tannins, and others say to have your water at 185 or so so that when it hits the grains it becomes 170?

 

[Suthrncomfrt1884]

One more question. How come some people say your sparge water should be at 170 to avoid tannins, and others say to have your water at 185 or so so that when it hits the grains it becomes 170?

You don't want to let your mash temp get above 170....but you want to bring it as close as possible. If your water needs to be 185 to bring the total volume to 170, then thats fine.

 

[Bulls Beers]

1. Mash for 60 minutes at your chosen mash temperature.
2. Vorlauf. (Drain a small amount into a container, and gently add that back to the mash, until what you are draining is free of grain particles).
3. Drain the entire mash into the kettle.
4. Measure the amount of wort in the kettle, and subtract that volume from your required pre-boil volume to get the amount of sparge water required.
5. Add the required amount of sparge water at whatever temperature it takes to raise the grain temps up to 165 - 170F. (I don't know what temperature this would be, but it is probably about 180F to 190F.)
6. Stir really well to dissolve the sugars. This is very important.
7. Vorlauf. Same as step 2
8. Drain remaining runnings into kettle.

-a.

+1..I do this too. The only thing I do differently is that I sparge twice.

 

[ajf]

Thank you so much for the run down!

You're welcome

I emptied all that sparge water into the kettle.
I then took the entire kettle of wort and poured it back into the tun.
I immediatelty drained it into the kettle...was this a bad move?

I honestly don't know, because I've never done it.

One more question. How come some people say your sparge water should be at 170 to avoid tannins, and others say to have your water at 185 or so so that when it hits the grains it becomes 170?

John Palmer gives a description of lautering see http://www.howtobrew.com/section3/chapter17.html

I find this quite amusing, because in the section on mash out, he recommends raising the grain bed temperature to 168F by using boiling water (you need to go back one chapter to find the reference to boiling water), but in the sparging section he says never use sparge water > 170F "as this could lead to astringency in the beer" with the astringency coming from excess tannin extraction. I feel that this section of his book really needs some modification.

Excess tannin extraction can be achieved by a combination of three things.

1. Temperatures > 170F
2. pH > 6.0
3. Sufficient time to extract the tannins

All three factors have to be satisfied in order to screw things up.
Decoction mashes, where you boil the grains during the mash are OK (The pH is too low)
Mashing out with boiling water is OK (pH is too low, and time to 170F is too short).
Using hot water with a batch sparge is OK (pH is too low, and time to 170F is too short).
The only time when using sparge water > 170 is a problem is when you have done a mash out (raising the grain bed to 170F), and you are doing a fly sparge which will increase the temperature to > 170 and the pH, and do so for a long time.

-a.

 

[Yooper]

I don't understand something here- did you say you poured the wort back into the mashtun after you were finished? With the grain? How come? Or am I misunderstanding?

 

[Yooper]

1. Mash for 60 minutes at your chosen mash temperature.
2. Vorlauf. (Drain a small amount into a container, and gently add that back to the mash, until what you are draining is free of grain particles).
3. Drain the entire mash into the kettle.
4. Measure the amount of wort in the kettle, and subtract that volume from your required pre-boil volume to get the amount of sparge water required.
5. Add the required amount of sparge water at whatever temperature it takes to raise the grain temps up to 165 - 170F. (I don't know what temperature this would be, but it is probably about 180F to 190F.)
6. Stir really well to dissolve the sugars. This is very important.
7. Vorlauf. Same as step 2
8. Drain remaining runnings into kettle.

-a.

This is exactly what I do when I batch sparge as well. I think this is the most common way. I know some people do a mashout, but it's not necessary with batch sparging since you can just add hotter sparge water to get the grain bed to 168 degrees. My first sparge addition is usually close to 195 degrees.

 

[DSMbrewer]

ajf made a comment about ph and tannins......how important is it to check ph level if I am using 5.2 in my mash? Should I still be checking ph or will the 5.2 take that worry away?

 

[Yooper]

ajf made a comment about ph and tannins......how important is it to check ph level if I am using 5.2 in my mash? Should I still be checking ph or will the 5.2 take that worry away?

5.2 is basically worthless, in my opinion. I'd check the pH with a meter if you have one available.

 

[Moody_Copperpot]

Thanks again for the info. I did pour the whole thing back through, but that was for filtering purposes. The grain was collecting on the supply line mesh that filters in my cooler mlt, so I was paddling it away and in doing so, the mesh line got temporarily stetched out and some grains got through, that's why I did it. It worked out well though, I was brewing a low gravity session beer with a target OG of 1.036 and I got 1.038.

 

[ajf]

5.2 is basically worthless, in my opinion. I'd check the pH with a meter if you have one available.

I'd agree with this. I don't use a pH meter most of the time because it takes too long to get the temperature down, and then wait for the meter to stabilize. Instead, I use a refractometer to monitor the gravity of the runnings, and stop adding sparge water when the gravity drops to about 1.015, and stop collecting when the gravity drops to 1.010. This isn't quite as accurate as measuring the pH, but it is a whole lot easier and quicker. I haven't had any tannin problems since I started doing this. I also didn't have any tannin problems before I started doing a mash out, but in those days, I doubt that the gravity of the runnings dropped as low as 1.010.

-a.

 

[DSMbrewer]

so if 5.2 is worthless and I don't have a refractometer, how should I check ph level??

 

[Bobby_M]

The next best thing would be to get the colorpHast 4-7 test strips. They are $20 for 100 strips but you can cut them in half lengthwise to make 200 strips. Make sure you get the 4-7 narrow range. With that, the odds of oversparging with batch sparging are pretty low unless you're using distilled water.

Running the total post-sparge wort through the grainbed again is basically the same as doing a no-sparge. IOW, it reduced your efficiency by a bit.

Don't touch the braid with the paddle when you're running off and if you need to clear the runoff, add it back to the mash prior to any later sparge infusions.

 

[DSMbrewer]

so the next question is, how do I adjust ph if it is too high or low? My LHBS should have test strips right??

 

[Toecutter]

I have been batch sparging in a rectangular cooler with a copper manifold in the bottom. I just built a copper sparge manifold to try fly sparging. The problem I have had with batch sparging is determing how much water gets obsorbed by the grain, so i end up with too little or too much wort. i'm going to try and control it better by pumping the sparge water into the grain bed through the sparge manifold and keeping an inch of water above the bed without disturbing the grain

 

[Wellshooter]

so the next question is, how do I adjust ph if it is too high or low? My LHBS should have test strips right??

I use Muratic acid (hydrochloric acid) that I get from a cleaning supply company. My water has CACO3 and if my rusty chemistry is right that should be HCL+CACO3= CACL+H2O+CO2. Anyway, it brings the PH down from 7.5-8.0 to 6 or less with a very small addition.

 

[Suthrncomfrt1884]

I use Muratic acid (hydrochloric acid) that I get from a cleaning supply company. My water has CACO3 and if my rusty chemistry is right that should be HCL+CACO3= CACL+H2O+CO2. Anyway, it brings the PH down from 7.5-8.0 to 6 or less with a very small addition.

I'm no chemist...and I'm not an expert on water even though I do my own adjustments, but hyrochloric acid doesn't seem like something I'd want in my beer.

I use that stuff to clean the concrete around my pool, and it takes layers of dirt off while smoking the second it hits the pavement. That, and it says on the bottle that it will burn my skin. Just seems like something you shouldn't be adding to water.

But again...I'm not a chemist.