Sparging

[Dark_Ale]

About 4 months ago I went all grain. I have brewed a couple of good batches but most have been not so great. I kinda went all grain without knowing what I was doing but I have learned from my mistakes but I have a few questions before I brew another batch. Below is a brief summary of my technique. I just would like some thoughts on what I could do to improve.

1. Heat water to 160~165 plane ozarka water with gypsum.
2. I know exactly how much water I need so I pour it right in my igloo then add all the grain and make sure its all stirred in even ending temp is usually 155 or so then I leave it for an hour. Do I need to be sitrring the mash while its sitting for an hour?
3. After an hour I drain a quart at a time pouring it back over the grainbed until there is no small pieces of grain and it has cleared a little.
4. Then I start a slow run off into my kettle. I have a hose that goes from my mash tun to my kettle to prevent splashing(HSA)
4. While its draining I have a pot of 170Fwater and I add this in with a ladel.
I dont have a sparge arm or sparge wand. I do this until I have collected 6 gallons or so. I have had some beers judged and I keep getting overspargeing as one of my problems. and my beer is just not that good. But sometimes it is? I have never adjusted the ph on my sparge water could this be a problem.
Once I get 6 gallons then I go on to the boil. I usually get good efficencies so I thought I was doing good. How should I sparge any help would be appreciated. What about sparge ph? Thanks

 

[alemonkey]

If you're just ladeling the sparge water I wonder if you might be experiencing tunneling of the mash - the sparge water just runs straight through where it was poured in, so that part of the mash may be getting oversparged and giving you some harsh flavors. Just a guess, though.

I made a really simple sparge manifold for my set up - it's basically just like a manifold on the bottom of the mash tun. It's made of PVC tubing with lots of little holes all over it. This lets it sprinkle water evenly over the grain.

When I first started AG I did the ladle thing, but what I did was to pour the water from a ladle over another spoon, so it sprayed all over the place instead of dumping in one spot. Seemed to work ok, but it was a PITA.

 

[boo boo]

You are basically fly sparging. You need to make sure the ph of your sparge water is in range and also that you don't go below 1010sg on your runnings.
Have you tried batch sparging. I suspect also that you have a bazooka tube for your drain and you are getting chanelling.

 

[Dark_Ale]

So are you just letting the sparge water gravity drain into your mash? How long should it take to sparge a 5 gallon batch of grains. is your run off equal to the amount of sparge water and how do you get them equal just pinch off or open the valve more?

 

[david_42]

Switch to batch sparging and adjust your pH. I swear by pH 5.2. Once you have cleared the wort, drain it completetly into the kettle. Figure out how much wort you have in the kettle. Then add enough water to the mash tun so you'll end up with 6 gallons of wort, stir gently for about 5 minutes and repeat the clearing. Drain that to the kettle. Do two batch sparges, if the tun isn't big enough.

This is the old way of sparging and it works very well. Many times two or three different ales were made from one batch of grain. The first would be a strong ale, the last a small beer.

 

[Dark_Ale]

I have a stainless false bottom screen and then underneath I have a type of bazooka screen on the drain. Its two screens basically. The stainless screen sits up a bit It holds a gallon of water under the false bottom that never touches the grain. I try not to pour the water on the same place on teh grains every time I move it around.

 

[Dark_Ale]

ok so let it sit for an hour. take off a little and pour back in until it clears. Drain to the kettle. Then basically do the same thing to get the amount of liquid wort that I need? So lets say my mash PH is 5.2 and I drain. Will the grain be enough to lower the second amount of water or will I need to lower it with acid? Or will I just have to run a batch and see how much acid its gonna take to get it down to a 5.2?

 

[boo boo]

9. Sparge with 76°C water and pH of sparewater 5.5.
Higher temperature and pH during sparging increase polyphenolic material extraction with resulting astringency.

10. Stop runoff at 1010 and 5.5 pH
Extract recovered at the end of sparging is not simply diluted (quality) first wort. Last runnings contain little of interest to brewers making quality beer. Although large breweries have financial interest in collecting last worts as low as 1.003, craft brewers rarely collect below 1010.

That was taken from here http://www.draymans.com/Articles/mash.php

 

[Dark_Ale]

to stop at 1.010 I would have to get a sample shut off my valve cool to 60F and then take a hydrometer reading...would it hurt for the water to sit on the grains while I do this...Is there a better way?

 

[cweston]

to stop at 1.010 I would have to get a sample shut off my valve cool to 60F and then take a hydrometer reading...would it hurt for the water to sit on the grains while I do this...Is there a better way?

You can take a hydrometer reading at a much higher temp and correct (using ProMash or Beer Recipator), although some say that this is very hard on the glass of the hydrometer.

It doesn't take very long to get a sample vial full of wort chilled down to 60 degrees, though. (Or to 100, then correct for temp.)

 

[Boston]

4. Then I start a slow run off into my kettle. I have a hose that goes from my mash tun to my kettle to prevent splashing(HSA)

Would somebody please set me straight on this: Is it possible to have HSA during any procedures PRIOR to the boil? I've always thought (perhaps incorrectly) that a good, long, rolling boil would eliminate any oxygen from the wort.
TIA,
Jeff

 

[Dark_Ale]

All I can get is that HSA prior to boil is controversial??? I just try to minimize cause I dont know any better.....But I have seen people who make good beer splash it around. I think it would be a cool experiment to make two brews...both the same under the same conditions, except splash the heck out of one during mashing and sparging.......and be careful with the other. Bottle and see if one taste differant?????

 

[boo boo]

Check out this http://www.brewboard.com/index.php?showtopic=46585&hl=hot+side+aeration for an experiment done by a brewboarder.

 

[PT Ray]

I have to say I have made some fine beer using pretty much the same techniques in question. I have refined some of the methods but still pretty much the same. One thing I have changed is sparge water volume. I used to sparge until I collected my post boil volume. Now I sparge with .5 gallon for every pound of grain. Sometimes this leaves me adding close to 2 gallons of water to the kettle to obtain my post boil volume. I can't say I noticed any major improvements. This may be because in the begining I was always brewing healthy gravity beer which would have been less proned to oversparging. For brewing water I just use filtered city water. Back when we had micros in town they were fond of the water and just filtered it to remove the chlorine.