Thinking of jumping to all grain via BIAB

[Happydad1689]

As the title says.....a few questions in bold.


1. I only have a 5 gal pot.....I would need a larger pot for a 5 gal batch wouldn't I? I know I have the option of just doing a smaller batch, would 3 gal be too much?

2. I am thinking of just doing it right and getting my coleman cooler out and getting a bag from this place http://www.biab-brewing.com instead of fighting with temps. If I would do this, could I just use the regular drain without modifying it?

3. What kind of efficiency can I expect? I read that some don't sparge and some "mash out." How would this be done using the cooler method?

Thanks for all your help

 

[Foosier]

5 gallon pot is not big enough for a 5 gallon full volume mash/boil batch. You could boild less and then use top off water to get you up to 5 gallons, but that would be the only way. My 5 gallon batches generally start a boil with 6.5 gallons or more of wort.

Mashing in a bag in a cooler will work. It is really no different than mashing in a pot or using a cooler with a manifold. The bag is your manifold. You should be able to use the regular drain, but you will likely need to pull the bag away from the drain to make sure the drain is not plugged by the bag.

Don't worry about efficiency. It will come out fine as long as you ask for double crushed grains. I use the same amount of grain as anyone else does and often go over the stated efficiency with just LHBS double crushed grains.

 

[Happydad1689]

5 gallon pot is not big enough for a 5 gallon full volume mash/boil batch. You could boild less and then use top off water to get you up to 5 gallons, but that would be the only way. My 5 gallon batches generally start a boil with 6.5 gallons or more of wort.

Mashing in a bag in a cooler will work. It is really no different than mashing in a pot or using a cooler with a manifold. The bag is your manifold. You should be able to use the regular drain, but you will likely need to pull the bag away from the drain to make sure the drain is not plugged by the bag.

Don't worry about efficiency. It will come out fine as long as you ask for double crushed grains. I use the same amount of grain as anyone else does and often go over the stated efficiency with just LHBS double crushed grains.

Do you "sparge" or do you just mash and drain?

 

[McKnuckle]

Everyone does it a little differently, which is why this forum exists - to generate thousands of posts expressing those differences.

If you mash in a cooler, your kettle needs to hold the batch size you desire (into the fermenter) plus enough water to boil off for the longest period you'll ever boil for, which should be 90 minutes. So if you boil off 0.5 gallons per hour, you'd need additional capacity of 0.75 gallons. If you leave a bit of head space in a kettle that's 5 gallons "to the rim," let's say you max out at 4.5 gallons, then you can make 3.75 gallons of wort (4.5 minus 0.75 = 3.75).

If you mash in the kettle in true BIAB fashion, you'll need to leave additional room for the grains, so the batch size will need to be smaller. I don't have a convenient calculation for that off the top of my head, but such a tool is out there online.

Whether you choose to mash in the kettle or in a cooler, you'll get a sense for how it all works when you try it. I suggest doing it in the kettle first with a batch size that easily works given the volume. Then you can decide if you want to add an additional vessel (cooler) to the mix. As with many things, adding components both simplifies some aspects and complicates others.

 

[RM-MN]

Do you "sparge" or do you just mash and drain?

Yes.


I've done a full volume, no sparge batch with good efficiency but I was right to the top of the kettle. From then on I mash with a little less than full volume and sparge to bring the volume up and get a little better efficiency. I've been doing 2 1/2 gallon batches in a 5 gallon pot. I don't think I could stretch that to 3 gallons as it would spill over during the mash and/or boil over at hot break.

 

[Thedutchtouch]

Starting volumes will vary based on your equipment, recipe, and boil off rate. For a 3 gal batch of a "normal" beer (og 1.060 or thereabouts) you want 3 gal(final volume) plus boil off rate(.5-1gal) plus grain absorption (.1-.07gal per lb depending on if you squeeze the bag etc) plus have to factor in the grain volume, which would put you over the limit of your pot doing 'standard' BIAB.

You could do a bit thicker mash, and then sparge (either dunk sparge or trickle water into the bag while suspended over your pot) to pre-boil volume of roughly 4 gallons. Be careful re:boil overs and it would be do-able.

The bag in a cooler would work just fine. If the valve gets stuck simply lift the bag up a bit. Wouldn't be exactly BIAB but who cares, make beer however you can.

 

[Happydad1689]

Starting volumes will vary based on your equipment, recipe, and boil off rate. For a 3 gal batch of a "normal" beer (og 1.060 or thereabouts) you want 3 gal(final volume) plus boil off rate(.5-1gal) plus grain absorption (.1-.07gal per lb depending on if you squeeze the bag etc) plus have to factor in the grain volume, which would put you over the limit of your pot doing 'standard' BIAB.

You could do a bit thicker mash, and then sparge (either dunk sparge or trickle water into the bag while suspended over your pot) to pre-boil volume of roughly 4 gallons. Be careful re:boil overs and it would be do-able.

The bag in a cooler would work just fine. If the valve gets stuck simply lift the bag up a bit. Wouldn't be exactly BIAB but who cares, make beer however you can.

Thanks for all the help.

Right now I do extract (4 gal) and top up to my 5 gal. Could I do the same with BIAB? Would I lose to much effeciency? (2.5 gal and top up to say 4)

 

[doug293cz]

Thanks for all the help.

Right now I do extract (4 gal) and top up to my 5 gal. Could I do the same with BIAB? Would I lose to much effeciency? (2.5 gal and top up to say 4)

In general you lose efficiency when doing higher gravity beers vs. lower gravity. Mostly, it's just because of the way dilution math works. For a higher gravity beer, the wort that gets left behind in the grain/MLT after sparging has more sugar in it. You could sparge more to get more sugar out, but then you have excess wort volume to deal with.

Brew on

 

[Thedutchtouch]

Thanks for all the help.

Right now I do extract (4 gal) and top up to my 5 gal. Could I do the same with BIAB? Would I lose to much effeciency? (2.5 gal and top up to say 4)

It doesn't matter how you make the wort, topping up with water is dilution either way. You just have to have a target OG, post dilution, and calculate the pre-dilution gravity needed to hit it. This has nothing to do with mash efficiency per-se.


Using your numbers, let's say you have 4 gallons of 1.060 wort, topping up to 5 gallons nets a 1.048 wort ((4x1.060)+(1x1.000))/5

If you started with the same wort, and distilled 2.5 to 4 gal you would get ((2.5x1.060)+(1.5x1.000))/4=1.038 wort. To end up with 4 gal of 1.048 you would need to start with 2.5 gallons of 1.076 wort ((2.5x???)+(1.5x1.000))/4=1.048