# 90% Efficiency Today With Braumeister



## SJW (24/3/12)

Could not believe what a difference sparging slowly with the BM made, after last week when I dumped 9 litres straight in to sparge and only got 70% efficiency, as most of the sparge water channeled straight through.
Today I did a German Pils with all Hal. Mid. 4.950kg's grain, mashed in 26 litres at 25 deg C (tap water temp), 20min @ 52 deg C, 45min @ 62 deg C, 45min @ 72 deg C and 10min at 78 deg C. I then sparged with 9.5 litres of water, 1 litre at a time every 2 mins, and had a pre boil gravity of 1.047.
So to keep within the style guidlines I might need to water this on down to 1.050. 
ALso I did not stop the BM to stir the mash.

Steve


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## alfadog (24/3/12)

SJW said:


> ALso I did not stop the BM to stir the mash.



Awesome. I use to stop and stir the mash but after reading a few posts lately I tried increasing the mash time without storing and had an increase in efficiency. I did not however mash as long as you did. I will try a similar mash time to yours and see how I go.

Cheers for the tip


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## SJW (24/3/12)

No problem alfadog, now I am not on a 3v system I find it easy to mash for as long as I want. I think mashing the grain in at tap temp does not hurt either as there are enzymes being activated and denatured all the way through the temp range, its just we denature most of them when we mash in at 52 or 67 to fire up the amalase enzymes. AnYway good luck and keep trying different things.

Steve


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## AndrewQLD (24/3/12)

sorry for the :icon_offtopic: SJW I'm not familiar with the mash regime for the Braumeister, do you have to do a full volume mash or can you tailor that down to a 4-5lt/kg mash and sparge with more or is the full volume mash implicit with this system?

Andrew


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## SJW (24/3/12)

I guess u could Andrew, but it just makes sense to me to mash with the max water and sparge with the minimum. I guess the problem with a Braumeister is you cant control the rate sparge water flows through the mash, as it is just gravity pulling it straight through. I have found no problems with mash with big volumes and the guy who runs basic brewing radio says he has mashed at 10:1 ratio and worked fine.

Steve


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## doon (24/3/12)

When I brewed Thursday I mashed with 25 litres grain bill 5.5kg. Sparged with 6 litres in 2 litres batches once last batch had dropped below filter lifted and put into pot to drain whilst I boiled for 30 mins at this point chucked in the last two litres I collected and boiled for 60 more mins. 

this got around 22 litres of 1.068 wort


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## doon (24/3/12)

Oh also mash schedule was 10 min at 55, 90 mins at 67, 10 mins at 78


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## Florian (24/3/12)

Also Andrew, if you say 4-5L/kg, then that's already full volume anyway. 5kg grain to 25L water plus 3L sparge is what I usually do. 

Today I tested the limits and added just above 6kg to the malt pipe, 50% of that was wheat, kind of expecting the dreaded wort fountains. The mash ran as smooth as ever though, but I also mashed in to 25degree water last night at 10:00 and only started the program at 8:30 this morning, not sure if that helped. 

Because I'm planning to split this batch I sparged with 8L and added another 2 to the boil. Ended up with 25L *into fermenter* at 1.056 minimum. 

Although I obviously got more out of the grist than usual I wouldn't necessarily want to repeat this unless I want the batch to be as big as possible. The downside with all that sparging is that a lot of crap gets washed back into the boil.
I honestly don't care what my efficiency is as long as I know what to expect.

Under normal circumstances I know that 5-5.5kg grain + 25L water + 3-4L sparge fills after break and trub and filter exactly one keg.
That's all that counts for me, the monetary difference in efficiancy is neglectable on a home brew scale.


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## SJW (24/3/12)

Nice one Doon AND Florian.
I agree, I dont care about efficiency but I just want predictability and consistency. I find that I have to leave about 5 litres behind in the BM of trub, so to get 20 litres into the fermenter I need to end up with 25 litres in the BM, and thats no problem once u work out how much to mash and sparge with.


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## Bongchitis (24/3/12)

SJW,

Do you really lose 5L to trub in the BM? Do you tilt the unit at all? I never leave that much behind and Im not sure I get the slow sparge = higher efficiency when trub losses are so high. I know reproducibility is the key for you/us but I am scratching my head a little.

I don't mean to sound like an arse, I am curious and am trying to learn as much as I can about my 20L BM.

Cheers mate.


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## Florian (24/3/12)

Was thinking the same but then remembered that he has the 50L, so that makes sense.


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## Bongchitis (24/3/12)

Ahhh I see, short pipe in the 50L.

Never mind me........ carry on.


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## SJW (24/3/12)

No lads I have the 20l BM,. I only wait about 15 mins after I finished chilling to 20 deg C. Then I drain into a fermenter. I stopped whilpooling and found that when I get to the outlet I can tilt the BM abd the wort just slips over the trub. But yes I end up with just under 5 litres of crap in the bottom and that is with 100g of pellets. Also I dont let any....ANY trub go into the fermenter so maybe thats why I leave so much behind.
Also when I say 90% brewhouse efficiency its not true brewhouse efficiency as I dont count trub losses. So everything is based on whats left in the kettle after the boil.


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## bullsneck (24/3/12)

What sort of gap size do you boys run on your mill?


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## Florian (24/3/12)

Same here, no whirlpooling required, and transfer at 93 degrees, but only leave 2-3L behind.

Bullsneck, I run my old (big) MillMaster on the 3rd setting to the right, no idea what that translates to in mm though.
I run my grain through twice on the same setting. After much playing around with the gap and fighting with wort fountains or poorer efficiency I found this to work out best for me.


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## SJW (24/3/12)

I get mine cracked at 1.2mm.
Never had a wort fountain......even though I am not sure what one is. If you transfer at 93 deg C does the trub get a chance to settle? you must be transfering a fair bit of trub if u are only leaving 2 or 3 litres.


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## Florian (25/3/12)

Plenty of time to settle with Brew Brite, though the climate up here might stretch out that time a bit compared to where you are, dunno. 

No trub at all, clear all the way, just a matter of tilting at the right angle at the right time.


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## Thefatdoghead (25/3/12)

I have the 50L and I usually wait about 20min after flameout before draining through my plate chiller into fermentor. I'll make 55L and end up with 52L in the fermentor. I use a pickup tube, I dont whirpool. On beers with heaps of hops I have about 4-5L of loss.


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## pk.sax (25/3/12)

How do you flameout in an electric rig?!


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## doon (25/3/12)

Figuratively speaking. I put brewbrite in at 15 mins till "flameout" once off put the lid on for 10 mins, come back stir it for 1 min lid on for 5-10 mins then drain to cube. Only leave between 2-3 litres behind although this can vary depending on amount of hops I used


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## kelbygreen (25/3/12)

SJW would be leaving behind the cold break as well this would be why there is so much loss. I get 2-3lts loss with no chill and 6lts loss with using a chiller. I know cold break is not a worry but never tried to separate them at all, I dont have a BM but sure the same thing applies when you chill in the pot.


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## SJW (25/3/12)

kelbygreen said:


> SJW would be leaving behind the cold break as well this would be why there is so much loss. I get 2-3lts loss with no chill and 6lts loss with using a chiller. I know cold break is not a worry but never tried to separate them at all, I dont have a BM but sure the same thing applies when you chill in the pot.


Good point there mate. Since buying the BM I have been chilling down to pitching temps so there would be a lot of cold break, and maybe if I did not chill so low there would be less trub. But being the first bew for a Wyest pack I like to make it clean as possible as I will split and save the yeast cake.

Steve


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## seamad (25/3/12)

On my rig ive found 25 l at end of boil gives me 22 l into fermenter, one keg and close to 2 X1.25 bottles. 
Mill is set to 1.15 
I fill cube to top with clean wort ( use brewbrite). The remaing mix of trub and wort i filter through some cheese cloth. Then transfer that into clean flask/s cover with foil and reboil. Use this for a starter and/or miniboil.
Start with 32l strike water and 2 l sparge.
Cheers
Sean

Dont normally use yeastcake, prefer to top crop if required and alwayssplit packs into 4 , one direct into starter and 3 vials for later.


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## doon (25/3/12)

32l strike water on 20l bm? Wouldn't that be way too much?


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## seamad (25/3/12)

It would be, ive got a converted 40l crown urn.


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## matho (25/3/12)

in my ultra small system I find using hop bag very useful in gaining more wort at the end of the boil, I just get a bit of rod across the top of the pot to hold the hop bags up off the element.


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## Bongchitis (25/3/12)

SJW said:


> Good point there mate. Since buying the BM I have been chilling down to pitching temps so there would be a lot of cold break, and maybe if I did not chill so low there would be less trub. But being the first bew for a Wyest pack I like to make it clean as possible as I will split and save the yeast cake.
> 
> Steve



Cheers mate, thanks for clearing that up... makes sense now. I no chill and leave to settle for 30 min post whirlpool so my trub is sans cold break and well settled. I transfer in the mid 80's.

I was getting antsy also about these really high brewhouse efficiency too. I get 70% true brewhouse eff (65% for high OG or hops), all trub losses etc (eg. 21L @ 1050 in cube ) and thought it was a little low compared to you guys. Now I realise I am measuring differently.


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## doon (25/3/12)

Ah makes sense seamad!


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