90 Min Mash.

[Brown_hound]

G'day guys..

Please forgive my ignorance/lack of education...

I've just been trolling for the above info, and can't seem to find any..


Last BIAB, my %eff was dead set shocking.. I sparged and mashed out etc.

Was just wondering if it has anything to do with my doing a 60min mash?

I did a High gravity wort a'la Nick JD's Stovetop (at 40lt) and got much lower efficiency than I previously have.


Just looking back through his tutorial for the Aussie Lager I notice he suggested a 90min mash..


Is this the norm for such high grain to water ratios?

Cheers in advance.

Hound

 

[beerbog]

G'day guys..

Please forgive my ignorance/lack of education...

I've just been trolling for the above info, and can't seem to find any..


Last BIAB, my %eff was dead set shocking.. I sparged and mashed out etc.

Was just wondering if it has anything to do with my doing a 60min mash?

I did a High gravity wort a'la Nick JD's Stovetop (at 40lt) and got much lower efficiency than I previously have.


Just looking back through his tutorial for the Aussie Lager I notice he suggested a 90min mash..


Is this the norm for such high grain to water ratios?

Cheers in advance.

Hound

Hound, the conversion mostly takes place within the first 20 mins of the mash, so no, a 90 min mash isn't required.

First try playing with the extract figures in your brewing software. Mine were out for a JW pilsner malt so I changed it. ( only had to add a little bit more to get efficiencies in).

Also try grinding the grain finer. This can improve efficiency by allowing more solubles available for conversion.

I don't sparge, I just give the bag a good squeeze to get the required boil volume and my efficiency is pretty much running at 75%.

My water ratio is anywhere between 5 - 7 litre per kg, depending on whether I cube or chill.

Good luck, hope some of this helps. :beerbang:

 

[cdbrown]

A longer mash can help if the grains aren't finely crushed - according to Jamil and Palmer. If the temp was low a longer mash also helps.

Did you do anything different than increase the amount of grain? What was the efficiency compared to normal?

 

[Brown_hound]

Hound, the conversion mostly takes place within the first 20 mins of the mash, so no, a 90 min mash isn't required.

First try playing with the extract figures in your brewing software. Mine were out for a JW pilsner malt so I changed it.

Also try grinding the grain finer. This can improve efficiency by allowing more solubles available for conversion.

I don't sparge, I just give the bag a good squeeze to get the required boil volume and my efficiency is pretty much running at 75%.

My water ratio is anywhere between 5 - 7 litre per kg, depending on whether I cube or chill.

Good luck, hope some of this helps. :beerbang:

Cheers for the quick responses fellas..

Re: JW Export Pilsener malt? Where would I find the info to tweak its potentials? Linky?

Have been using the coffee grinder for the grain, so crush size isn't an issue..

A longer mash can help if the grains aren't finely crushed - according to Jamil and Palmer. If the temp was low a longer mash also helps.

Did you do anything different than increase the amount of grain? What was the efficiency compared to normal?

As to Gibbo's quote above, my water to grain ratio is well off according to his numbers.

I believe when I was doing BIAB in my 19lt pot it was approximately 12-13lt of water to 5kg of grain, then dunk sparged/topped up
This time round I did about 10kg of grain in 29-30lt of water, Dunk sparged(x2), then topped up... So ratio wise it's pretty similar.

19lt pot I was getting about 74-75%, and 40lt I got 59-60%.....

Other than that I cant really think of much else I did differently- albeit on a larger and proportionate scale.

Weak..

 

[beerdrinkingbob]

I do the high grav boils too and from what i have read and witnessed you can expect drops in efficiency. Great job on the 75%+ when you where doing it in the 19 ltr pot.

Personal from my experience the only time i hit 75% was when i mashed a 70 and created a heap of unfermentable wort, think that one stopped at 1.024. I hover around 65% to 70% consistently but the most popular number these days is 68% after 15 AG brews with this method.

Summation - you should get you 75% if you do single batches but once you get to double territory you will start to see some drops in my experience.


EDIT: I'm talking fermentor efficiency not boil or pre boil, not sure if others are talking the same

 

[Acasta]

19lt pot I was getting about 74-75%, and 40lt I got 59-60%.....

Are you taking your efficiency as in fermenter or pre-boil?

Because i on my last batch, mash efficiency was 85% but into fermenter eff was only about 70%. As there are losses to break and cooling, you may find that with a larger grain bill you have more losses, and this is whats causing your efficiency drop. It also depends on what you add into your fermenter. If you add all the break your numbers will look better, however the break will settle and you have more fermenter losses.

 

[Brown_hound]

Are you taking your efficiency as in fermenter or pre-boil?

Because i on my last batch, mash efficiency was 85% but into fermenter eff was only about 70%. As there are losses to break and cooling, you may find that with a larger grain bill you have more losses, and this is whats causing your efficiency drop. It also depends on what you add into your fermenter. If you add all the break your numbers will look better, however the break will settle and you have more fermenter losses.

G'day guys and thanks again..

Yeah, I'm talking losses of wort into fermentor post boil (excluding break)

Back to up the top for a second fellas...

Just curious where I could get some pretty solid info on the specs of grain... And what is fine/coarse difference in Beersmith? I'm figuring it's pretty important as I use a grinder?

Cheers..

 

[Hatchy]

The shop you buy the grain from should be able to give you the specs for it.

 

[Acasta]

Just curious where I could get some pretty solid info on the specs of grain... And what is fine/coarse difference in Beersmith? I'm figuring it's pretty important as I use a grinder?

Just check out the maltsters themselves, or your LHBS where you get them should carry the info. There also some profiles for some malts you can load into beermsmith.

http://www.beersmith.com/support.htm Have a look down the right side near the bottom you'll see some of the things i was talking about.

Not too sure about the course/fine thing, however i've read that using a grinder and having a finer crush or grind will improve eff. I've gone from a coffee grinder to a crankandstien mill and havn't noticed much of a change, in fact im probably getting more efficiency into fermenter because i have less trub.

 

[Brown_hound]

Just check out the maltsters themselves, or your LHBS where you get them should carry the info. There also some profiles for some malts you can load into beermsmith.

http://www.beersmith.com/support.htm Have a look down the right side near the bottom you'll see some of the things i was talking about.

Not too sure about the course/fine thing, however i've read that using a grinder and having a finer crush or grind will improve eff. I've gone from a coffee grinder to a crankandstien mill and havn't noticed much of a change, in fact im probably getting more efficiency into fermenter because i have less trub.

Epic Acasta!

Up until now I've been manually entering all my grain into BS...

Funny that I downloaded the damn thing from the top of the page, and all the stuff I needed was down the bottom..

Dead set brilliant.

Thanks again, all of you guys.. As per always, a great help.


Hound

 

[Acasta]

haha NP mate, glad to help.
If your having troubles with the efficiences and trub check out this thread. I went through similar problems.

http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...showtopic=49930

 

[HoppingMad]

Have been using the coffee grinder for the grain

Would have thought a better mill than a grinder would definately improve your efficiency.

Spoken to commercial brewers whose livelihoods depend on extracting as much as they can - they get the best mill to get the highest they can - so I dunno about discounting this.

Grinders chop husk, creating problems with filtering on the grain bed, adding haze and flour to your brew and with some grains can add astringencies when the husk is chopped up. Grinders can also add to risks of increased stuck sparges with grains like wheat. But we all start somewhere. Ask experienced AHB members like Manticle about the difference a mill made to his brewing when he upgraded from a coffee grinder and he'll set you straight. Things improved for him out of sight judging by what he's posted on this forum.

A new mill in due course IMHO will definately improve your brews, and your efficiency. Plenty of info on this on AHB and in texts. But everyone brews different, so good luck with it.

Hopper.

 

[Nick JD]

All other things being equal (same gear, same recipe ... but with LHBS milled grain rather than my usual coffee grinder stuff) I lost 6% efficiency into the kettle.

YMMV.

 

[beerbrewer76543]

It seems to make more sense to talk about efficiency into the kettle rather than fermenter as there are no losses into the kettle. That way you are measuring the true extract of sugar from the mash process and it is common across all systems

 

[Thirsty Boy]

If you insist on trying to lever so much volume out of such a small pot, then your efficiency will almolst certainly suck testes. Especially if you are trying to do it via BIAB.

The 90 min mash might (probably will) help, stirring the mash a few times while its mashing might help, stirring while you ramp up to mashout might help, dont "top up" sparging more more might help - getting gear that is appropriately sized for making the amount of beer you are trying to make - will help.

BTW - coarse-fine difference is a spec that tells you about how well modified the malt is, it has basically nothing to do with how you can expect the malt to perform depending on whether you personally crushed coarsley or finely.

 

[Hatchy]

Apologies for the off topic but I don't have a coffee grinder, could I use my barley crusher to grind coffee beans? Would I get decent efficiency from my coffee beans or should I buy a jar of blend 43? Even more off topic, what happened to the 1st 42 blends & what made the people at nescafe think that blend 43 is OK coffee?

 

[felten]

Even further OT, the story I always heard was its a blend of the scraps from 43 other coffees, delicious.

 

[Brown_hound]

Would have thought a better mill than a grinder would definately improve your efficiency.

Spoken to commercial brewers whose livelihoods depend on extracting as much as they can - they get the best mill to get the highest they can - so I dunno about discounting this.

Grinders chop husk, creating problems with filtering on the grain bed, adding haze and flour to your brew and with some grains can add astringencies when the husk is chopped up. Grinders can also add to risks of increased stuck sparges with grains like wheat. But we all start somewhere. Ask experienced AHB members like Manticle about the difference a mill made to his brewing when he upgraded from a coffee grinder and he'll set you straight. Things improved for him out of sight judging by what he's posted on this forum.

A new mill in due course IMHO will definately improve your brews, and your efficiency. Plenty of info on this on AHB and in texts. But everyone brews different, so good luck with it.

Hopper.

Cheers Hopper,

Definitely the ultimate goal is to get a mill.. Will ask Manticle also- f**k that bloke knows his shit.

Just scraping together some cash money farkin'... Gotta slip it slyly past the missus also.. Money better spent on shoes in her opinion...

Apologies for the off topic but I don't have a coffee grinder, could I use my barley crusher to grind coffee beans? Would I get decent efficiency from my coffee beans or should I buy a jar of blend 43? Even more off topic, what happened to the 1st 42 blends & what made the people at nescafe think that blend 43 is OK coffee?

Back on topic, would I need to crush/grind the Blend 43? Know where I could find some instant beer powder?

 

[MHB]

Fine grind is like talcum powder, even coarse (for the test) is probably finer than most of us mash with, the malt specification that we need is CGAI (Coarse Grind As Is). What we usually get is FD (Fine Dry), Moisture and Coarse Fine difference (if this over 1%, seriously consider a protein rest).
If FD was 80%, moisture was 4% and C/F was 1% the CGAI would be 80-4-1 = 75%.
If you mashed 1Kg and got 750g into solution you are getting 100% efficiency

IIRC 43 beans was how many beans it took to make a cup, never sat down and weighed the beans, just a double dip into the 2 shot basket..
MHB

 

[beerbrewer76543]

Cheers Hopper,
Know where I could find some instant beer powder?

Were 2 buy k thnx