Braumeister NEXTGEN Build

[QldKev]

On my 3V I let Beersmith do the maths for me, and just dial it up so I'm just shy on my pre-boil water level. It's easy to add 1/2 a litre, than to remove it.

There is a another way to adjust water for differing grain bills. On my 1V upfront say I don't give a f.... I have three marks 32, 29 and 25. I don't adjust water levels to suit grain bills. Strike 32L, mash etc.. Remove the BIAB, drain for a sec into the kettle and drop the bag into a bucket. Check my vols. On a smaller grain bill I will be already at 29L, on bigger ones I will need to pour some drainings from the bucket back into the kettle; on really big grain bills I may need to sparge the bag a little to get more vol from the bucket, to achieve my 29L level. From here on our the 60min boil from 29 to 25 is all constant.

If you are BIAB'ing brewing bigger beers in a small vessel and are having issues with the vol of strike water plus grain, just leave some water out up front. Add it as part of a sparge routine. Back when I use to traditional BIAB I always allowed a 3L sparge water addition.

QldKev

 

[stux]

Grain displaces about 0.7L/KG when wet

Grain really absorbs about 1.56L/Kg, but contributes about 800g of extract/KG, which itself displaces about 309ml, which means an apparent absorption of about 1L/Kg (depending on gravity of wort)

Crusty. There is an efficiency drop. If you sparged you'd get closer to 90% efficiency

Of course at normal gravities it's not worth the bother with BIAB because efficiencies are pretty good with full volume no sparge

 

[Malted]

Nice post Malted but really curious as to why you think not sparging effects efficiency.

Simple Crusty, sparging extracts extra sugars that you would otherwise leave behind. Boil off the extra liquid that you introduced and the resultant wort has more sugars in it than had you not sparged. In your case you don't need extra sugars.

I am not commenting from the comment that you commented on, that my comment was that it is unique to BIAB. Sparging on any system will increase efficiency of extract extraction.

Crusty. There is an efficiency drop. If you sparged you'd get closer to 90% efficiency
Of course at normal gravities it's not worth the bother with BIAB because efficiencies are pretty good with full volume no sparge

 

[lael]

So, basically, you can work out a pre-boil volume you need. And then you can work out if your pre-boil volume you'll actually get will exceed that. If it will then your BM's volumes aren't practical.

As I mentioned before, you can work out the volumes/sparges etc for a low-range, mid-range, high-range beer.

You BM's dimensions need to be such that you'll be able to accomplish what you want, which means ending up with a pre-boil volume <= the pre-boil volume that you need.

As the gravity of your wort increases, the loss to absorption becomes more significant (higher gravity losses), and most likely a high percentage of the total (more grain less wort), which is why efficiency drops as you go up. Sparging helps to recover this loss, but dilutes the wort!

thanks ekad and stux! - this is very helpful! I now understand why / how high-gravity is less efficient!

so - pre-boil volume basically can be lower, but can't be higher. It's easy to fix low pre-boil by sparging / adding water (which will affect gravity as mashing pulls out more sugars than sparging), but if you are higher - boiling longer is a bad solution.

Therefore - if you can't hit pre-boil or lower with the malt pipe design - back to the drawing board.

ok, so qualifies as low / med / high?

low ?

med 1040 - 1060?

high 1060+?

 

[lael]

You have a limited gravity and volume range, outside of these are not as easy as with other systems. The system is optimal when used inside these ranges but you need to do things differently outside of the ranges. There are other restrictions but for most brews minimum water level and maximum amount of grain are the main limiting factors (but that is specifically thinking in regards to big beers - aka high gravity beers). Other factors migh include things like: say you do an 80% wheat beer or use >20% rye, these mashes can get stuck (i.e. they gloop up that much that the pump is unable to push the wort through them, then you get burnt stuff on the elements and nasty results like that). In this case you may need to add rice hulls to bulk the grist out (it is like fibre in your diet, generally it has little nutritional value but more of it makes your poo runnier :lol: ). Extra rice hulls can mean less space for grain which can mean lower potential gravity of the wort.

would a more powerful pump help deal with this issue? and does wort scorching occur even with low watt density elements?

Yes some BIAB chaps put the full volume into their pot and dunk the grain into it and do not sparge. That is, they start with enough water to account for the total losses through the whole process to achive their desired volume into the fermenter. Since they don't sparge and thus reduce efficiency, they have to add some extra grain to achieve their desired gravity of the desired volume. It takes a little bit to calculate it (but no more than planning any other style of brewing) but has the advantage of being a simple and easy brewday.

How much sparge water. You can calculate your theoretical or expected losses but the best way is to start from there and measure everything to fine tune those predictions for subsequent brewing. Measure how much water you start with (always), measure how much is still in there when you pull the grain out, measure how much you sparge with, measure how much is in the kettle pre-boil, measure how much is in the kettle post boil, measure how much trub is left in the kettle when you have drained off to your cube or fermenter (easy to do but a lot of foilks don't do this), measure how much is in the fermenter, measure how much yeast and gunk is left in the fermenter after you rack to a keg or bottle it. Measure measure measure to determine your expected values for future, then expect them to vary slightly. Boil off/evaporation rates can vary, grain absoption rates can vary, more flour in the grist will probably mean more kettle trub (and thus greater volume losses), a crap load of hops will soak up some of the wort and lead to greater losses, different strains of yeast can mean less or more finished beer, lots of dry hops in the fermenter will soak up some beer; ergo the volume of finished beer can vary from batch to batch. An easy safe gaurd on the hot side is to do an extra sparge of the malt pipe over a bucket and hold that liquid to near the end of the boil and add it if neccessary to reach the desired post boil volume.

are there any guidelines on how much sparge water is required to effectively extract sufficient sugars from a 'single' or 'double' sugars? Does anyone sparge over a bucket and then pass the sparged water through the grain again to pull more sugar out? (would it be worth the effort?)

Buy another pot and cut it down - by all means! That's the difference between the 'short' malt pipe and the regular malt pipe in the 50L Braumeister. Diameter and design is exactly the same, only the height varies.

Given sufficient insulation and a lid and you are able to reduce energy loss, I'd suggest that perhaps 2400w might bring 40L to the boil (but I suspect not) but would be painfully slow if it did. However, there are a few reasons why you would not want a full lid on during the boil. Yep plenty of folks throw an over the side immersion element into the fray. Bare in mind a lot of the cheap ones burn out and are dangerous. Get a good one if you do that.

I'm going to run some more numbers - it seems like the key is finding a size of pots/ malt pipes that allow flexibility. Ideal (I'm guessing for me) would be to find a pot 35dia 45 height that could then be used (bought three times and cut to suit height) for different batch sizes.

Are you starting to understand why such a project is easier for seasoned AG brewers to get their heads around it? Go to someones brewday, watch them brew an all grain beer. Seeing is learning. Keep asking questions, we might just get you through it. :super:

definitely! thanks for the help! I think I'm starting to get my head around the parameters to make it work.

Malted was focussed on the spreadsheet and did not mention loss to grain absorbtion (even though it was in his head with regards to how much he needs to sparge). He should have mentioned it. The other posters after his explained it.

To go over it again: grain goes in water, grain comes out of water, grain keeps some of the water, you now have less water in the pot. Even if you squeeze the grain, it will still keep some water. Some folks think it is ok to squeeze the grain, some think it is not ok. You might get more liquid out of it by squeezing but it might be cloudy and lead to more trub in the kettle and thus lower volume of wort produced, so you may not gain anything by squeezing, maybe you will have more sugars, maybe you won't.

Thanks again everyone for all the help - super appreciative!

 

[Malted]

Can I check here - I think I understand, but want to be sure - you aren't saying you add 3 Litres to compensate for the grain - you are saying that the grain volume increases the total fluid volume in the system by 3 Litres?


ok - so can i confirm - you put the pre-boil volume in as the strike water, you lose some to grain absorption, then you replace it during sparge to get back to pre-boil volume? Thanks for the numbers - very helpful.

Yes that seems to be correct. I think he is saying that the grain displaces a volume of water. This is important because you don't want things to overflow. You need to think about total volumes when sizing pots.
However, the grain soaks up some of the water too, how much is soaked up and how much is displaced is explained by Stux. I still am not sure of the numbers.



For BIAB and 3V systems that could be the process and that is the basic principle of it; but it is not that simple for a BM or clone. I do not put the preboil volume in as strike water, I have to add some water at err umm, preboil .

For a BM or clone where you are targeting a particular bottling volume (eg 50L of finished beer from a 50L BM), the preboil volume may include amounts to compensate for grain absorption, boiling evaporation, cooling loss [it is not an actual loss but is a volumetric loss], loss to kettle trub, loss to yeast/trub in fermenter etc. I can not physically put this amount of water in as strike water as it would drown the malt pipe. Some folks have a way around this but that might be digressing too far atm.

For example, for a 50L bottling volume, I might mash in 53L of strike water but the total water needed is in the order of 73L (to account for all losses). The 50L BM pot has a total volume of about 80L so if I had a strike volume of 73L, I would go close to overflowing (accounting for displacement) and would drown the malt pipe. Therefore my strike water volume is less than the preboil volume, ergo I have to add extra water to reach desired preboil volumes and if I do not add this as sparge water then I am just wasting sugars.

After the mash, when I take the grain out that reduces the volume in the BM becase the grain is not displacing anything and they stole some of my wort due to absorption, this then gives me more space for the sparge water and when added I am then up to my preboil volume (which is not 73L but about 66L).

I might then lose 10L to evap during the boil, 56L remains post boil. 2L by volume mysteriously vanishes somewhere during the process as the wort cools, theoretically 54L remains. I might lose 2L to kettle trub, 52L remains. I ferment that and lose 2L to yeast trub, I keg 50L of finished beer. I then get drunk every night and the missus calls me condescending (though I don't think that word is in her vocabulary but that is what she means) when I get yabbery after having moved onto the red wine after a few beers. These are not hard and fast numbers, they are approximates only. More than likely I would lose a greater amount to kettle and fermenter trub than that.

 

[MastersBrewery]

I then get drunk every night and the missus calls me condescending (though I don't think that word is in her vocabulary but that is what she means) when I get yabbery after having moved onto the red wine after a few beers. These are not hard and fast numbers, they are approximates only. More than likely I would lose a greater amount to kettle and fermenter trub than that.

not to mention if the missus gets nasty and pours said beer on ones head, further losses but predicting these accurately is as impossible as predicting her mood. h34r:

 

[lael]

ok - trying to be able to run pot - testing scenarios quicker and keep a record of what works and doesn't. Can I get a couple of you to look over this and see if it looks right as far as strike volumes / post mash / sparge etc please?

Its basically angus' spreadsheet in a different layout with further calcs to check strike vols etc.

View attachment Lael__s_Braumiser_Volume_ScenarioTester.xls

 

[Edak]

So when I went to KK this week I saw that they are going to start selling the Kaixin pump instead of their current version. This is a good re-assurance to the quality of the Kaixin pump. They said that the price would drop a little bit too. I compared both pumps and the only thing that was alike was the colour, otherwise completely different.

 

[bonj]

So when I went to KK this week I saw that they are going to start selling the Kaixin pump instead of their current version. This is a good re-assurance to the quality of the Kaixin pump. They said that the price would drop a little bit too. I compared both pumps and the only thing that was alike was the colour, otherwise completely different.

A reseller switching to a cheaper unit is by no means an assurance on quality.

 

[Edak]

A reseller switching to a cheaper unit is by no means an assurance on quality.

This I suppose is true, I still use the other pump (barb fitted one).

 

[angus_grant]

A reseller switching to a cheaper unit is by no means an assurance on quality.

he he, you took the words right out of my mouth.

 

[lael]

I'm thinking about buying a sheet of perforated stainless from metalmesh / m&s. Essentially it looks like two things. 1. 2mm thick stainless is more expensive - actually about the same price as 1.5mm but the sheet size is smaller. 2. stainless perforated sheet is just expensive. 1.5mm 2500x1250 or 2mm 2000x1000 both work out at just under $600. 2mm thick is about $580. With cutting i think it would be about 30 more. Is anyone interested in getting plates / sharing a section of the sheet? The companies I've spoken to have all said they don't have / do offcuts...

From my calcs you could get the following plus some small offcuts out of a
1.5mm sheet (sizes are assuming no cut width for the blade, so would be slightly smaller I would imagine). 6x350mm 12x200 4x450 2x 300x450
or
2mm sheet (again without blade losses). 2x450, 8x350, 4x300

I'm in Sydney - happy to travel / meet up to help people get them after cutting. Appx cost is num plates / sheet + cut cost. for 1.5mm it would be about $30ea, for 2mm it would be about $45-50 ea. (24 pieces vs 14 pieces per sheet). I need to double check the larger sheet size as it may have been 2440, in which case the costs for 1.5 would be higher. I'm leaning toward 2mm as people with 1.5 have commented it is perhaps not strong enough.

Thoughts?

 

[Malted]

I'm thinking about buying a sheet of perforated stainless from metalmesh / m&s. Essentially it looks like two things. 1. 2mm thick stainless is more expensive - actually about the same price as 1.5mm but the sheet size is smaller. 2. stainless perforated sheet is just expensive. 1.5mm 2500x1250 or 2mm 2000x1000 both work out at just under $600. 2mm thick is about $580. With cutting i think it would be about 30 more. Is anyone interested in getting plates / sharing a section of the sheet? The companies I've spoken to have all said they don't have / do offcuts...

From my calcs you could get the following plus some small offcuts out of a
1.5mm sheet (sizes are assuming no cut width for the blade, so would be slightly smaller I would imagine). 6x350mm 12x200 4x450 2x 300x450
or
2mm sheet (again without blade losses). 2x450, 8x350, 4x300

I'm in Sydney - happy to travel / meet up to help people get them after cutting. Appx cost is num plates / sheet + cut cost. for 1.5mm it would be about $30ea, for 2mm it would be about $45-50 ea. (24 pieces vs 14 pieces per sheet). I need to double check the larger sheet size as it may have been 2440, in which case the costs for 1.5 would be higher. I'm leaning toward 2mm as people with 1.5 have commented it is perhaps not strong enough.

Thoughts?

Some folks have bought thinner perf sheet (eg link http://australia.rs-online.com/web/c/abrasives-engineering-materials/mild-steel-tube-sheets-angles/perforated-steel-sheets/?searchTerm=perforated+sheet&sort-by=default&sort-order=default&applied-dimensions=4294881846&lastAttributeSelectedBlock=4294959273 but this looks too flimsy at 0.55mm thick) because it is available in smaller sheets and then have reinforced it with bracing bars to stop it flexing as much. I was going to go the same way as you. The smaller the holes, the thinner the sheet and vice versa - I just could not get thick enough sheet with fine holes and it seemed like too much effort so I just bought some 2mm plate, cut it myself and then drilled it out.

 

[MastersBrewery]

Some folks have bought thinner perf sheet (eg link http://australia.rs-online.com/web/c/abrasives-engineering-materials/mild-steel-tube-sheets-angles/perforated-steel-sheets/?searchTerm=perforated+sheet&sort-by=default&sort-order=default&applied-dimensions=4294881846&lastAttributeSelectedBlock=4294959273 but this looks too flimsy at 0.55mm thick) because it is available in smaller sheets and then have reinforced it with bracing bars to stop it flexing as much. I was going to go the same way as you. The smaller the holes, the thinner the sheet and vice versa - I just could not get thick enough sheet with fine holes and it seemed like too much effort so I just bought some 2mm plate, cut it myself and then drilled it out.

Hell! now thats devotion to the task, how long did it take to drill out and how many holes. :huh:

 

[Malted]

Hell! now thats devotion to the task, how long did it take to drill out and how many holes. :huh:

A very long time and two pilot drill bits. Deburring and polishing took almost as long. I didn't count the holes. Probably would not have attempted it if I didn't have a drill press.
I still have to do the other plate :unsure: but I know it will be worth it. I am using a Big W pot for the malt pipe; the buggers are slightly tapered so they can nest. This means that that the bottom plate has to have a slightly smaller diameter than the top plate.

The center tie-rod is a beauty. I am not using all thread rod, I got some SS rod and cut thread onto the ends of it. Likewise I got a 10mm section of 50mm round bar and cut a thread through it, instead of putting a washer on the inside of the outer pot.

ATM I am trying to juggle the pump, fittings, element ends and control box so I can decide where to drill the holes in the main pot. Oh and I still have not got the code flashed up to the controller because I have not got the upload process sorted out. It has been sitting for far too long because of competing priorities (read - the missus won't let me play in the shed for very long atm). I am getting antsy about it not being finished yet.

 

[matho]

ATM I am trying to juggle the pump, fittings, element ends and control box so I can decide where to drill the holes in the main pot. Oh and I still have not got the code flashed up to the controller because I have not got the upload process sorted out.

Malted if you need help loading the code, bonj or me can help, just let me know.

About the filter plates, you don't need very small holes if you are using a filter mesh as well, my top plate has slots over 1cm wide, it holds the mesh in place very well.

cheers steve

 

[angus_grant]

I am just going to use a cut-up BIAB sock on my top filter plate and see how that goes for the first few brews. I did buy some mesh off another user but it is slightly smaller than my top filter plate.

But will be able to fit that mesh to the bottom filter plate, which I haven't figured out yet. Will probably buy another grill plate like I already have and cut it down to fit.

 

[stux]

Jaybire in the US makes custom perf mesh false bottoms for kettles/mashtuns.

http://www.norcalbrewingsolutions.com/

A filter plate is very similar to a false bottom

 

[MastersBrewery]

Jaybire in the US makes custom perf mesh false bottoms for kettles/mashtuns.

http://www.norcalbrewingsolutions.com/

A filter plate is very similar to a false bottom

I noted this earlier in the thread, but @ $100 a plate it might be worth following Malted's meathod