Efficiency

[mattyh77]

So I have been doing a bit of reading lately in preparation for getting my Robobrew for my 40th.

I was reading up on the differences between the efficiency types, being mashing and brewhouse (or total). I have Beersmith as my recipe guide and it uses brewhouse efficiency. Obviously I cant set mine yet as I dont know it, but I heard around 75%. Anyone know better?

My question is, when people on here talk about efficiency, are they talking mashing or brewhouse?

 

[Danscraftbeer]

Stick with Beersmith default settings (72% BH Efficiency). Trust them to be an average and then see the results of your brew.
Don't worry about measuring mash efficiency its very vulnerable to misreading's.

 

[Jack of all biers]

I'm not sure I agree that mash efficiency is particularly vulnerable to misreadings. If the volumes are measured and calculated correctly as well as the gravity readings it is just as accurate as any other measure of efficiency.

To the OP, most people talk about efficiency with their own understanding of what they mean without expressing which they are talking about, or at least that seems to be my reading of many posts over time. I personally don't bother with Brewhouse efficiency, seeing it as something more for commercial bean counters. It has it's place for consistently achieving a volume of product, but can only be improved by brewing a few batches and tweaking your system to lose less. Mash efficiency (or conversion efficiency) is also similar, but I do bother to calculate as it gives me an understanding of how well I have extracted sugars at different temps and pH values, so I can later achieve similar results (consistency again).

Have a look at Braukaiser's wiki on Efficiency here for a better understanding.

Edit - Note Braukaiser takes the German version of Brewhouse efficiency as essentially conversion efficiency plus lauter efficiency and some (including myself) understand Brewhouse efficiency to have the meaning as defined in Brewers friend which is;

Brew House Efficiency - An all inclusive measure of efficiency, which counts all losses to the fermentor. This can be thought of as 'to the fermentor' efficiency. Hops absorption factors into this, and is reduced on the same equipment by ~1% in super hoppy beers.
Gravity - OG (measured after cooling, before pitching yeast).
Volume - how much wort went into the fermentor.

 

[mattyh77]

Thanks Jack. That's the article I was reading for definitions.
I guess my first few I'll measure both so I can have the right input into Beersmith.
Then just work out mash efficiency after that.

 

[Danscraftbeer]

I'm not sure I agree that mash efficiency is particularly vulnerable to misreadings. If the volumes are measured and calculated correctly as well as the gravity readings it is just as accurate as any other measure of efficiency.

Maybe if you have full circulation set up. I don't.
The problem in my experience is that you cant get a reliable measurement of pre boil gravity.
Its so hard to stir or whatever to fully mix the new malt wort to get a reliable reading. Given it is so hard then why bother?
Brew house efficiency, (end result) is all that matters in the end so that is all you should worry about.
2c.

 

[Jack of all biers]

stir the kettle from bottom to top gently for a bit then run some out of the kettle tap (if you have one), I find a couple of litres will do it. Return and stir some more, then take your gravity sample. That's my method, but others wait until the kettle begins the boil then take the sample straight after boil has commenced, which allows the boil action to mix the possible stratification layers. It's really not that hard.

I don't have a full circulation set up and rely on gravity to get the wort into kettle then the tiniest bit of elbow grease to mix the wort for a reliable sample, as described above.

 

[Danscraftbeer]

I have tried very hard as above. 15minutes boiled and stirred hard I finally got a reading as it should be. That's the point maybe.
Its far too hard to finally get a reading that you should expect in the first place..
Just saying that the expected mash efficiency isn't worth the trouble of testing to confirm what can be expected with consistency.

 

[Jack of all biers]

If that's your situation, that's a pain and I see your point. The only thing is that in the brewing process, or processes, mash efficiency is one that can have the greatest effect on overall brewhouse efficiency, as most of the other factors such as evaporation, trub losses, hop losses, dead space losses, spillage losses etc can easily be measured and predicted. If the mash efficiency is out, then many factors could be at play and may need attention. With only brewhouse efficiency taken into account, one knows the OG, FG and total volumes, but will have to back track through the process to find were the losses occurred (or didn't occur). Hope I make sense early this morning.

Anyway, horses and courses and nothing wrong with not measuring or calculating any of the efficiencies, as they are all about achieving consistency or improving process. If you have that achieved, then it won't tell you much other than the occasions you miss a step or forget something, which won't help much at the end of the process anyway.

My 2c.

EDIT - spelling. What, it's early -_-

 

[MHB]

Agree with JOAB, measuring at all the steps in the process lets you identify where losses are and if you wish, to take remedial action.
It may, to home brewers not matter much in terms of dollars and cents, but improving your efficiency by 10% would mean every tenth grain bill was free. Assuming that it isn't at the price of beer quality, nothing wrong with saving money where you can.

Pursuing efficiency for its own sake can be a bit of a trap, in that if you go too far you can reduce the beer quality by over extracting the malt, you can end up with too much sweet water and having to boil for too long or very intensively. Energy is often more expensive than malt.
Understand efficiency and using the information it gives us can be of both cost and quality benefit - but you need good information to base decisions on.
Mark

 

[Blind Dog]

start at the beersmith default, making sure you understand what it's actually measuring. Then measure your own (I find pre boil and post boil the most useful, but measure all the way to the keg/bottle as well) and dial it in. It is really useful to keep good records to improve consistency and also to spot some issues as they arise.

 

[mattyh77]

Thanks for all the great reading.