Finally Ag

[jakub76]

After dabbling in extract brewing on/off since I was 16 I've finally gone All Grain.

I've been collecting bits and pieces over time and I originally tried BIAG, inspired by Nick JD. My recipe was an ambitious Kolsch and my fermentation temperatures got all messed up. It's sour, fruity and feels powdery, not a triumph - but no pictures means it never happened right?

On to my FIRST AG brew

I used my stove to prepare strike and sparge water as it's easy and saves gas. I made my mash tun out of an old esky and some plumbing bits from Bunnings. Vinnies and Salvos sometimes have eskies but they sell very quickly I must have called 30 thrift shops around Sydney before an old esky turned up on ebay for $29. I was inspired by this link but mine's simpler/cheaper. Instead of getting a " nipple, I got a 6" length of threaded " pipe that I cut down to size with a hack-saw. This meant I could use a couple of washers and some homebrewed rubber gaskets to lock the fitting in place. Being a 57litre esky the drain hole is quite high, it leaves around 5 litres of space below the drain hole. I tilted the esky for lautering, not sure how that effects my efficiency.

 

[jakub76]

I'm making Parvenu Blonde, a recipe I mashed together from a little research.

http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum//ind...amp;recipe=1025

OKI added 13 litres of strike water at 72 degrees, added grain and stirred. Mash temp was too high, 70 so left the lid open and continued stirring for 5 minutes while temp edged down to 66. Closed lid and mashed at 66 degrees for 60 minutes. I forgot to take a temp after the 60 minute mash but my test run with water the previous day showed that I lose 1 degree over the hour.

Added 4 litres of boiling water to mash out. Tilted esky mash tun and anchored with a brick and clamp. Lautered into kettle, (best price I could find was 40lt aluminium stock pot - $85 from www.allquip.com.au)

I began fly sparging with 75 degree water siphoned from a 15lt stock pot. Ran water onto alfoil so as not to disturb the grain bed. Continued sparge until runoff SG was 1.000 at 70 degrees. Added remaining 3 or so litres from the HLT into the water already in the mash tun and did a batch sparge stirred thoroughly and recirculated run-off until clear (1 litre). Continued sparge with SG reading 1.010 at 70 degrees. I took 500ml of the wort and added a tsp of sugar for a yeast starter, cooled to 22 and pitched yeast.

 

[jakub76]

At this stage I fired up the burner under the kettle while the last few litres of wort trickled in.

Pre-boil SG 1.039.

It took my 2-ring burner around an hour to bring the wort from 70ish degrees to a boil. Skimmed hot break then bagged and added my bittering hops. Jiggled and stirred for 50 minutes until my flavour hop addition (also into bag).







60 minutes after 1^st addition I added the final, aroma hops pellets straight into the wort, fished the hop bag out and gave it a squeeze. I placed the lid on then cut the flame after 30 seconds. I secured the lid, sprayed some idophore around and left it to cool for 1 hour.

Post boil SG was 1.047. According to BrewPal that's 65% efficiency.

Into cool bath, changed water after an hour and added ice bottles, down to 25 degrees in around 2.5 hours total. Strained through voile into fermenter, aerated with paddle and pitched yeast starter.



Placed in brew fridge set for 17 degrees with sensor taped to the fermenter insulated by cardboard.

 

[jakub76]

The temperature controller was an absolute bargain on ebay, $35 delivered. www.tinyurl.com/y9g9cqo or search ebay for Mini Digital Temperature Controller Thermostat Aquarium (no affiliation).


It has a heating and cooling circuit, Wagners Electric Services on Liverpool Rd, Ashfield in Sydney have these small, black, housing boxes for $2, some basic drilling, filing and two extension cords later - hey presto, temperature controlled fermenting for under $50!



Ferment at 17 degrees for 9 days. Diacetyl rest at 22 degrees for 2 days. Bottle and store at 17 degrees for 4 days. Cold condition if you're patient, I'm not.

I Ended up with 20 litres, partly because of a spill while transferring to fermenter. My 65% efficiency seems quite low, any ideas how I can improve that figure?

Thanks for all of the great info and ideas that everyone puts into this site. This thread is my first post but I have found HEAPS of useful info on this site reading everyone else's.

Cheers.

 

[Flash_DG]

Wow Nice job there mate : D
Put my first brew day to shame
Love the vertical elevation device for the HLT btw

 

[raven19]

My 65% efficiency seems quite low, any ideas how I can improve that figure?

I only hit around 70% after 20 odd AG brews.

Grain crush, temps, sparging all have an effect.

At 65% for brew #1, I would not worry and just continue to brew with good control.

Congrats, great setup. :icon_cheers:

 

[hefevice]

Nice work, and congratulations!

Should be able to easily improve your efficiency with an improved manifold design in your mash tun. The single SS braid is better suited to batch rather than fly sparging. You need to be collecting the wort over a wider area to reduce channelling of the wort and to minimise the volume that is not being effectively drained of sugars. John Palmer has a good discussion in the web version of How to Brew which can be found here.

If you don't feel like building another manifold, then try batch sparging. There is a heap of information on the Interwebs about this topic, just google "guide to batch sparging". This should get your efficiency up to between 70 and 75% (possibly even better). Final word on efficiency is if you are over around 70%, consistency (i.e. achieving the same efficiency each time) is more important than how high the number is.

 

[browndog]

My 65% efficiency seems quite low, any ideas how I can improve that figure?


As Hefevice said your system is better suited to batch sparging rather than fly. I use a double sparge method like this, drain mash tun, add 1/2 the sparge water (90C) give it a good stir and recirculate untill the bits of grain have gone then drain to the kettle, fillthe tun with the remaining sparge water, stir, recirculate and drain again. You should be able to bump your efficiency to 75% or greater with this method. Beersmith has all the batch sparging profiles and once you have your system dialled into it correctly, it will give you the exact amounts of water for your given preboil volume.

cheers

Browndog

 

[jakub76]

OK Thanks Hefevice and Browndog - I'll do a batch sparge next time.
I've read about collecting unwanted tannins and astringency from disturbing the grain bed too much or from squeezing your grain bag when doing partials.
Would a double batch sparge risk more astringency?

 

[glaab]

nice job bloke! I dunno about upping your efficiency but if you put a short piece of copper tube inside the MT from the bottom up to your fitting it should syphon the tun empty. I read in another thread where some are putting a length of slotted copper inside the braid to prevent it collapsing under the weight of the grist. Dunno if that would help efficeincy at all but it would be easy enough and if you don;t begin the slots until after the bend down to the floor of the MT you'll kill 2birds with one stone. Cheers

 

[browndog]

OK Thanks Hefevice and Browndog - I'll do a batch sparge next time.
I've read about collecting unwanted tannins and astringency from disturbing the grain bed too much or from squeezing your grain bag when doing partials.
Would a double batch sparge risk more astringency?

Can't say it has ever caused me any astringency problems.

 

[jakub76]

Thanks Glaab, short inner tube sounds like a great solution.
Browndog, if you're not getting any added astringency from a double sparge then I guess my concern is unfoundered. I'd be stoked to improve my efficiency by that much, I'll give it a red hot go.

 

[manticle]

I would have thought a better manifold (so the wort is draining from several places rather than one point) would help as suggested.

Nice job and nice interpretation of gravity system.

 

[browndog]

I would have thought a better manifold (so the wort is draining from several places rather than one point) would help as suggested.

Nice job and nice interpretation of gravity system.

If you are batch sparging it won't matter as you wash the sugars out when stiring. If he was getting very slow or stuck sparges it would be another matter.

 

[manticle]

If you are batch sparging it won't matter as you wash the sugars out when stiring. If he was getting very slow or stuck sparges it would be another matter.

Ok.
Good to know.
Cheers.

 

[Nick JD]

It's easier to buy cheaper grain than to increase efficiency.

 

[manticle]

It's easier to buy cheaper grain than to increase efficiency.

That's not really much of a solution. What about situations where you want to brew a bigger beer and need all the room in the tun you can get?
What if you have a preference for using weyerman's or another more expensive malt?
What about the idea of generating avaoidable waste?
What if you grind everything by hand and wish to reduce the amount of work for yourself?

Nothing wrong with wanting to get more out of your ingredients. I wouldn't just buy more cheap oranges to get more juice - I'd buy good oranges and learn to squeeze them better.

It's also not necessarily easier - there are some simple things you can do to increase efficiency that are possibly easier than incorporating an extra kg of grain into your recipe. Hot sparge water temps, batch sparging in this instance as suggested etc, etc.